3 big mistakes that are damaging your Pinterest growth 2024

Have you found yourself sitting in your workspace, happily creating your best Pinterest pins, and yet they don't get any re-pins, clicks, or attention!? 

Yeah, I think we can agree; sadly, we have all been there. 

When I first started out being a Pinterest manager, I kept thinking why my client's pins weren't performing like I wanted to or why isn't my own when I've put so much time into them? 

I kept changing and changing the designs when suddenly it occurred to me one day. Maybe the design aspect isn't the problem, but it's something else. 

I realised that "something else" was my Pinterest SEO. Mine and my client's pins at the time lacked the Pinterest keywords they needed. 

So after investing more time in Pinterest SEO, I noticed that my client's pins were getting 100+ clicks and a TON of engagement!

That's why today I'm going to show you the first 3 simple Pinterest SEO mistakes I made and how you can fix them, so your pins can start growing as you desire. 

1. No Pin Descriptions 

The first big mistake you're making is not putting your pin descriptions in your blog's images. 

I always recommend that anyone marketing their business on Pinterest add Pinterest pins to every blog post. This is because we want anyone reading your blog post to share what they have learnt with their Pinterest audience. 

But uploading it to your website isn't good enough. 

What you need to do is go wherever your "image alt text"* is on your pin image and then write a short pin description with at least 3 keywords of what your blog content is about. 

(Make sure to double-check your spelling. I use Grammarly to help me sort out any wrong words or missing punctuation, as I'm a quick typer. So if you're like me, I recommend you try it out).

And just like that, you've got an automatic pin description! So if anyone shares your images from your website, you have all your vital SEO in there.

*If you have Squarespace like me, you only need to double-tap the image and box like the one below should come up. 

2. No Pin Title

Next on the list of common SEO mistakes is your Pin title. It is vital to have a title for your pin. Otherwise, your pin will not be searchable on Pinterest. 

Not only that, but I, as a Pinterest strategist, get frustrated when I go on to Tailwind communities and I find the perfect pins but with no title. So when I want to share them, Tailwind doesn't let me because they have no title. 

So to save you from having un-sharable and un-searchable pins, you need to do the same as you did earlier.

Go to your pin image, but this time you need to go where it says "filename". So that is where you're going to put the title of your pin. 

If you have more than one pin image on your blog post, don't use the exact same title. Instead, try changing it up to contribute towards "fresh content", and the Pinterest algorithm will love you for it. 

If you want to know more about fresh content, check out this blog post here - How to Create 4 Pins in Under 5 Minutes

3. No keywords 

As you may have noticed earlier, I talked about keywords in your description.

But I want you to note that you need to be using Pinterest keywords, not Google keywords. After all, they’re both two different search engines. 

You want to add keywords to your title and your description for the ultimate optimisation. 

There are many ways to find Pinterest keywords, whether on or off Pinterest. One easy way of finding keywords by yourself is using the Pinterest search engine and finding keyword suggestions there or using the “trends” feature on Pinterest to help.

If you’re stuck or don’t want to go full DIY, then here are a few resources to help:

Yoast (only for WordPress users) 

Keysearch

Free Pinterest SEO Survival Guide 

Now that you know these 3 mistakes…

It’s time for you to start applying. Whether you have old blog posts or new blog posts, pin images or no pin images on your blog posts, now’s the time to change that.

Not only will these three SEO tricks boost the chances of your pins popularity on Pinterest, but they will also result in more web traffic. In addition, you might find they help add towards your SEO on your website.

This means Google might start favouring you too. 

Share me with your friends!