Pinterest is an amazing tool and a great way for people to find you over and over again. Cara Chace is here to share some basics about Pinterest and how it can give you more visibility in your organization.

In this episode you'll learn:

→ why Pinterest isn't a social media platform.
→ why Pinterest isn't just for food bloggers.
→ about the power of keywords.
→ who is on Pinterest.
→ what your website needs to be effective on Pinterest.

Want to skip ahead?  Here are some key takeaways:

[7:17] Pinterest is more of a search engine than a social media platform. It operates on keywords like Google and YouTube with the purpose of driving people to your website. This is different from social media in that it doesn't have an algorithim based off of engagement.
[14:21] If you're creating content for your audience then Pinterest can be a great way to repurpose it. You may have to be creative with what you're putting on Pinterest but it will be a great resource for people that are trying to find information. Your organization can provide that information and then create a way for them to dive deeper into your organization.
[15:00] Pay attention to the problem you solve. How can you come up with keywords that those people would be looking for. Use those when developing your Pinterest strategy.
[21:30] Pinterest has a worldwide audience. Still skews more towards women than men but all age group, even teens are using the platform.
[27:23] Make sure you claim your website with Pinterest and get the tracking code on your website so you know where people are landing and what content they love best. It's just as easy as putting your Google Analytics and/or Facebook Pixel on your website.

Resources

Online Fundraising Virtual Summit Waitlist
Free Pinterest Training

Full Transcript

[INTRO] Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of the digital marketing therapy podcast. I'm Sami, your host. And thank you so much for joining me. Now today we're going to talk about Pinterest. Now wait before you say, I don't need to listen to this one. I don't need to do Pinterest, Pinterest can't work for nonprofits, all the things, just another social media platform, I challenge you to listen to this episode, I'm joined by somebody that I've known in the business world for a very long time, Cara Chace, who's a Pinterest expert. And we're talking about kind of all of the top level things to consider when it comes to Pinterest and how you can maximize it and why it can be a really awesome long term strategy, and also why it can allow you to take the same content you've already created and repurpose it over and over and over and over again. So it can help get you off the content wheel. And it will also work nicely in in conjunction with your Google Ad grant, if that's something that your organization is running. If you don't know about the Google Ad grant, don't worry. We have an episode about that with Grant Hansel from Nonprofit Megaphone. I'll link that up in the show notes at thefirstclick.net/podcast.

Cara Chace is the creator of pin power method, a Pinterest marketing membership designed for online entrepreneurs. She started in social media in 2011 by managing 13 million fans across 17 social media accounts for a worldwide band. Since then, she has gone on to discover what makes a fantastic digital marketing strategy for online entrepreneurs. by teaching how Pinterest fits into that strategy and creating lots of lightbulb moments. She loves nothing more than helping fellow business owners except maybe a good book and one more cup of coffee.

So yes, definitely something she works on is Pinterest for online entrepreneurs. And you might be thinking to yourself, well, we're not online entrepreneurs, but you are. So when you're working and getting into the online space, getting more visibility for your organization, trying to diversify your donors and reaching out to your ideal donors. Pinterest is a great strategy for that and can be a really great tool in your toolbox. So I'm not saying this is something you have to add right now if you don't have time for it. But I definitely want you to listen to this episode so that it can marinate in your brain. Or if you've been thinking about adding Pinterest, I think you're going to get some great tools, some great feedback, and some great ideas for how to make this happen. Okay.

Before we get into this episode, it is brought to you by our guide nine ways to raise more money online. And this is just some ideas again, to get you into that online space, get you thinking about how you might continue to raise more money diversify, get more people in your in your donor journey, and just get people interacting with you so that you can reach out to them and solicit those monthly gifts or walk them up into larger donors. Okay. So you can get that guide by going to thefirstclick.net/fundraise. I hope you'll download it. It's totally free. And let me know which one are you thinking that you might start with first or which ones are you already doing that are having success for you? I'd love to hear. So again, that's the first click dotnet forward slash fundraise. But for now, let's get into the episode.

[CANNED INTRODUCTION] You're listening to the Digital Marketing Therapy Podcast. I'm your host, Sami Bedell-Mulhern. And each week, I bring you tips from myself and other experts, as well as hot seats with small business owners and entrepreneurs to demystify digital marketing and get you on your way to generating more leads and growing your business.You're listening to the digital marketing therapy podcast. I'm your host, Sami Bedell-Mulhern. And each week, I bring you tips from myself and other experts, as well as hot seats with small business owners and entrepreneurs to demystify digital marketing, and get you on your way to generating more leads and growing your business.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Well, Hey there everyone. Please join me in welcoming Cara Chace to the podcast. Cara, thank you for being here.

[CARA CHACE] Thank you so much for having me. I can't wait to chat.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah, we have been in the same circles and kind of known each other for several years now. And I have just it's you want getting you on the podcast is something I've wanted for a long time. So I'm so glad that you're here.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, we we have been in the same circles. So I'm glad we finally made it happen.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah. Okay, so we're here to talk about Pinterest today. And so before we kind of jump into some tactical actions and why nonprofits might want to think about Pinterest. Why is Pinterest your go to tool of choice?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, great questions. So when we first met each other, I believe I was still doing all social media and digital marketing. So I used to do all the social platforms, at least the ones that existed five years ago. No Tik Tok now. Tick Tock now clubhouse, um, and I built websites and did email marketing and blogging and just kind of everything under the digital marketing umbrella. And what I realized after two years in business when I actually looked at my analytics and stepped into that CEO role of Okay, what am I doing and what returns am I getting for what I'm doing with marketing, Pinterest was driving an insane amount of my traffic, my opt ins, my leads everything. It was somewhere around 80% Wow, my traffic was coming from Pinterest, and that was definitely one of those aha moments that we kind of all dream about where it's like, wow, I need to pay attention to this.

And so I started, you know, digging in and really educating myself and understanding how Pinterest worked and and what was working for me and why it was just performing. Like nothing else performed, and made the decision to niche into Pinterest in 2017. Wow, that's how long ago it's been. And it has been the best thing for my business and my clients. So yeah, I chose to focus on Pinterest, because I saw the results that I got me and my clients. And so I just went all in?

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Well, I want to call out, one thing that you said is you look at the data, and you realize what we're working really well. And you double down on this instead of trying to do all of the things because everybody says to do all of the things, right.

[CARA CHACE] And what I noticed in my business was I was working on an agency model where I had one to one clients that I was providing services for on a monthly retainer basis. And because I was doing everything, it was so hard, the busier I got to keep up on all the changes. And as we know, social media and digital marketing has evolved exponentially just in the last five or six years. So I felt like I didn't know enough about each platform to do it successfully for every client that wanted it. So it was kind of this like jack of all trades, master of none.

At some point in my business, because I was doing so well. I got so busy. You know, it's kind of funny. So, um, yeah, it it. The nice thing was is that I didn't have to dig very far. It was so obvious. I love it when that one. Yes, yes. So then it just became educating and going all in?

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah. Okay. So you mentioned that you were doing all the social media platforms. But I know that you have a very strong feeling about how Pinterest is not a social media platform. Can you talk a little bit about that? And kind of what the differences are there?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, absolutely. So this is a super common misperception that social media is included with our Pinterest is included with social media. And even Google Analytics kind of lumps it under their their social media stats, right? But the fact of the matter is social media. Those are content and engagement platforms. What Pinterest is, is a visual search engine. So it has far more in common with Google or YouTube than it does with Instagram, or Facebook. And the reason it's a search engine is because it functions on keywords. So whereas Instagram has hashtags and algorithms based on engagement, and conversation, and all of that kind of stuff. And we know Facebook has gone way off the deep end of algorithms, and all of that kind of stuff, right?

The reason Pinterest works so well is number one, it functions on keywords like any search engine, to show you the content that matches what you're searching for, and the problems you're trying to solve. But it's also one of the only platforms that's designed to get people to click through to your website. Yeah, so like Instagram, you have your one little link in your profile. Facebook, if you try and put up content, where it links off of Facebook, they'll suppress that reach, you know, a lot of these platforms want you to stay in their little bubble of their website in their in their platform. Pinterest is actually designed to get people to click through to your content on your website. So and that is a game changer. Yeah, absolutely. And, and when you think about, you know, the other thing is social media, the content that you put up tends to not last very long. There's a very short lifespan for that content, because of you know, 10s of millions of users and algorithms and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, like a tweet lasts, what, 18 minutes, right? The latest thing, you know, Facebook post Instagram posts, maybe 24 hours. And it's not that that content isn't still there. It's that the algorithm kind of stops showing it as something new and interesting to your followers.

With Pinterest, the content actually snowballs and is evergreen and continues to build over time. And the reason I know this is because I have a blog that I wrote in 2015. That is still one of my top traffic drivers to my website today. De from because of the pins that you're Yes, that you already had out there, but also because of new pins that you can consistently create for that content. That's Yes, sir. Yes, yeah.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Okay, so we'll get into some of that stuff in a second. For sure. That's like the gold, right? I love it. Like just being able to I mean, I learned from you. So hopefully, I'm not gonna say something where you're like, Oh, my gosh, I taught you nothing.

Um, what the social piece of Pinterest to me is not in the engagement, one on one direct engagement, but in providing like a community of saying, like, Hey, you came here, because you wanted to learn about this. But here's a ton of other resources mine or other people's that I think would benefit you, in your learning in your growth in your whatever. And I feel like that's kind of the unique Community and Social piece, even though it's not direct with Pinterest, right?

[CARA CHACE] So you know, what other social platforms would term as engagement is not what happens on Pinterest, so Instagram, or YouTube, you know, whatever, you're gonna have that whole, like, share, follow hearts, whatever. With Pinterest. What happens is people engage with your content, and they give you signals that they're interested or not, such as saving a pin to their own board or clicking through to your website or sharing it to a group board or you know, something like that. But what it is, is actually giving that content, some legs to it, instead of just hoarding it, or you know, whatever it is. So, you're right, Pinterest is where you can curate the most valuable information for your audience. Because, again, people are coming to Pinterest, searching for answers to questions or problems. They want ideas and inspiration for how to do something better, how to be better how to learn something. It's a very inspiring platform. So if you're able to draw people in with providing quality content or information that matches what they're looking for, it's almost like you've provided them with a goldmine that they can get lost in of your content and your information or other things that you think are valuable to them. Yeah, and that's just building your know, like, trust factor.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Exactly. Okay. So this might make sense, you know, for people are probably thinking, Okay, well, if I'm a food blogger, or if I'm a fashion person, like Pinterest is great. But as a nonprofit, and you I know you get this all the time, but let's just say for the nonprofit world, like why might they want to be on Pinterest, and what types of things might they want to be sharing?

[CARA CHACE] Right. So that's another really common misperception is that Pinterest is only for like wedding professionals and recipe bloggers, wires, right all the DIY stuff, how to make a birdhouse and you know, five steps. But I am here to tell you that Pinterest can be used effectively by anyone with a website.

So the whole point of Pinterest, again, is to drive traffic from a piece of content you put up which is your pin back to your website. So you are not limited to blogging or like a Shopify store, anything like that. Any page on your website that you want to drive traffic to, you can put up a pin for. So if you're a nonprofit, chances are you probably have some blogs, you probably have an About Us section you might have gone as far as having information, downloads, resources, you know, whatever it is the key thing because nonprofits are not a huge industry on Pinterest, you're going to have to be really intentional about thinking about your target audience and what they're searching for, in order to really take advantage of the amount of traffic that's on Pinterest. Do you want me to expand on that? Because that could be a little I can lose people there.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah. But one thing I want to say? And then yes, absolutely expand on this. But one thing I want to make sure to trigger for people is you guys have access to the Google Ad grant for free, which is a $10,000 grant on that allows you to run Google Ads back to your website. And so as you're working through that campaign, and the keywords that you're doing there, Pinterest is a great place to duplicate those efforts, and still drive a ton of traffic organically on Pinterest to those same pages. So same content that you're creating, you can utilize and multiple platforms.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, absolutely. Don't work harder than you need to. Right. And so I want to talk a little bit about finding your keywords and it's so great that you mentioned that because this is going to dovetail a little bit with how I want to expand on that concept. When you're looking for your keywords on Pinterest, you really have to walk way back to your customer journey or your audience journey to when they first realize they might have a problem that they want to solve or something that they want more information about.

My best example of this is one of my members who's a business coach. She could not figure out her keywords on Pinterest, and she kept getting stuck and going. I there's there's no business coach keywords on Pinterest. And the mindset shift that we had to have was there, they're not coming to Pinterest to hire a business coach, right? They're not there yet. Pinterest is so early on in that awareness journey, you have to think 5, 6, 7 steps back. Maybe they start with how do I be more productive? How do I plan my day better? How do I you know, what are like the best entrepreneur tips for working at home, all these things where they have first identified that they want to do something better, or they need to solve a problem for themselves, where you provide them with a great opt in or a great blog, or you know, whatever it is, and they get in your world, hopefully get on your email list. And six months later, they realize you're the business coach for them, because you're helping them step by step solve these problems way back in the customer journey.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah, so one example might be like, let's say you're an environmental company doing trying to get people to have zero trash in or whatever, net zero waste, right? Right. Yes. So maybe your Pinterest page has articles that you've done on how you can implement that in your home and other articles for people to know, you know, in different geographical areas that they might be in that might have different situations. And they just keep seeing, you pop up with several articles, they visit your website a few times, they learn a lot from you. And they're like, Oh, my gosh, we have changed our household. We want to continue to support you and dive deeper. So now we're going to become donors, or we're going to become volunteers.

[CARA CHACE]That's exactly it. That is a perfect outline of an example of how nonprofits could take advantage of this. And by the way, zero waste is huge on Pinterest. There you go.

Right. So this is an example of somebody who's not coming to Pinterest to look for a nonprofit to donate to, right. They're looking for how to make a difference in their life, their home, their family, their community, whether that is pet adoption, or zero waste, or, you know, I'm trying to have more non toxic items in their home, school, and they were talking about getting on Pinterest with all the homeschooling to like provide activities for kids that were in their enrollment category that they were going to be enrolling for in the fall. So like, you know, activities that parents can do at home to keep their their kids busy and educational. So yeah, I mean, the sky's the limit. The sky is the limit. So but don't think about how do I get somebody to want to donate to my organization? It's where does where does somebody feel like they want to make a difference that's aligned with with our organization.

Um, so one of the key things that I want to make sure we don't miss in particular for nonprofits is with Pinterest, because it is worldwide. If you are a nonprofit that is very specific location based. So you're an adoption agency for animals or or something like that. That is location specific. Remember that that is also a keyword and you need to be putting your location and your content all over Pinterest as well.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] That's such a good point. So Cara, when we think about keywords for Pinterest similar is similar to when we think about keywords in Google and that we kind of want to think about what what's the question they're asking and then go from there.

[CARA CHACE] Yes, um, so there's a little bit of a difference that I've noticed in Pinterest and Google in just kind of how people type in their keyword search phrases. And I don't know if that's just because the platforms are different. I have a feeling it's a very similar audience. As far as like sometimes I use Google, sometimes I use Pinterest. But there are a few key words that come up on Pinterest over and over that are really useful for tying into your specific keywords such as how to do breaking with word ideas in it, and listicles do really well. So like five tips for you know, that kind of stuff. Not that you want to have that specific thing for your keyword search, but tips ideas, how to inspiration. There's all sorts of key phrases like that that you can tack on to your longtail keyword phrases that seem to be more prevalent on Pinterest. I, my impression has been on Google, people tend to shorthand their keyword phrases a little bit more than on Pinterest.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah, I think that's true unless you're doing Voice Search. Yeah. I'm great. But that's a really good point in that one of the tools and hacks that we've always said is, if you're trying to start if you've no idea where to start with keywords, go into Google and just type in like one of the main phrases and see what kind of starts to auto populate. And you can do the same thing in Pinterest and get some ideas about what are some common searches that people are looking for?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, so what's really interesting is when you do a Google search, and you scroll down, at some point down the page, you'll see that related searches function or like people also search for a whatever it is. on Pinterest, they do the same thing, but visually. So if you type in like Pinterest marketing tips, and you scroll down the page, you'll see blocks, and they're they're visual. Again, it's not text like Google, but it will give you related search terms relating to Pinterest marketing tips. So that's a really useful one as well. Yeah, in a way to work smarter and not have to, like try to wrack your brain. What are all the things?

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Okay, so before we get into the Pinterest, website connection, because I do want to make sure because that's a critical piece to success. What you know, when we when we talk with organizations about what platforms they choose to be on and where they're spending their time, the audience for Pinterest, I know has been growing, but kind of what does that look like right now? As far as numbers as far as like, who's using the platform? Like who's engaging on it? Like, what? Are there any industries or types of audiences that maybe Pinterest wouldn't work for?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, so I would say, um, the segment that they've been able to track the best for purchasing power is millennials. Millennials have a huge presence on Pinterest. And they typically start their buying decision journey on Pinterest, that I could see them. Yeah, absolutely. So it's still a platform that heavily skews female versus male.  That doesn't mean that they're not, you know, men audience segments on there, but it definitely skews heavier female and you're gonna find all ages on their teenagers use it for how to start their first you know, bullet journal or or school organization or stuff like that. And older women use it for, you know, everything from quilting to recipes, and whatever it is it it's almost hard to say that there isn't anybody that doesn't use Pinterest.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] My daughter hijacks my Pinterest account and I looked at it and I was like, What is going on? Cuz she was searching for patterns to make clothes on. Robot robot rope roebucks robot have no idea. But here we go. I'm aging myself anyway. Right, Roblox, Roblox, but the money is called roebucks. Anyway, that so she was like, she was like, Mom, I need your Pinterest account, because I need to look for patterns because I'm designing my own clothing on this game, right? And people post patterns all over Pinterest. And she's 12. So I hear you.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah. And then same. She uses it to when she's working on her jewelry that she likes to make. She likes to get out. So yeah, I'm working with my daughter right now who's eight in thinking about her next bedroom and what she'd like to look at some ideas and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, pretty much everybody uses Pinterest. But they've identified millennials as really using it for specifically purchase decisions.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Well, and I will say I was a critic, and I was hesitant, and Cara knows this. And I was, you know, I remember I think I have it ingrained in my brain. The day that you yelled at me and you're like, get off Pinterest. Like you do not need to just be looking at recipes, like get on the other side of it, like start getting the other side and I got I got scolded but it is true. And it was worth it. And you know, we aren't super active on Pinterest right now. But it is like the key thing for us that we're working on and q2 is starting to develop that again because we did see definite impact for me started.

[CARA CHACE]  And and well and the thing to understand and you know this is that consistency is the name of the game and it is a long term strategy. So don't go into Pinterest thinking that it's going to be like Instagram where you you know batch your content for a month and then you see these huge spikes in traffic. Thinking brand awareness and all of that. It really is so much more like a long term SEO strategy. Because all those keywords you're using in your profile and your pins and your boards and all of that, that is just like a search engine where it takes the platform time to understand what your content is about and where to show it.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN]Yes, but I'm all for foundational, long term games, because that is yes, we're in it for the long term. We're not just here to be like, you know, making money for six months and then getting out. Right, exactly. Okay. So keywords, definitely something we want to pay attention to. And then you talked a little bit about, you know, if you have a website, then Pinterest is a good strategy for you. But you know, what kinds of things are going to help you up level your Pinterest game on your website?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah. So I teach Pinterest strategy for online entrepreneurs in terms of like different phases to go through and phase one is optimizing. What that means is making sure every single box is checked, so that your profile is set up correctly, both front end and back end. So what that means is, okay, you've done your keyword research, and you've got them in your profile, and your board descriptions and your pins, and you know, you're doing all that. But on the back end, it's really important to claim or confirm your website with Pinterest. And all that is is a little piece of CSS code that you put in the head tag of your website. It's a lot simpler than it sounds. But what it enables Pinterest to do is talk to your website and understand the customer journey between Pinterest and your content on Pinterest and your website. It's just as important as making sure you have Google Analytics set up with the same as a facebook pixel. Right? It's exactly the same thing. Yes, it tracks the customer journey and and gives you a whole bunch of Pinterest analytics that you wouldn't have access to otherwise. Yeah, so good. Yeah, so it's stuff like that, um, you know, setting up your conversion tags, which are like pixels, a lot of people don't realize that you can upload custom audiences to Pinterest for retargeting in the future. So you can upload your email lists, and your, you know, website visitor information and all of that kind of stuff to set yourself up for retargeting people that are already in your audience or finding those look alike audiences that are new people that act like audiences you already have.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] So I want to say that that is critical for especially in the nonprofit space, because they have usually are going to have at least two audiences and a minimum right your donors that you're trying to go after. And the people that you are providing people, whatever environment, whatever, that you're providing services to the community, so that those tags are going to be great at helping you be able to differentiate between who you're sending information to segments to.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, absolutely. So there's both pieces, like I said, making sure on the front end, and the back end, all those boxes are checked. And what I liken it to is if you don't take the time to optimize your profile, which actually could take you just a few hours really if you if you're tech savvy already. It's like having your foot on the gas and your car being in neutral. If you don't optimize your profile, you can put up 50 pins a day. But if your website's not connected, and you're not truck tracking your traffic the way you should, and giving Pinterest all the tools that you know, you can give it to optimize your your content, then you're going to go nowhere fast.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah, absolutely. So when we have that done, we've got our pins up and people are and we're like linking to content that we have on our website. Like, what do we need to have in that content?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, so again, you want to think of it like an SEO strategy. Don't just link to a you know, I see actually wedding professionals make them this mistake. They want to link back to just galleries, beautiful weddings, without any verbiage whatsoever about what it's about, well, Pinterest because it functions like a search engine and actually reads the quality of the page you're connecting the pin to. So if you have no words on there, nothing for it to say, Okay, this makes sense for what the pin says it is. It's gonna think that's not quality content.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] So, do you liken this to like restaurant at restaurants, recipes, and I hear this all the time, people are like, Alright, when I look at a recipe on Pinterest, I just want to get to the recipe and I have to read this whole life story of the food blogger. You've heard this Right, right.

[CARA CHACE] So this is where you need to do things as a business owner that doesn't have to do with Pinterest. It has to do with your content. So like I do the same thing when I'm looking for something on Pinterest and I click through it and I'm on my phone in the Pinterest browser. And there's 50 million pop ups and I can't read the content. I'm like, wow. Right? So if you're a recipe blogger and same thing where I'm like, how long do I have to scroll? Before I get to the ingredients, put a jump link at the top of your blog that says, if you just go to the recipe, click here.

Like, there's simple ways to think about your customer journey, not how do I get them to have to scroll by 50 million ads, and I'm here for the recipe, right? So you really got to put yourself in your visitors shoes. But going back to what do you need to have on your website? Like, how do you set up your website, all of that. So remember that Pinterest is for any URL, any page that you have on your website. So this could be a landing page for your opt in or your freebie that you're offering to your community or you know, whatever it is, this could be blogs, this could be it galleries, of, you know, maybe past events, but you should at least have some verbiage and SEO value on there. Besides just pictures. This could be about the story of your nonprofit, how you got started, why you do what you do.

One of my favorite things actually to create pins for is my resources page. So I have a resource page on my website with all the tools and sites and apps and everything that I use in my business. for nonprofit it would be you know, what you would think resources page for a nonprofit would be if like other links and complementary businesses or organizations in their area, you can literally create a pin for any page on your website is not just trying to turn out blogs week after week. So you have enough content.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Well, and um, just as an example. So we just recently did some work with this organization in Detroit that provides and resources for immigrants and refugees in their community. And so they work with law offices, and social service, like all sorts of things. So they have all those resources on one page. So they could create a separate pin for each of those resources, but still all directing people back to that same page.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, and here's the beauty of Pinterest. And you've heard me say this many times, it's not about creating new content, it's about it's about creating new pins for the content you have. So on Pinterest, the pin itself is the content blog. So as long as you have a fresh pin, which is defined as an image or a video that has not been seen on Pinterest before, then that counts as a fresh pin. So there are approximately a bajillion different templates that you can use for pins out there. You know, you want them to be on brand, you want them to convey your organization and have readable fonts and look good and all of that. But you can create as many pins as you want for the same page, as long as that graphic looks different.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah, so I want to make sure you guys heard this because this is like, this is like the gold and Pinterest is you don't have to create brand new content all the time. So for those of you that are creating like a really long form blog post once a month, like you can create pins for that same blog post, over and over and over and over and over again, the critical piece here, I think, and Cara, if you can touch on this as well is making sure that what you are creating and sharing on Pinterest is part of your sales or donor journey, so that you are driving people back to something that's hyper relevant to where you want them to go next, not just creating it for the sake of creating it.

[CARA CHACE] Exactly. I'm so glad you said that. I've had to say this to both clients and members over and over again, is that Pinterest will get you traffic all day long. But it's your website's job to convert that traffic. So having and I work with this with my one on one clients as well, we will say okay, this is a really good blog post to create some pins for this month. But there's no call to action on this post. There's nothing for them to do next. They're just going to read it and bounce right off. So it's making sure that Pinterest is the top of your funnel. But you don't have a leaky bucket when it comes to your sales funnel.

Yeah, so when I look at I sit down and I batch once a month, all of our Pinterest content. And that's actually phase two of what I teach. And I sit down and the first thing I do is look at my Google Analytics and my Pinterest analytics and see what's performing really well. So if I have a piece of seasonal content that say is about you know, working less than the summer as an entrepreneur or something like that. And I know that I start getting clicks to that every year around May or so, I know that okay, this is old content, but I'm going to create 10 new pins for this blog post from three years ago, make sure it's refreshed and updated and has a good call to action. And that's going to be 10 out of my 40 pins for the month. And then I might go to Pinterest and see, okay, this pin that I created last month is starting to starting to do really well. So do I want to create a new graphic and use the same title and description? Or maybe I just want to tweak the graphic or the verbiage slightly? How do I want to try and replicate the success of this pin, typically, somewhere between a third and a half of my pins that go out every month or for new content, sometimes less sometimes I have months where it's like this is all refreshed, repurpose content, because you're looking at the data and paying attention to what the people want to see not just throwing things out there because you feel like you need to exactly it's so I typically only put out a new blog maybe once a month, sometimes it's like six to eight weeks, depending on what I have going on in my life. But my Pinterest content stays consistent because I can continue to create fresh pins for content that I already know does well and drives traffic.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] That's incredible. And I think a game changer for nonprofits that don't have a large team. Right? Okay, so there's one more thing I want to touch on. Because I know there's we're kind of just doing a top level interest one on one or one on one because there's so much we could dive deep anyway. But I do want to touch on the fact that when you're part of your Pinterest, Pinterest strategy is also bringing in content that you don't create. Now, you wouldn't do that on other social platforms, right? You want it to be pretty much all of your own, except for maybe LinkedIn when you share, you know, articles that are relevant to your profession. But why is sharing other people's content on Pinterest a good for you and be an essential part of your strategy.

[CARA CHACE] So I'm so glad you asked this because this has changed, okay. And that was best practice from the time Pinterest was in beta in like, what 2011. Two up until about six months ago. So it used to be they said, We don't want you just re sharing your own content. We don't want people to just see your content every time they click over to your stuff. We want you re sharing other people's content, because that makes us a better community. And everybody was on board with that. And it was great. Um, you know, tailwind cues. tailwind, is a approved third party Pinterest scheduler that I use, I teach how to use it, I use it with all my clients. And we would have depending on the client anywhere from 5050 of their content and others content to like 80/20 80% their content 20% other people's content, Pinterest, I mean, not even six months ago, there have been huge changes in Pinterest in the last six months.

Right around January, actually. So it's really only been a couple months, they came out and said we want you creating your own content. And we want that to be what you're pinning. And they have completely flip flopped on it. That does not mean that you shouldn't repin other people's content, particularly if you think it's super valuable and interesting. So the way that I've changed this for myself and my clients is I have a pretty, like highly vetted group of people that are complimentary to my business and my industry, or I just know, the content that they put out is really high quality and valuable. And I'm not going to have to worry about their pin going to some spam, like ad heavy, weird website, right. Um, they're just kind of people that I know from having been around a long time. And typically what I'm doing now is I am really only resharing, one, two to three pins per day, and the rest anywhere from like eight to 10 pins per day. It's solely my content. Okay. So they have flip flopped on that. And so I'm glad you brought that up. That's good to know, I'm learning something today, right? I mean, it's the same thing as how people used to teach to pin 50 times a day and just loop the same pins with board booster and that went out the window when Pinterest figured out what was going on.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] So what I love about what you just said though, is you have a group of people that you've vetted. So I love to talk about collaboration. So when we think about, you have niched down to Pinterest, but that doesn't mean that that's your entire digital marketing strategy. So if you have other people that you trust that you can then provide that value to your audience to say, Okay, I don't teach this. But here's some great information, you might want to know about updates to SEO, or updates to Facebook or ways to create new graphics, whatever it might be, it's a great way to kind of pull that all together and still provide a whole picture. Support.

[CARA CHACE] Absolutely. And the best way to illustrate this is when people are creating profiles, or they know they just need to totally redo their Pinterest profile, or, you know, whatever it is, a lot of people get stuck on their boards, they think, Well, I do this thing does one thing. So how many other boards should I have? And what should they be about? And you need to think about it like a Venn diagram of what is your audience interested in? that also makes sense with yours. And just like you said, I have boards on general social media marketing, I have boards on email marketing, I have boards on website design, you know, anything you can think about in the digital space, because if somebody sees me repin or put up content about that, chances are they could also benefit from learning a little bit more about Pinterest marketing, and they could choose to follow me and see my content in their feeds, all that kind of stuff. So it really is that whole, you know, yes, you you want your profile to be about you and your business and and the value you're providing to your audience. But what else is your audience interested in?

So like somebody that sells farmhouse sinks, I have a member who's a Shopify store owner, she does fantastically well. And she sells literally, that's her niche farmhouse sinks. But she has boards about interior design, she has boards about kitchen layouts, you know all those things. So again, it's not about what do I sell, it's, where's my customer at in their buying journey, what they're thinking about what problems they're trying to solve?

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN]  Well, and so let's think about one example that just popped into my brain is if you're in the adoption, you know, area, you might have, you know, collars and, you know, doggie sweaters and food and food bowls, and things that you recommend people purchase, right, or dog training thing, things that you don't do yourself, but that you can then also provide value to your sponsors and corporate partners to say, Hey, we have this is the traffic we get on our Pinterest all the time, like we can build this into your sponsor package has added value.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I can think of probably 10 things off the top of my head from like, how to have a successful dog or cat adoption, like how to make that successful in your home, how to introduce an animal into your home, if you have other pets, behavior training, like you said, like all these things that are going to be questions and concerns for your audience that you can help them with. And yes, like you said, you're going to have stats and numbers and all sorts of stuff to say this is the value that we provide.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] Yeah. Okay, well, we could talk about this forever. I feel like I've given people a good we might have to have you back to dive deeper into maybe one or two separate tactics.

[CARA CHACE] Oh, yeah. You know, me, I could do this all day long.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] You do it all day long. Yeah. Is there anything else? I mean, if you if you don't already feel like you should be on Pinterest, then start from the beginning and listen to this episode again. But is there anything else that you think people should know about that? Maybe I didn't ask yet. When it comes to Pinterest?

[CARA CHACE] I would say really the stumbling block. The mindset issue that I run into all the time with people is they think they have to do a lot on Pinterest, and they think there's some magic number they let the overwhelm keep them from getting started. There is no magic number of how many times you should pin per day. There's no magic Canva template for your pin graphics. Start small, get your system going get your plan going. Look at the data first and build from there. Like I said, consistency is really the most important piece. So don't be the person that's like Yes, I'm all in and you pin 15 times a day for a month. And then because you haven't really integrated that system into your business, you burn out and you drop the ball. That's not what we want to do. If you pin once a day for the next month, and hopefully you're using a scheduler like tailwind so that you don't have to actually go into Pinterest once a day. That's going to get you started and get you covered. As you continue to learn and build that system into your business.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] That's so good. I love that I love it when we have people on that are not like you have to go balls to the walls right away or Yes, that's a fail. Yes. I mean, I agree on that.

[CARA CHACE] I agree.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] If people want more Pinterest resources or want, you know, more support with Pinterest, how can they find out more about you and learn from you?

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, so I have a fantastic free training that is at carachace.com/free. And that's C A R A C H A C E, I always have to spell it for people.com slash free, and you just get immediate access. It is about an hour long presentation. And it goes into the three phases that I teach, which is optimized batch and scale. So you're going to get a lot more clarity on how to do it, and why from watching that training.

[SAMI BEDELL-MULHERN] I love it. And we'll link all of this stuff up in the show notes. So you can head on over thefirstclick.net/podcast to check that out to get all the links to find Cara everywhere. And all the resources we kind of talked about today. So thank you so much. I really appreciate you being here.

[CARA CHACE] Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for having me.

[CLOSING] So I was loving this conversation. I even learned a few things from her and Pinterest has been on my mind for a while. So I'm gonna start to jump back in and create new pins and get my content out there as well. So I'll be doing it right alongside you. If you have any questions or want some support. Come on over to our Facebook community at facebook.com/groups/thefirstclick, come join us there I'll share my Pinterest journey with you. And we can collaborate together. All the resources that Cara talked about are going to be available in the show notes at thefirstclick.net/podcast. So definitely check that out. And I hope that you add Pinterest to your strategy. This was such a fun episode to do and I love talking about ways that we can take content we already have and use it and use it and use it and use it and still get great results. So I thank you for listening to this episode. Please make sure you subscribe wherever you listen so that you don't miss out on a single one. And you know if you wouldn't mind leaving us a little review over on Apple podcast. That would be great. We'll see you in the next one.