Skip to content

Pinterest SEO Simplified

I know, I know. Pinterest is our escape, our happy place. So when you mention Pinterest and SEO (Search Engine Optimization) together, unless you’re an SEO pro, you’re probably cringing just a bit right now!

No worries, you won’t find any tech speak here, just tips to help you get your content found on Pinterest. In fact, it’s possible that SOMEBODY (me) spent a good many hours reading and re reading the Pinterest Engineering blog in an effort to pull out some gems and distill them down just for you. Intrigued? Good!

Pinterest SEO: A Complete Breakdown hide
1. Is Pinterest SEO Worth My Time?
2. What is Pinterest SEO?
3. Pinterest SEO Factor: Keywords
4. How to Do Keyword Research on Pinterest
5. Pinterest SEO Factor: Interests
6. Pinterest SEO Ranking – How to Get Your Pins at the Top
7. Pinterest Personalized Ranking
8. Pinterest Distribution and Your Website
9. Pinterest SEO Wrap Up

Is Pinterest SEO Worth My Time?

Sure is! Since Pinterest is a visual search and discovery engine, it shares a lot more in common with Google and other search engines than it does social media sites like Instagram.

For instance, like Google, Pinterest can be a powerful driver of qualified traffic. In fact, it’s long been the #2 driver of social traffic, and for many Tailwind members, it’s the number one source of website traffic – period.

BUT, If you want people to see your content on Pinterest and you want to generate more traffic from Pinterest to your site, you need to help Pinterest distribute your content to the Pinners who want it.

And while follower engagement IS a factor in the distribution of your content, Pinterest is actively seeking your help to determine where to show your content in search, the home feed, and related (or “More like this”) Pins. That’s where Pinterest SEO comes in – and that’s where there is a lot you can do to improve your content’s SEO.

What is Pinterest SEO?

Since Pinterest is at heart a search and discovery platform, optimizing your Pins, profile, and content for Pinterest is very similar to optimizing for Google. And just like with Google, the uptick in traffic from your hard work may not happen overnight, but it will happen.

Note: We’re attempting to present many of the factors shared publicly on Pinterest’s Engineering blog, but there may be others which are not publicly shared. If you stick with these suggestions and always aim to help Pinterest create a platform full of high-quality, fresh, engaging content, you’ll go far!

Here’s What You’ll Learn:

  • Pinterest SEO Factor #1 – Keywords
  • Pinterest SEO Factor #2 – Interests
  • How to Check Your Own Pins for SEO
  • Pinterest SEO Ranking – How to Get Your Pins at the Top
  • Personalized Search Results – Why No Two Pinners See the Same Pins in Search
  • How People Search on Pinterest
  • How to Do Pinterest Keyword Research
  • Why Your Website Matters to Pinterest Search

If you prefer to watch a lively discussion on this topic with me, Jeff Sieh, and Jennifer Priest, you’re in luck!

Pinterest SEO Factor: Keywords

SEO and keywords go together like PB&J, but unlike the iconic sandwich, things can get a little overwhelming here – and fast. Not to worry! Here (not necessarily in order of importance/impact) is where Pinterest looks for your keywords in order to decide if your Pin should appear for a certain search query:

  1. Pin Title
  2. Pin Description
  3. Board Name
  4. Board Description
  5. Linked Page Title, Description, Main Text
  6. Search Queries that frequently lead to clicks on that Pin
  7. Name of objects detected in an image
  8. OCR – optical character recognition
  9. Lexical Expansion – similar words and phrases

1. Keywords in the Pin Title

In this example, the Pin Title is “How to Write Email Marketing Subject Lines.”

The Pin Title must be set manually when you schedule a Pin on Pinterest.

If you schedule your Pins with Tailwind, we will attempt to pull a good title from your website meta data.

We recommend you review Pin titles before you schedule to make sure they follow Pinterest’s best practices:

  • Support SEO by using keywords – Pinterest uses the words in your title to determine when it appears in search.
  • Don’t repeat the description text – use the title to focus on the content of the Pin, while using the description to give MORE context and detail.
  • Take care not to sound “click-baity” (in fact, don’t use the word “click”).
  • Think of it as a compelling headline – encourage Pinners to click by supplying relevant details about the linked content.
  • Put the most important text at the beginning – the first 30 of your 100 characters are most likely to appear in the feed. 

2. Keywords in the Pin Description

The Pin description is where you want to include additional keywords relating to your topic, while also giving more context to what your Pin – and the link it leads to – are about.

If you need keyword inspo, try entering your topic in the Pinterest search bar! You’ll see various options of what people are searching for on Pinterest that would make great keywords to use!

If you’re struggling with your Pin description, you can also use Tailwind Ghostwriter to help create a keyword-rich, engaging caption for your Pin.

Simply put in your Pin URL, identify what you’re posting about (ex: lifestyle content, information, product or promotional) your Pin title, and any keywords or phrases you want to be sure to include.

Ghostwriter will give you three AI-generated Pin descriptions to choose from! You can either tweak your description or leave it as is – over 86% of our users do! It couldn’t be easier to use, and you can try it for yourself with a forever-free plan of the Tailwind marketing suite.

3. Keywords in Board Names and Descriptions

In the example above, our Pin was saved to “Email Marketing.” Use keywords naturally in your Board names – and save your Pins to Boards with relevant names and topics. You can use your board descriptions to give more context about the Pins saved there!

4. Linked Page Title, Description, and Text

Pinterest is looking at the content to which each Pin links to get more keyword signals. When Pinterest sees our Pin, those clever Pinterest bots go to the linked page and look for meta informatio on the page.

This is what you enter on your blog as SEO title and meta description. The bots ALSO scan the main text on the page, looking for keywords.

5. Search Queries for That Pin

Even if you don’t use a certain keyword anywhere, if your Pin gets clicks from certain search queries, your Pin may be tagged with that keyword.

How would that happen in the first place? The key lies with Interests, and we’ll cover how Interests influence Pinterest SEO in a moment.

5. Keywords of Objects IN the Pin Image

Woah. Pinterest can “see” our images? Yeah, they sure can. And they identify items in our Pins – which is why they suggest we feature our products prominently in our images wherever possible.

Here’s a cool image from the Pinterest Engineering blog which shows how they identify objects in a Pin image:

This shows the annotations that Pinterest’s AI can pull from a single image on Pinterest.

These annotations play a factor in whether your Pin shows up on someones home feed and where, placement in Related Pins, search, Board suggestions and even detecting spam on Pinterest.

Isn’t that amazing? But before you ask, don’t worry. If your product or service doesn’t work as a single image on Pinterest, this is not the be-all end-all of Pinterest SEO. Let’s keep going!

6. The Text ON Your Pin

I know, this one amazes me as well. Pinterest calls it “Optical Character Recognition,” and it’s exactly that. They read the text on your Pins. Here’s another image from that same post illustrating the incredible ability they have to “read” our text on images.

THIS is why text on Pins can be very helpful to improving your Pinterest SEO.

7. Similar Words and Phases

This is why we don’t need to worry about using plurals or every possible iteration of a key phrase to cover our Pinterest keyword bases. Pinterest handles it for us. Some examples might include:

  • email marketing tips – might also appear for “Email marketing ideas”
  • email subject line – email subject lines
  • subject lines email – email subject lines

How smart is that?

How to Do Keyword Research on Pinterest

Pinterest keyword research is fairly simple. You can use the auto-complete search feature, or go down a rabbit trail with guided search. First, auto-complete…

Start typing in one of your relevant key words and Pinterest will give you a few suggestions. Write these down.

You can also use the Pinterest Trends tool to research trending topics, and the demographics that are most interested in them!

Pinterest SEO Factor: Interests

Every Pin on Pinterest is mapped to several Interests. There are tens of thousands of Interests organized to 10 levels of specificity (?!) and they’re used to remove unsafe content, provide personalized recommendations, target ads, and as a ranking factor in search results.

Pinterest shared a peak at how they map Pins to Interests:

What does this mean for YOUR Pinterest SEO? Beyond trying to picture your product or services in the image and employing good use of keywords, there doesn’t seem to be much you can do to influence Interest mapping.

But it is important to know how it works when we get to ranking (soon!).

How to Tell if Pinterest is “Seeing” Your Pin as Intended

This is a fun one. Do a closeup on your Pin on Pinterest and scroll down to the “More like this” Pins. Are they similar to your Pin and would you be happy to have your Pins search results like this? If so, great! If not, review your keywords in all 9 spots above and see if you can clarify your keywords for Pinterest.

And here are the related or “More like this Pins,” showing how Pinterest is categorizing our image and assigning keywords and Interests:

Pinterest SEO Ranking – How to Get Your Pins at the Top

This is what we all want – to get our Pins to the very top of the search query results on Pinterest! Ranking all comes down to – which Pins are most likely to delight and inspire Pinners and create the best user experience? Those are the ones that will show up first. Here are some of the things that impact general ranking (according to the Pinterest Engineering blog):

  1. Text Relatedness – is the text found in multiple places (1-9 above!)
  2. Consistency – Is the Pin and are all its elements related to the linked content?
  3. Pin engagement/popularity

1. Pinterest Ranking Factor – Text Relatedness

Text relatedness is simple – are the same keywords and phrases found in all the keyword spots we discussed above? This is why it’s so important to save your Pins to the most relevant Board first – Pinterest wants to see that the Pin belongs on that Board and will connect the two.

It stands to reason that if the keywords are the same across multiple sources, your Pin is likely a good match for that keyword query!

2. Pinterest Ranking Factor – Consistency

Consistency (Pinterest calls it “cohesion”) between a Pin and the content it links to is essential.

Make sure you are using the same keywords in your Pin description as you’re using on your blog post. And make sure the image you are Pinning, or something similar in style, are on the page that Pin links to.

3. Pinterest Ranking Factor – Pin Engagement and Popularity

Pinterest repins, clicks, closeups, saves, comments, photos – all these engagements have an impact on your Pinterest SEO and ranking in search results.

Pinterest has mentioned that they serve up your Pins to your followers first, so use Pinterest Audience Insights to find out what YOUR audience is interested in.

Pinterest Personalized Ranking

While text relatedness, cohesion, and engagement return a great selection of Pins of interest to a search for any given keyword, Pinterest takes it a step (or more) further.

They want to show you what YOU want to see. With that in mind, Pinterest looks at several signals to rank your personal results. Here are a few of them.

Pinterest Personalized “SEO” Considerations:

  • Are the Interests this Pin is mapped to the same Interests that YOU tend to engage with?
  • Are people like you apt to be interested in one Pin over another (based on identifiers such as gender, etc.)?
  • Do you tend to engage with this type of Pin?

This is the “magic” part of Pinterest SEO. You can (and should) follow best practices for design, consistency, and skillful use of keywords, but in the end, Pinterest is a search AND DISCOVERY network and they’re constantly working to create a better, more personalized experience for all of us.

The more you pay attention to the engagement on your Pins and run tests with different images and keywords, the better you’ll be able to tell which of these “magic” factors helps move the needle in terms of traffic and conversions on your site.

How People Search on Pinterest

Since 97% of searches on Pinterest are unbranded, it’s clear that people are open to discovery and inspiration. Rather than searching terms such as “best running shoes” as one might on Google, a person on Pinterest is more likely to search something such as “beginner running tips.”

With that in mind, you’ll want to expand your keywords beyond your product or service to attract people before they even know they need you.

Pinterest Distribution and Your Website

Pinterest wants to serve up Pins that lead to quality content. Aside from the obvious must haves of useful content, well, written, it also needs to be engaging and inspiring. You should also make sure you verify your site with Pinterest. That allows Pinterest to see that YOU are the owner of the content you share from your site.

Make sure you use Rich Pins on your site to give more context to your Pins.

Pinterest wants to send traffic to quality sites that provide a great user experience. In fact, they won’t even take your money to send ad traffic to pages that are full of pop ups and ads, so it seems likely that sites like that will see their content suffer in search.

Then there’s quantity. Pinterest wants you to Pin consistently, but it also wants you to Pin high quality, fresh content. Try to create new content on your site at least weekly – and make sure there is a Pinnable image on every post! When in doubt, lean towards fewer high quality Pins, rather than spamming your account with low quality or duplicate Pins.

Need help being more consistent on Pinterest? Schedule all your Pins for the week in minutes with Tailwind! Try a free (no credit card required) trial.

Pinterest SEO Wrap Up

While all search engines keep some secrets, Pinterest has shared with all of us many details about how SEO works and how we can get our Pins ranking higher.

Seven steps to Pinterest SEO success:

  1. Make good use of keywords in 9 important spots.
  2. Understand Interests
  3. Learn the Pinterest ranking factors to get your Pins at the top
  4. Understand personalized search
  5. Perform keyword research
  6. Make sure your website is Pinterest worthy!

Feeling ready to give Pinterest SEO a try? REALLY give it a try? Combine what you’ve learned here with a commitment to creating new content every week and your Pinterest traffic WILL increase. Let us know how it goes!

Grow Website Traffic with Pinterest

Ecommerce Transformation: A Case Study on Tailwind Ads’ 525% Traffic Growth Success for Home Stitchery Decor

Ecommerce Transformation: A Case Study on Tailwind Ads’ 525% Traffic Growth Success for Home Stitchery Decor

Home Stitchery Decor is a Calgary, Alberta-based business that specializes in creating modern farmhouse home decor items. Founded…
Read More
AI Email Writers: An Email Marketing Superpower

AI Email Writers: An Email Marketing Superpower

Every small business owner can relate to the challenge of not having enough time and resources to market…
Read More
<strong>AI In Ecommerce: Where To Begin?</strong>

AI In Ecommerce: Where To Begin?

AI is causing shockwaves with the paradigm shift it is causing across verticals — and the ecommerce industry…
Read More
<strong>AI Social Media Content Marketing: The Definitive Guide [2023 Edition]</strong>

AI Social Media Content Marketing: The Definitive Guide [2023 Edition]

With AI social media tools, content marketers can create social media posts and all sorts of long-form, short-form,…
Read More
AI for Blog Writing: How To Use It?

AI for Blog Writing: How To Use It?

Lots of companies are turning to artificial intelligence (AI) to help them create blog posts and generate articles.…
Read More
AI For Small Business: Where To Use It?

AI For Small Business: Where To Use It?

Many small businesses working with limited resources think that new technology and new tools driven by AI are…
Read More
6 Benefits of Using AI Writing Tools for Content Creation

6 Benefits of Using AI Writing Tools for Content Creation

Writing content can be tedious, but with AI writing tools, it becomes easier and faster. Learn the 6…
Read More
The Power of LinkedIn Hooks: How to Stand Out and Get Noticed

The Power of LinkedIn Hooks: How to Stand Out and Get Noticed

Understanding LinkedIn Hooks: What They Are and Why They Matter To truly understand the power of LinkedIn hooks,…
Read More
The Only Instagram Image Size Guide You Need in 2023

The Only Instagram Image Size Guide You Need in 2023

Let’s face it: we’re living for all the fantastic new ways you can post your best photos and…
Read More

97 Comments

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      Thanks, Simone!

  2. Avatar
    David Bigwood

    A question I meant to ask during the FB cast, does the XMP metadata help at all? The metadata that’s attached to JPEG and TIFF images in document properties. We commonly fill-in title, summary, keywords, and provider/supplier. On Flickr this imports and automatically fills-in their fields. Thanks.

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      First, thanks for joining us, David! It’s not clear. I can tell you that the image name (as in file name) does NOT appear to be a factor.

      • Avatar
        maria

        I remember that a person from Pinterest on a Webinar said they are not a factor anymore, and I trust her and now you. Changing the names takes a lot of time. Thanks a lot for this Article Alisa, it’s super clear!

        • Alisa Meredith
          Alisa MeredithModerator

          Hi Maria! Yes, she did say that in my interview with her last year, but things do change. That said, I didn’t see any mention of sections on the Engineering blog as a ranking/SEO factor and even when it’s been discussed, it was never said that it’s more important than a Board Title, so I think we’re safe to not worry too much about it.

          I’m so glad you found it useful. Thanks for letting me know! ~ Alisa

  3. Avatar
    Kat

    Omg thank you! This is the Information I needed to find! I’ve been working hard pinning and have had no flow to my site, with this Info I can fix what I am doing wrong.

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      This makes me so happy, Kat!! Keep us posted if you think of it. ~ Alisa

  4. Avatar
    Siva Mahesh

    Amazing read as usual. Thanks for the detailed Pinterest SEO guide.

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      You’re most welcome. Thank you for stopping by, Siva! ~ Alisa

  5. Avatar
    Maria

    Hi There, Just a question on hashtags. Previously I was able to search for them by entering in the Pinterest search bar a # and then follow it with a word but now it seems they removed it. Is there any other way to find related, quality hashtags for my pins?

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      I’ve found that if you upload an image to Pinterest and start typing a hashtag in the description you can gets suggestions there. Hope that works for you Maria.

      • Avatar
        Maria

        Hi Alisa, Thank you for your reply. Its must something on my end,I’ve tried your way but nothing comes up 🙁 Anyways thanks again.

  6. Avatar
    Samm

    Hi Meredith

    I use to pin people contents everyday. Is it OK if I have more of other people contents in my board than my own content? Will it harm the SEO of my pin?

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      No harm at all, Samm. 🙂 ~ Alisa

  7. Avatar
    Fun With Puzzles

    Pinterest drives most of the traffic on my websites. Thanks to tailwind for helping me to improve my Pinterest followers and hence more traffic to my websites.

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      That’s so great to hear!

  8. Avatar
    Rose Wismans | FudgeMyLife.org

    This was a really great in-depth guide on Pinterest SEO, but I’m left with one question about the pin images also having to be present on your webpage. Does that mean that it’s better to have all your pin images that you use visible in your blog post? Or does Pinterest also ‘see’ them if you hide them using the tag?

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      Thanks Rose! Pinterest is looking for the experience to be cohesive to the viewer, so I would guess they do NOT see hidden Pins. HOWEVER, what they said is that they want to see similarity in style and theme, not that is has to be the exact image. So, I would experiment freely. 🙂 Thanks for your note.

  9. Avatar
    seki hudson

    By far this is the best in-depth post I ever read about Pinterest and Pinterest SEO, still new to Pinterest but I am getting some traffic already, looking forward to implementing tips I learned from this post to increase my traffic.

    • Alisa Meredith
      Alisa MeredithModerator

      Thank you so much, Seki! Wishing you lots of success! ~ Alisa

  10. Avatar
    rishabh

    Thanks for sharing this detailed guide on pinterest ranking factors , it surely helps a lot in understanding the whole algorithm behind this platform

  13. The 2021 Pinterest Interface in Detail - Superwoman SolutionsPingback

    […] By including relevant keywords (that relate to the page you’re linking to) in your Pinterest Pin description AND Board title and description where the Pin is saved, you send a signal to Pinterest about your content (think: Pinterest SEO!) […]

  14. A Tour of the 2021 Pinterest Interface - Superwoman SolutionsPingback

    […] By including relevant keywords (that relate to the page you’re linking to) in your Pinterest Pin description AND Board title and description where the Pin is saved, you send a signal to Pinterest about your content (think: Pinterest SEO!) […]

  59. 4 Methods to Use Pinterest for Buyer Acquisition - SEOPingback

    […] you’ll efficiently attain your focused viewers. Since most Pinterest customers are conducting long-tail key phrase searches, smaller manufacturers turn into extra seen to their focused viewers. These long-tail key […]

  73. Pinterest İzlenimlerim Neden Düşüyor? – DandpPingback

    […] Pinterest’e, içeriğinizi tanımlamalarına ve doğru kişilere sunmalarına yardımcı olmak için mümkün olduğunca çok sinyal verin. Hakkında daha fazla öğren Pinterest SEO’su. […]

  76. The Hottest Wedding Industry Social Media Tips & Trends In 2021 - Infoavg.my.idPingback

    […] Make recent, valuable material. Inspiring material is actually excellent, also, yet absolutely nothing arrives near “valuable” material that gives worth towards audience. Suppose in regards to discussing your own the majority of lovely images of your own function and also attaching all of them to sources which happen to be optimized for search. […]

  79. A Pinterest Marketing Strategy For 2020 - Infoavg.my.idPingback

    […] Get inventory of the Pinterest membership. Perform your own Board names as well as explanations precisely illustrate the material you are sparing right this moment? Perform you may need a brand-new Board or more to integrate keyword phrases that you’ve began to jot down pertaining to on your blog site otherwise otherwise on the item web pages? Pinterest SEO matters! […]

  80. The Do's and Don'ts of Pinterest Pin Design - IDNTimesPingback

    […] important your success in Pinterest. The most effective summaries incorporate key phrases (suppose Pinterest SEO) as well as define properly just what the Pin is actually pertaining to as well as just what […]

Add a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

shares