Make Money Online With Pinterest Affiliate Marketing
Do you get most of your social media traffic from Facebook, Twitter and Instagram?
You could be missing out on an opportunity to expand your audience and diversify your income.
Another powerful source of traffic you could be using is Pinterest.
In this article, we’ll talk about:
- What is Pinterest affiliate marketing
- How to make money in Pinterest
- Best Pinterest affiliate marketing tactics
- How to grow your Pinterest account
- Why choose Pinterest over other social networks
Let’s get started with Pinterest affiliate marketing
What Is Pinterest Affiliate Marketing?
Pinterest affiliate marketing is when you make product recommendations to your Pinterest followers and earn commissions when they make a purchase using your affiliate link.
They don’t get charges extra when using your affiliate links.
You have done all the hard labor by identifying the products that are suitable to them and they make a purchase trusting your recommendation without having to waste time researching the different products that are available.
You earn money for doing so.
Both parties win.
How To Use Affiliate Links On Pinterest
To add Pinterest affiliate links you first need to create a pin.
Go to your profile page, click on the plus icon and select “Create Pin”.
The next step is to add your pin title and description.
Many affiliate programs and networks such as Amazon, do not allow for affiliate links to be used directly on social media.
The best workaround is to use Pinterest to drive your followers to your blog articles where you have already added your affiliate links.
So, imagine we’re creating a pin that looks like this:
We need a picture. We can either use our blog article’s cover picture or get free stock photos from sites like Pexels.
The picture cannot be wider than it is long. If you need to resize it, you can easily do it using Canva.
Once it is ready, add it in the pin.
Then, tell everyone what your pin is about. In this example, we say that this is the best dog food for labs.
Lastly, in the destination link field, add the url of your blog article.
Everyone someone comes across your pin and clicks on your link, they get directed to your blog articles and includes your affiliate link.
Some affiliate programs allow for affiliate links to be used on social media and the same applies for some social media platforms. However, their policies change frequently so I do not recommend to use your affiliate links directly on your social media. It is safer to direct people to your blog articles that contain your affiliate links.
Best Tactics For Pinterest Affiliate Marketing
Now that you know how to create pins directing people to your blog that contains your affiliate links let’s have a look at the best tactics for Pinterest affiliate marketing.
1.Make Product Recommendations That Are Relevant
The pins that your create should be relevant to your audience.
Here are some niche examples and relevant products you could recommend:
- Dogs: food, toys, collars
- Digital Marketing: online courses, software, tools
- Fitness: equipment, gear, online workout programs
- Camping: tents, sleeping bags, supplies
Offering all sorts of products will not help you succeed. Find out what your problems your audience is facing and offer them products that solve these problems.
2.Test What Links Bring The Best Conversions
You have to options. You can link to your product review articles that contain your affiliate links or your info articles.
If your audience is ready to buy, they will most likely be more interested in your product reviews.
If on the other hand, they need more information on their problem, they will probably be more interested in your info article and once they are ready to buy, they will have access to your product reviews.
You need to test where your audience is in their buying journey.
Link some pins to your product reviews and some to your info articles.
Do this for a month and compare your results.
3.Avoid Link Cloaking
Always add the full URL link in your pins and avoid link cloaking.
As per Pinterest’s Acceptable Use Policy, your audience need to know where they are going.
How To Grow Your Pinterest
You now know how to get the most out of your pins. Let’s have a look at how to grow your Pinterest account and maximize your income.
This process involves creating pins and boards as well as following others.
Step 1: Create 10 Boards & Add Pins To Them
If your Pinterest profile is new or small with less than 200 followers, the first step is to create 10 boards.
Each board needs to be relevant to your niche. This is an opportunity to demonstrate to your audience that you have a range of interests within your niche.
For example, if your niche is dog food, you could create the following boards:
- Dog nutrition tips
- Best dog food by breeds, Ingredients or Health Issues
- Brands
- Dog memes
Focus on creating boards that your audience will appreciate don’t just create boards because you need to get to 10 boards to get started.
To create a board, go to your Pinterest profile, click on the plus icon and select “Create Board”.
You will then be asked to name the board.
Avoid marking your board as secret. This feature is there to use until your publish a sufficient number of pins so that your board is not empty. But we will create enough pins so you don’t need to use it.
Now that you board is live, it is time to start pinning.
I do not recommend pinning on your own. It is a very daunting and time consuming process. You could use pin scheduling tools like Tailwind instead.
You can give Tailwind a go using their free trial to see if you like it.
Get started with Tailwind for free.
Grow Smarter On Pinterest And Earn More Money With Tailwind
With the pin scheduler of Tailwind, you can create beautiful pins and schedule them to get published at the best times for engagement.
You can also choose to shuffle your pins.
If your Pinterest account is new, aim to pin 40-50 images per day.
Step 2: Grow Your Following
In order to start gaining followers, you can start following other people and repinning content that is the most popular.
After you have created your first few boards and filled them up with pins, start following others. Focus on accounts in your niche.
Next, repin the most popular content. You already know it has done well in the past so it will do great when you publish it as well.
To do this, go to your Pinterest account and search for a topic. I am going to search for “dog food recipes”.
Activate Tailwind. Identify the pins that you prefer.
The ones at the top are usually successful.
Remember that you should pin 40-50 images per day.
Follow this process for a few weeks and you should see your following growing.
Once you reach 200 followers, you can start scaling Pinterest.
Let’s find out how to do this.
Step 3: Scale Your Pinterest
By now, you should have gained 200 followers and gaining attention.
It is time to start scaling your Pinterest operation by joining group boards.
Here is an example:
When you join a group board, your followers get to see pins from other group board members. Within a few seconds, you could get thousands of people to see your pins.
To find group boards that are relevant to you, search for “TOPIC group board”. I searched for “dog food group board” in the example above.
Click on any of the results with an owner picture displaying multiple people to enter the group board.
You will be able to see both its content and contributors.
To join the group board click on the “Join” button. If you don’t see such a button, the board either doesn’t accept new members or they require you to read their description as they might have indicated how to join them there.
Once you join a group board, identify the founder. Click on the contributors. The founder will be the first person listed. Follow them and message them to ask if they still accept contributors to the group board as you would love to join. Let them know what your niche is and reassure them that you will respect their rules.
Once you are in, carry on with publishing popular pins but also more of your own pins directing people to your content.
This is the smartest way to scale your Pinterest account.
Is Pinterest Better Than Other Networks?
Rome wasn’t built in a day. The same applies to Pinterest. Overnight success is not realistic on this platform.
Despite this, I do find it better than other networks.
Facebook isn’t as popular as it used to be. Its algorithm has changed and the reach of Facebook pages posts has significantly dropped. This is to force you to use paid ads to boost them. Following this change, ad costs have been on the rise. According to Business Insider, Facebook ad costs are rising after the News Feed change by about 122% year over year.
Twitter on the other hand, has lost its users for a completely different reason.
According to Mashable, the average click through rate on Twitter is 2.8%. As following increases however, this rate decreases. Compare this to your average open rate when you do email marketing. It should be around 20%-25%. Twitter is clearly not the best option. It doesn’t work as well for its users nowadays.
Pinterest doesn’t come with any of the disadvantages mentioned above.
Not only that but you don’t need to take a Pinterest course or be an expert in using it.
Why Should You Choose Pinterest Over Facebook And Twitter?
You can create a large following for less money and work. You get more bang for your buck.
Affiliate marketing on Pinterest is straight forward and less competitive than on other networks.
With Pinterest, you can register more sales by driving more traffic to your blog.
All you need is to learn the basics to make it work for you.
What Next With Pinterest Affiliate Marketing?
Pinterest affiliate marketing requires more work but it pays off better than other social media networks.
Your workload can be reduced by using tools such as Tailwind for pinning automation or even hire a virtual assistant.
Then you can use your spare time to build an authority site or enhance your knowledge in digital marketing.
Hope you enjoyed this article on Pinterest affiliate marketing and you’ll find it a starting point to incorporate Pinterest in your affiliate marketing strategy and tactics.
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