If you follow my blog regularly, you already know I never get too excited over the latest social media crazes.
However, it’s really hard to ignore a website site that generated notable traffic even before I joined.
That’s what happened with my Flat Stomach Exercises site and Pinterest — one of the fastest growing social media sites around today.
For the last three months, it has been one of my top 10 traffic sources for my Site Build It! site (see screenshot on the right), and I only became a member just a few weeks ago.
What is Pinterest?
In case you haven’t heard, Pinterest is a social media site for images that allows you to “pin” (share) photos you find on the Web.
And what’s really awesome about it is you don’t have to become a member to reap the benefits.
If someone likes your article or a photo on your site, they can simply “Pin” it using the Pinterest toolbar. The image will be posted to their board and will link back to your website.
So even if you have no intention of getting involved with yet another social media network, at least make sure you use high quality images that are free for commercial use on your pages.
You don’t want to miss out on traffic from any of the 10 million+ monthly (and growing) Pinterest users who may decide to pin/share your content.
Why I’m Sold (For Now, Anyway)
Here’s what excites me the most about Pinterest. I’m a busy gal and I don’t have time to devote to another social media site. I’m sure you can relate.
However, the exposure my sites have received from the minimal amount of time and effort I’ve spent seems to be worth it so far. Plus, it’s kind of fun to use and very relevant to my hair website since it’s a visual topic.
And what’s cool about the network is people pin all kinds of content — even YouTube videos!
Watch the video below to hear my thoughts on the growing network, and check out my Pinterest SEO strategy for my latest site.
And if you don’t want to hear me ramble, I wrote a more detailed article about Pinterest here. 🙂
Also, discover how I got one image to go semi-viral on Pinterest.
Effective tips for to generate traffic to the website. I am already using this method. But not proficient. Now I got some tips. Hope these will be helpful to increase more traffic to my website.
great post thx for these tips going to use now i m creating more and more boards to get traffic from pinterest.
I never knew Pinterest can do so much, though I always used it as a normal sharing social networking website but frankly speaking never got any considerable traffic in return. Will try to follow your tactics and lets see if i get something good 🙂
Thanks for the video Lisa. I just heard about Pintrist last week at the yarn shop. I have pinned a few things,but really thought it was for people that had nothing better to do with their time than tell other people what they like. After spending a few minutes “pinning” I started to have a lot of fun. My blog has a lot of knitting video tutorials. I had no idea I could pin them. I do now. Thanks so much!
Thanks for the info Lisa, as always you give goooooooood info, will check it out to see if we can get some additional traffic
Pinterest is going to be the next big social network in the world but at this point of time its only popular in European countries not in Asian countries.
Hi Lisa, Thanks for the information about Pinterest. I’m just getting started there and this was helpful.
Pinterest is gud for traffic but I don’t get any traffic at all any ways to get more traffic I mean any alternative for it. I tried buffer any other thing
Hi Lisa,
Thank God for your blog post because I had no idea about Pinterest. Thanks for sharing a great way to use Pinterest to drive traffic back to my blog and have fun at the same time. I briefly looked over it and it looks really cool. Once again, thanks for sharing.
Hi Lisa I have come across your advice a lot and finally I found a place to say thanks. Haven’t looked into this Pinterest a lot think I’m gonna start to see how it goes. Thanks Marc@ Custom Chrome Wheel Covers
You really convinced me to use Pinterest for my blogs!
By the way..don’t I receive some kind of special prize for posting the 100th comment? 🙂
Thank you for this information about Pinterest. I have heard about it, but was not sure if it is worth it. But I will take a look.
I’ve been hearing a lot about Pininterest although I haven’t tried it yet. I appreciate the information, sounds like I’ll have to give in and give it a shot! Thanks for your post.
This sounds like a great idea especially if you have lots of photos on your site and never have enough time to keep up with all your online obligations! Thanks so much for all your helpful content.
Nice post, Lisa. I’ve been considering Pinterest of late as well. I’ve heard quite a string of success stories talking about traffic generation. Might give it a try. Thanks.
I’m with you are the way on this. And I really don’t think that they will fizzle. BTW, you have fans in Canada.
Alexander Jade International Ltd.
I’ve been noticing Pintrest a lot in blogs lately. But, with such a wide variety of social media buttons on a website, why add another one?
Pretty much everyone and their mother now has a facebook like, a tweet, a stumble upon, a reddit, and a g+ button. Eeek.
Is pintrest really that useful Lisa?
You ask why add another button. Because over 10 million people use Pinterest and chances are your visitors do too ,but you have to test it and will never know unless you try. For my hair site, the traffic that Pinterest has brought has been very quality – 5-minute average visit and a 40% bounce rate is not bad.
I don’t have it on all my sites, just my hair site. No one can really tell you if it will work for you or if it will be useful. It could be a total bust on your site. For me, when I saw free traffic coming from a site I hadn’t used, I figured why not try it out. Never hurts to test — especially on visually-oriented sites.
Thanks Lisa, I’ll keep that in mind.
Not much with Pinterest but after reading the post i think i need to pin my interest!!
Wow Lisa,
Pinterest is showing Up a nice Referral
for Traffic since Pinnings are shown on
My FaceBook. Nice Blog Post That I’ve
read twice so far. That’s a Good One.
Stay Blessed Always…Peace!
I think the reason Pinterest is so successful is that people like visuals so much. The site is set up like an art gallery and people just get drawn into the pictures.
Hmm.. I think I will follow your post. I don’t know what is pinterest, but I will try to learn it. Seems easy to use. Btw, do you know plugin how to add pinterest button on wordpress? so reader can pin it?
Hi Lisa,
I have to be honest I got my invite for pintrest a couple of days ago and I STILL dont get it ha ha ha. I am just not sure how it can drive or the point of it to be honest! Having said that I will keep going back to it and trying to understand it with helpful tutorials/Posts like yours
Thanks for the post
First comment here. Goes without saying, but great post and video. I can see Pinterest catching on, mostly because of the points mentioned in the article above. I’ve not been a big fan, or a ‘pinner’, I’ll be honest, but there is potential most certainly.
Awesome post and video Lisa, As we know that pinterest is a new social network but growing very fast i read another post about pinterest using eye catching images in your posts and share them on pinterest to get good amount of traffic. i’m using it and getting traffic on my blog.
Thanks.
One of the first photos I put on Pinterest generated a lot of repins and traffic, which got me hooked, still trying to duplicate that one, LOL! I’m sure it will be a natural for your hair site, a lot of people pin hairstyles that they like on there.
no doubt pinterest comes out as a winner in 2012 for best free traffic.thank u very much to share this kind of article on social media admin.
Lisa,
Have you heard of the Pinterest like site called Pinerly? It’s somewhat like Pinterest, but they allow you to schedule your pins. That’s something Pinterest doesn’t do “for the moment.” When you get a chance, check them out and let us know in a blog post, how you feel about Pinerly!
I can appreciate pinterest but I do not have many pictures to show on there. I focus on content.
It’s definitely the next biggest thing in social media and shouldn’t be ignored. Some of the stuff you can find there is actually pretty cool and it’s nice to have another place to drive traffic to your site.
One thing I would recommend, is if you’re going to sign up and be an active user, be sure to not post just YOUR things. Make boards for other things you’re interested too. This will help engage existing users of the site as well.
I’ve been using stumbleupon for free traffic but I will have to add this to my arsenal of traffic tricks!
Thanks for sharing this!
The traffic may be free, but is it relevant?!? I couldn’t imagine sending over useful traffic for a site like Pinterest if I’m being honest.
I agreed with Factsin. Thank You!
I don’t think i will use it just yet to help grow my Hubpages as some have, but i am going to look further into it as time goes on. For now I must say that i enjoyed going to their site, and just roaming around, as there were a lot of interesting things on their home page.
I recently joined in the Pinterest network. Now I have around 180+ followers and getting enough traffic from it. Now this Pinterest is my 3rd high referring traffic to my site. I will recommend to the users to use Pinterest and spend a reasonable time to develop for to start showing the traffic to your site or blog.
I just discovered pinterest today, from your blog.. I’ll try to make some traffic for my blog.. Thanks Lisa
I recently got addicted to PInterest. I joined it way bacl but hadn’t used it somehow! And now I wish I hadn’t! Though I am still working traffic on my blog through it but yes, I like what you mention here! Might try out pinning for blogging! 🙂
great post i have just joined pinterest and im still trying to figure out how it works
Thanks for the info…I’ve been invite to join pinterest and thats good for me!
Very cool! We’ve just been invited to join Pinterest last week, so we’re excited to explore what it can do for us!
Very cool suggestion. I had only recently heard of Pinterest. Thank you for giving an in depth explanation of the site.
wow, lisa, thankz for sharing this info, really helpful.
thanks lisa… i like your blog… and am newbi..
This is great and timely info for me…I’ve noticed traffic coming from Pinterest on a few of my bigger sites. Guess some images got on their somehow. Very exciting to say the least, guess I’ll need to check this out more now to see what all the buzz is about.
I am a pinterest fan myself. Pictures there are of a wide variety, I can explore photos and react differently to each. All of them are worth spreading in the net.
Thanks Lisa! Here in Italy Pinterest is almost unknown (as Twitter was up to 10 month s ago). So, in my case, I don’t know if it is worth spending time now on Pinterest, but I will take into serious consideration your advices when it will be the right moment!
I decided to be a member yesterday. I am a bit slow and I cannot find the option where I can post a pic. I will take time exploring it and I won’t stop until I get it. I know how talked about the site is and how many are becoming really satisfied.
This is my first time to heat about Pinterest.I have to try it as well and see if it will increase my traffic.I gotnothing to loose anyway.Thank you Lisa for the wonderful post
Hi Lisa,
Can you share some numbers and also bounce rate? I have the feeling pinterest is very similar to stumbleupon and the traffic from there is almost useless.
I just recently received an invitation from Pinterest. Since then i make sure to check the site once a day to get new ideas from home decor and DIY.
Just signed up for an invite. Thanks for the tip!