How to Get Big on Pinterest

Pinterest is one of the most powerful platforms for driving traffic, generating leads, and building a loyal brand following, but only if you treat it like what it is: a visual search engine. Forget everything you know about chasing likes on other social media apps. On Pinterest, an old Pin can send you traffic for years after you’ve published it. This guide is your complete roadmap to growing a significant presence on Pinterest by focusing on strategy, not just aesthetics.

Understand Pinterest's True Purpose: It’s a Search Engine

Success on Pinterest starts with a fundamental mindset shift. It is not just another social network where people go to connect with friends. People go to Pinterest to plan their futures, find inspiration, solve problems, and make purchase decisions. They are actively searching for ideas related to home decor, recipes, fashion, business advice, and millions of other topics.

What does this mean for you? It means your content needs to be discoverable. Unlike a tweet or an Instagram post that has a lifespan of a few hours, a well-optimized Pin can gain traction over weeks, months, and even years. Someone searching for "small living room ideas" today might find a Pin you create years from now. This long-term value is what makes Pinterest a goldmine for creators, marketers, and businesses.

Step 1: Set Up for Success with a Business Account

If you’re still using a personal profile, your first move is to switch to a free Pinterest Business Account. This is non-negotiable if you want to get big on the platform. A business account unlocks features essential for growth that personal profiles just don’t have.

What you get with a Business Account:

• Analytics: See which Pins and boards are performing best, what your audience is interested in, and how much traffic you’re driving to your website. This data is your guide to creating more of what works.
• Rich Pins: These are enhanced Pins that automatically sync information from your website. There are different types, like 'Article Rich Pins' that show a headline and author, and 'Product Rich Pins' that display real-time pricing and availability. They're more professional and provide better context for users.
• Claim Your Website: This is a big one. Claiming your website links your Pinterest profile directly to your site, adding your profile picture to any content Pinned from your domain. It also gives you access to a deeper level of analytics about what people are saving from your site.

Once you’ve switched over, optimize your profile to attract the right audience and signal your topic authority to the Pinterest algorithm.

• Your Profile Photo: Use a clear, high-quality headshot or a clean brand logo. Make it easily recognizable.
• Your Profile Name: Don't just put your name. Include a primary keyword that describes what you do or what you offer. For example, instead of "Jane Doe," use "Jane Doe | Vegan Recipe Blogger."
• Your Bio: You have a limited space, so make it count. Clearly state who you help and what you offer, sprinkling in your most important keywords. This helps users and the algorithm understand what your account is all about.

Step 2: Master Pinterest SEO to Be Easily Found

Since Pinterest is a search engine, you need to think like an SEO. People find your content by typing keywords into the search bar. Your job is to figure out what those keywords are and use them strategically across your account.

How to Find the Right Keywords

Pinterest gives you all the tools you need for keyword research built right into the platform. No expensive third-party tools are necessary.

Use the Pinterest Search Bar: Type in a broad topic related to your industry (e.g., "living room decor"). Pinterest will automatically suggest more specific, long-tail keywords underneath the search bar in colorful bubbles. For "living room decor," you might see suggestions like "cozy," "farmhouse," "modern," or "on a budget." These are topics that real users are actively searching for. Make a list of these and repeat the process for all of your main content pillars.

Where to Place Your Keywords

Once you have a list of hyper-relevant keywords, you need to seamlessly integrate them into your profile and content. Putting them in the right spots tells the Pinterest algorithm how to categorize and rank your Pins.

• Pin Titles: Your Pin's title is your headline. It should be catchy and contain your primary keyword. Think like a magazine editor: "10 Easy Ways to Organize Your Small Kitchen."
• Pin Descriptions: This is where you can tell a small story and include several long-tail keywords naturally. Don't just dump keywords, write 2-3 helpful sentences describing what the user will find when they click. Include relevant hashtags at the end.
• Board Titles & Descriptions: Your boards need to be optimized, too. Give them clear, keyword-rich titles (e.g., "Healthy gluten-free recipes," not "Yummy Stuff"). Then, write a short paragraph description for each board that includes a few related keywords. This helps Pinterest understand the context of the Pins you save there.
• Your Profile Bio (As Mentioned Above): Reinforce your niche by putting your core business keywords right in your bio.

Consistently applying keywords across your account creates a powerful signal to Pinterest, helping your content get shown to the right users. This is by far the most important activity for organic growth.

Step 3: Create Pins People Actually Want to Click and Save

SEO gets your content seen, but great design gets it clicked. Your Pins need to stop the scroll. With thousands of images competing for attention, your visuals must be clear, compelling, and optimized for the platform.

Hallmarks of a perfect Pin:

• Go Vertical: Always use a vertical aspect ratio. The standard recommendation is 2:3 (e.g., 1000 x 1500 pixels). This takes up more screen real estate on mobile devices and performs best.
• Use High-Quality Images or Video: Blurry or poorly lit visuals will get ignored. Use crisp, clear, and vibrant images and video clips. Video Pins often get prioritized a bit higher in the feed because they hold a user's attention longer.
• Add a Text Overlay: Your visual is the hook, but a text overlay is the bait. Add a bold, easy-to-read headline directly onto your Pin image. This immediately tells the user what your Pin is about without them needing to read the small description. Use fonts and colors that match your brand.
• Stay on Brand: Keep your style consistent - use the same fonts, colors, and logo placement across your Pins. This builds brand recognition over time. Viewers will start to recognize your content in their feed before they even see your name.
• Include a Clear Call to Action (CTA): A simple CTA in your description like "Read the full recipe on our blog" or "Shop this look now" encourages users to take the next step. Let them know what's waiting for them when they click.

Your goal is to become a content factory, but that doesn't mean sacrificing quality. Use tools like Canva to create simple templates you can reuse quickly to produce great-looking Pins without starting from scratch every time.

Step 4: Adopt a Consistent and Fresh Pinning Strategy

To get "big" on Pinterest, you need to feed the algorithm consistently. That doesn't mean you need to be glued to your screen all day, but you do need a reliable publishing schedule.

Focus on "Fresh" Pins

In the past, endless repinning of the same content was encouraged. Today, Pinterest heavily prioritizes fresh content. A "fresh Pin" is defined as a brand new image or video that has never appeared on Pinterest before. It can link to an old blog post or product, but the visual itself must be new.

Here’s what that means in practice:

Instead of creating ONE Pin image for your blog post about "10 Time-Saving Morning Habits," create 5-10 different Pin designs for it. You can switch up the background image, the text overlay headline, or the colors. Then, you can schedule these unique Pin designs to be published over time, driving long-term, sustained traffic to the same piece of content.

How Often Should You Pin?

This is the million-dollar question, and there's no single magic number. The key is consistency that you can sustain. Start with a goal of pinning 3-10 fresh Pins per day. This shows the algorithm that you are an active and valuable contributor to the platform. Trying to pin 30 times one day and then disappearing for a week is far less effective than pinning 5 times every single day. Look for a quantity you can realistically maintain.

Final Thoughts

Getting big on Pinterest isn't about viral luck, it's about strategy and consistency. By treating it like a search engine, optimizing your account and content with the right keywords, creating scroll-stopping visuals, and sticking to a consistent publishing schedule, you can build a powerful engine for traffic and brand growth that works for you 24/7.

If creating and manually pinning multiple fresh designs every day feels overwhelming, that's where a good planning tool can make a huge difference. At Postbase, we built our visual calendar to make planning and scheduling your content - especially video pins and posts for other platforms - a straightforward process. You can see your entire month at a glance and schedule your pins in bunches, freeing you up to focus on creating great content without the daily login grind.