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There’s a lot that goes into Pinterest SEO best strategies. The beauty of it is, it doesn’t have to be as hard as you think.
If you implement everything I’m about to tell you, your chances of being seen are going to increase tremendously. Make it a part of your routine and watch your numbers as they continue to go up.
Let’s dive right in to get a better understanding of Pinterest SEO.


What is Pinterest SEO?
For the easiest comparison, think of it the way you do with Google.
When you’re optimizing the SEO for your website, you’re doing it in order to rank higher and be more easily found when users search certain keywords or phrases.
Pinterest works the same way.
Pinterest looks at all the information you provide within a Pin and determines how it will be ranked. If you are using Pinterest to drive traffic to your website, you need to treat the SEO of your account as a whole with the same importance that you do for your website.
Why are Keywords so Important?
This is how you are found when anybody does a search. They may do a search for something completely relevant to your content but if it isn’t optimized correctly and accurately, you will never be found. You want to be at the top of the search results every single time whenever someone is looking for information related to your content.
The only way that is going to happen is if you are using not only the right keywords but placing them properly too.
Best Way to Find Pinterest Keywords
Pinterest SEO best strategies include utilizing the search bar within Pinterest to determine keywords that you should be using.
When you start to type within the search bar, it automatically generates the most popular search terms.
For example, I’m going to search ‘cooking with kids’ in my Pinterest search bar. When you enter ‘cooking’ in the search bar, it automatically starts generating keywords and phrases of the most popular searches.
Here is what popped up.


As you can see ‘cooking with kids’ is the 4th option on what popped up. This is clearly a highly searched term and a good option to be used.
Once you determine which search terms are being used most, next you’ll need to make sure you’re using a good balance of both short-tail vs long-tail keywords. This is a big part of Pinterest SEO’s best strategies.
Short Tail Vs. Long Tail Keywords
Short-tail keywords usually consist of 1-2 words while long-tail keywords can consist of 4-5 words or maybe more.
The reason you want to use both is that you want an opportunity to capture your entire potential audience. Some people use very short search terms when they are looking for more general information about the topic.
In my example, if I simply searched ‘cooking,’ anything related to that topic would pop up.
On the other hand, some people use longer search terms when they are looking for something more specific. My search for ‘cooking with kids’ was a lot more specific and the results would be more closely related to what I was looking for.
You want to be able to get into both of those search results to have a better chance of being seen. This is why a balance between the two is super important.
Where to Place Keywords?
Pinterest is a powerful tool and should be treated as such. It’s extremely smart and looks in every possible place for keywords to better match your Pins with the correct search terms.


The following are all the places you want to make sure that you are including these keywords in order to rank higher on Pinterest and maximize your Pinterest SEO best strategies.
- Pin title
- Pin description
- Pin image (yes they can read the image itself)
- Pin image file name
- Board name
- Board description
If you'd like some more tips about Pinterest, check out Why You Need to be Pinning with Intention and how it's important to your success.
Pin Title
You want to make sure you’re including your Keyword in your title. What word or couple words do you want to use that you think people will search for? This is the first place that you need to add that.
Also, make sure your title is something people are searching for. You want to pop-up as soon as someone searches for information provided within your content.
Pin Description
This is a great place for both your keywords and key phrases. Don’t just type in a bunch of keywords and phrases that make no sense like you do hashtags on Instagram. Pinterest wants it to be in sentence format and read as such.
Don’t forget too, this is the best spot to place a call to action. Make sure to say what the Pin is about, what makes it important, and what needs to be done next. You want them to click through to your website so give them a reason to.
Another great way to execute Pinterest SEO best strategies.


Pin Image
You might be thinking, why does the image matter? Well, Pinterest is soooooo smart, it actually looks at what the image is and reads the words on it.
This is just another factor that helps them to further determine what your Pin is about and what keywords and key phrases to connect it with.
Pin Image File Name
Yes, they can even read the title of the image file name. This is a great place to hide those longtail key phrases that might be harder to work into the Pin or board description.
I like to try to add a couple to each image name. This is another great place to apply Pinterest SEO best strategies.
Pin Board Name
Make sure you’re naming your boards with terms that people are searching for. The easiest way is to try and search what you want to name your board to see whether it even shows up in the search.
If it shows up immediately, then you know it’s a highly searched term. If it doesn’t, I’d reconsider choosing another name if you want it to show up in searches.
Pin Board Description
This is the most overlooked place to put your keywords and key phrases. I myself am guilty of ignoring this section. But again, another great place to tell people what your board is about. This will also help you rank higher in the searches for those matching search terms.
If you haven’t done these descriptions yet, I’d suggest maybe doing a couple each day to catch up on getting it done. It will definitely help you in the long run. Pinterest SEO best strategies include putting keywords everywhere as possible.


Make Sure You Stay Up to Date
Things are constantly changing. This could include staying on top of changes to the rules and regulations within the Pinterest platform, the trends of what people are looking for, or the best strategies to drive the most traffic to your website.
Whatever it may be, you don’t want to be left behind so stay on top of the Pinterest SEO best strategies. Everyone else on Pinterest is constantly upping their game and studying the trends. You need to make sure you are always maximizing your opportunity to be seen and keep driving traffic to your desired destination.
Making sure you are making the best use of every opportunity to place your keywords and key phrases is critical to your success. Implement Pinterest SEO best strategies and give yourself a chance to be seen as much as possible.
Now that we have that part figured out, you might want to check out, How You Can Use Pinterest to Start Making Money.
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Really great information! The topics covered in this post is on point!
Great suggestions and so true! The YOAST plug in helps me optimize SEO and I use the same strategy for my pins. Pinterest is my top traffic driver to the blog.
Great post!! This is certainly an area I need to beef up!
All great tips! I love using Pinterest and hoping the more I use it the better I get at it!
Great tips! I thought I was doing pretty well just starting out with about 100k monthly viewers, but with the new algorithm change it plummeted to about 50k, but it looks like it has recovered and now I can focus on growing again.
I’m not enjoying the changes either! My numbers are not very pleasing but I’m determined to get them up!
this is the best comprehensive information i have read on pinterest lately. i am struggling to understand both pinterest and tailwind. i love pinning but find it so tiresome!!!
This was so helpful. I have so much to learn how Pinterest works. Thanks
Great tips and reminders. I’ve been steadily working on all of these points and seeing growth from my efforts.
I need to get better at my Pinterest SEO. I’ve neglected it.
Optimizing your Pinterest profile is important. I think so many bloggers are forgetting the gold that Pinterest search is for traffic.
Pinterest is a great media source to get high traffic on website and I’m currently use this right now thanks for this great strategy tips it would help a lot.
This is really helpful for me as a newbie in this blogging field, I need a lot to learn huhu. Thanks for this.
Great suggestions. Pinterest is a wonderful too to drive traffic.
For the longest time I’ve had and still have many questions regarding pinterest. I really want to use it but I just don’t know how. But this post has shed some light on a lot of questions I had. I’ll keep my eyes peeled for more on pinterest. Really helpful. Thanks for sharing.
I never thought about utilizing the image file name to my advantage. Thanks for the tip.
It is an insightful and informative post. I learnt something new today 🙂
thanks so much for this informative useful sharing, gonna learn & practise for my SEO max. cheers, siennylovesdrawing
Bookmarked! These are awesome tips, do they work the same way for google?
I can’t agree more !
Like they say: “starting is half the battle”.
I prefer Pinterest over many other social platforms !
What admire the most about it is the DIYs and infographic posts.
Indeed, working on building a powerful seo strategy in it
is definitely fruitful !
I know pinterest drives traffic and I’ve been guilty of not utilizing this tool to create engagement. Thank you for sharing your insights.
THANK YOU! Pinned and saved for reference!
I really REALLY need to up my pinterest game! Thank you!
I am still struggle a bit with this, very helpful information!
I’m struggling with Pinterest and the entire SEO subject, and these tips are super helpful. I didn’t know about long/short keywords…
Dang this was helpful! I’ve been just using SEO that I use in my post for Google. But I need to remember to head over to Pinterest to test out my keywords there, too. And I hadn’t thought about making my image names different keywords for each one. Right now I’m just naming them “Pin for [insert post title] [insert 1-5]” so I can definite improve upon that! I’m pinning this post for later! Thanks!
I had no idea that it could read images. This is super helpful information; thank you!
This is super useful and easy to understand. I’m still new at this, and will definitely have to go back and change some stuff in my Pinterest account! Thanks so much!
Super great tips! Thanks!
Really interesting!! I know I need to use pinterest more – my friend SWEARS but it – but I just hardly ever get on there anymore! I really need to step my game up!
Pinterest is such a great way to get traffic to your blog. Great tips!
I love how Pinterest works but I still have so many things to learn about it. Thank you for this post!
What a great article! SEO is definitely something I need to work on.
I’m still learning Pinterest, just started almost a month ago. For now I had some monthly viewer, not so much but very few click link so hope to improve my Pinterest strategy. Thanks for sharing all these useful info
These are really great! I’m hoping to get more traffic from Pinterest as I get better at it.
In the description, can you write more than one description? example is Long skirt out / long skirt / how to wear long skirt. If yes, what do you use as a separator? Is it comma like in the blog posts?
Thanks in advance.
In the description, you’re going to want it more in sentence format. Maybe use that style in the image file name. I usually save my images using this format. (title – keywords – key phrase). You might be able to fit a couple of those in the description if you were to say something like, “Do you like to wear long skirts? Let me show you a variety of looks on how to rock long skirt outfits.” Hopefully that helps!
These are important lessons for new bloggers. I wish I had this information when I first started!
Exactly why I wrote it because I didn’t know this when I started out. Hoping it really helps the newbies and is a refresher for the more seasoned bloggers.
Great tips! Pinterest is my favorite place get visitors.
This was so helpful! I’m going to go check right now if my image titles and board descriptions are filled in correctly. Thank you.
As a blogger, I, of course, know about many of these aspects and really work hard on them. However, it’s always good to be reminded of how important all those steps are.
Agreed! I have to remind myself of the basics at times because I get so wrapped up in other aspects of my blog.
Hi it’s Brenda from RubyHemMinistries.com Seems I’m right in step with my Pinterest SEO. I hope I start seeing some decent traffic soon.
Thank you for this post! I learnt so much…. I can’t believe Pinterest can even read the image file name. I’ve been doing it all wrong it seems!
I needed to read this today, been discouraged because my monthly views keep going down. Super helpful!
Great post – I find Pinterest group boards reach to be declining of late. However, I am still seeing nice traffic from Tailwind Tribes directly. Maybe these are the new “group boards” – anyway, another super hot tip is VIDEO. Pinterest wants to get in on the video game, and they are pushing video way more than images right now so if you can create some video content!
Maybe it’s just me but I skip over the videos usually. I struggle to access the link to CT to see more so I just pass over them now.
I had no idea Pinterest could read the words on the pin image! I feel like this is the missing link I needed!
I had been practicing many of these things for a while and amazed at the increase in my exposure. But then fell off the wagon on them and watched it go back down. This is a great precise what to make sure you are doing everything. Thanks for the encouragement to be more diligent with this. Good read.
Great post! Lot’s of useful information. Can’t wait to utilize.
This was so helpful. I have been having trouble with Pinterest, so I’m going to try some of these tips.
Wow ! Great info and so concise and easy to follow! Thanks!
Thanks for sharing this! I’ve been a long time user of Pinterest but never have utilized it to drive traffic to my blog… not properly anyways!!
Thank you for sharing these great tips for Pinterest. Really useful for newbies and a good reminder to older users ?
Thank you so much for these great Pinterest tips. I’ll be putting some of them into practice.
Thanks. Needed this so much
I need this as I am brand-new in navigating Pinterest.
Very informative article. Will be reading more of your info. Thanks so much
Pinterest is one of the best social media sites for bloggers and if you understand Pinterest SEO you can drive thousands of people every day to your blog.
Great post and you broke it down so its easy to understand. I am still new to the blogging world and haven’t really scratched the surface of Pinterest yet but I know that I really need to. I will definitely refer to your post because it was helpful and straight to the point. Thanks!
Thanks for writing this! I thought you had some really great points! I love Pinterest for marketing, although sometimes it’s hit or miss for me how well it works.
Thanks for sharing this, it is very informative! I am still very much a pinterest and SEO newbie so any and all tips always help.
I’m still learning about Pinterest and this is so helpful! Thank you! 🙂
I am so new to Pinterest that I’m still trying to navigate it. This post gave very useful tips. Thanks