Looking for ways to get over the Pinterest traffic slump and increase traffic? I’m sharing four ways to increase Pinterest traffic in just a few minutes each day.

My Pinterest Traffic Strategy

This is a beginners guide to quickly increasing Pinterest traffic. If you’re strapped for time to dedicate to your Pinterest strategy, this is a great approach to make sure you’re using your time wisely and driving real results (traffic to your website or blog).

Here’s a look at what I suggest you focus on:

1. Give old posts an extended life
2. Pin your own content, aggressively and  more consistently
3. Understand which content will be popular in the upcoming months, and pin that
4. Pin a variety of Pin formats

But, before we dive in let’s back up a bit.

I’ve been hearing a lot of bloggers and online business owners say that they are seeing a lot less traffic coming from Pinterest lately. Is this true for you? If so, I have a few educated guesses as to why you might be experiencing a Pinterest traffic slump.

Possible Reasons Your Pinterest Traffic Dropped

Wondering why your Pinterest traffic is down? Here are some possible reasons:

• There are a lot more people saving ideas on Pinterest (around 400 million Pinners as of 2022) which means there is a lot more content for Pinners to discover. (ie your content is getting buried, fast).
  
• It’s possible you’ve been putting less effort into understanding what’s working on Pinterest and simply Pinning your images and then crossing your fingers your content takes off.
  
• You never had a clear and informed Pinterest strategy other than joining a few group boards and Pinning all of your recent blog posts.
  
• You haven’t taken into account all of the new ways Pinners can discover content now (keyword searches, browsing Pinterest Explore, Promoted Pins, Idea Pins).
  
• You forgot all about those older pins that used to do so well at bringing in traffic, and now they’ve died out.
  
• You’re posting duplicate Pins to multiple Pinterest boards (not a good idea!)

Can you relate to any of these possible scenarios? (I’m raising my hand over here.) I also noticed a dip in traffic to my entertaining blog (ThoughtfullySimple.com), so I put a simple plan in place to get over that Pinterest traffic slump. And my plan only required me to spend 15-20 minutes each morning. The good news is that with a little effort you can swing that Pinterest traffic back in your direction.

How To Start to Grow Your Pinterest Traffic

Not sure where to start? Well, because I like to make the most strategic use of my time, I like to start with the things that will take the least amount of time and effort, but make the biggest impact (I’m ALL about working smarter, not harder).

So, here’s a short list of just three things you can do in just 15 minutes per day that will help increase your Pinterest traffic.

1. Give old blog posts an extended life

Update images on old blog posts that have historically brought in significant traffic from:
a) Pinterest and b) Google search.

These will likely be your older posts that have some great SEO value. Could they be updated? For me, this was most impactful use of my time. I had a few posts that seemed to hit it out of the park with SEO value making it so a lot of traffic was coming from both Google search and Pinterest (example above), but they were really old and had images that were not really optimized for Pinterest. I focused on updating the images so they were optimized for Pinterest. To do this, resized them to be the
ideal Pinterest image size, added a text overlay, and gave all of my alt images new optimized Pin descriptions.

They might not be your favorite posts of all time, but people are finding them and sharing them so you might as well make sure they are as strong. To find out what posts to focus on, look at what posts are bringing in the most traffic in Google Analytics and focus on the top 5-10 posts.

TORI’S TIP: Pick one post to do this for each morning for two weeks. It will only take you about 20 minutes each day.

2. Pin your own content, aggressively and  more consistently

How often are you pinning your own blog posts? I’ll bet that you need to step it up. So many people tend to focus on their ratio of pinning their own content vs other people’s content and I just don’t understand why people get hung up on this.

You are NOT going to drive any traffic to your blog, drive customers to your shop, or subscribers to your list, by pinning other people’s content. Just saying.

The truth is, people are not going to your board and looking at your most recent pins and thinking “Gosh, Tori only pins her own things.” Like you, most Pinners log into their account and either scroll their home feeds, start navigating with Explore, or begin searching in the search bar. THAT is how they are finding new pins. But, are they YOUR pins? Or are they all of the other bloggers’ pins you’ve been worrying about sharing?

Pin your own content to several different boards–regularly. Do it like it’s your job (because it IS your job!). Of course sharing other relevant content is a nice way to round out your Pinterest boards, support fellow bloggers, and simply enjoy using the platform. But, it should not be a priority. Your content is a priority since that is what will get your more Pinterest traffic.

TORI’S TIP: Binge Pinning is 100% fine. Pinterest doesn’t push out all of your pins in real time like they used to. Their algorithm drips out your Pins to your followers’ feeds based on their super smart algorithm. So, feel free to knock out all of your pinning at once. I like to do 5 minutes in the morning and 5 minutes in the evening. It doesn’t really matter how much time you spend, just that you are pinning consistently. You can also use the scheduling tool to make sure you have content ready to drip over the course of the week.

3. Understand which content will be popular in the upcoming months, and Pin that

In addition to using Pinterest’s new trend tool, I like to use Google Analytics to help inform what to Pin. Pinners are planners and if you begin thinking like a Pinner would be searching, your whole Pinterest-strategy game is about to improve. If you dial in to what Pinners will be searching for 30 and 60 days from now, and make sure that content is fresh on Pinterest, you will increase the chances of getting in front of them at the right time. This works really great with evergreen and seasonal content. I like to take a look ahead, by looking back. (Stick with me here!). To get insight and make an educated guess on what Pinners will be looking for in July . . . in May, I do this exercise:

• Look in Google Analytics and set the date range to July 2016 and compare that to July 2015.
• Next, navigate to Acquisition > Social > Network Referral > Pinterest (on the left sidebar)
• Then I look at what what posts saw the most traffic from Pinterest. If it was a top post for both years, chances are it’s going to be a strong one again. Looking back at just one year is fine too, but if you have the historical data, might as well go back to two years.
• Then, I make sure to begin pinning and repinning that content now (you can also go through step one above and update the images and Pin descriptions at this time if needed).

TORI’S TIP: Keep in mind these steps are meant to bring you an increase in Pinterest traffic NOW. That’s why we are focusing here on what we KNOW brings traffic in July, vs what we want people to see or think the trending searches will be.

No guessing required, we are leveraging data to build on what we know has worked in the past.

4. Pin a variety of Pin formats

Many people get frustrated when things change on Pinterest. The algorithm is ever-changing which means your content strategy needs to evolve as well. If you’ve noticed your Static Pins aren’t getting much traction then pay attention to what type of Pin formats are doing well. Currently, Pinterest is favoring Idea Pins. And, video always seems to get in front of Pinners as well. It’s smart to Pin a variety of Pin content and take note of what seems to be driving the most impressions, engagements, and traffic.

What do you think? Plan to spend a little time to try out these 4 methods for increasing your Pinterest traffic? Let me know in the comments! And be sure to Pin this post to reference later using the buttons below. 

Want more?

• Master Pinterest descriptions to drive even more traffic.
• How to design click-worthy Pins
• How to optimize your Pinterest boards
• How to utilize Pinterest’s new trend tool
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Tori Tait is sharing her experience as a Content Director and Pinterest expert. Since 2006 she's been helping entrepreneurs build their businesses online through simple & smart marketing strategies.