Earlier this year, we would have said that follower count does not really matter on Pinterest. It’s all about the SEO right - growing monthly views to then get more traffic to our website or blog? While this is still right, Pinterest has made it clear that they want us to stay on the platform longer, to engage with its users and of course see their adverts! They are now actively sharing your new and interesting content to your followers first - so it it is now important to focus on growing this audience. As more people seeing your pins, who already love what you do, means you are more likely to get more click throughs.

But how do we grow our followers? Our follower numbers have been growing organically across our 3 Pinterest accounts over the last year or so, with one account growing by 5000 followers in 12 months. This has primarily been a result of creating great content or pins, that Pinterest users love and search for (crafting, interiors and fashion) consistently focusing on using key words on boards and pins.

However on top of these best practices there are other things that you can do. Here are just a few ways to get more followers on Pinterest.

Turn up on the platform rather than just scheduling

While Tailwind is great to schedule pins, saving you time - it can mean you spend little time on Pinterest itself. Try to make time to turn up, to search for pins, see what is trending, see what they suggest to you in your home feed. When you see great pins that resonate with you - engage with them. Manually pinning regularly and re-pinning others content manually will also help.

Engage with other users - like and comment on their pins

Remember that Pinterest was once thought of solely as social media and not SEO - and they are keen to get back to that (to a certain extent). Therefore take the time to engage with other accounts, leave comments, follow boards, follow accounts, like pins - show up! Use the search bar and type in something similar to you, to find accounts that you’ll love (and will love you back!)

Use the Trend and Explore pages and engage and re-pin from there

The trend page is a great tool to see what is popular, to help you with your own content creation. If you see pins that you like, and that are aligned to your brand - take the time to engage with them.

Follow relevant boards in your niche

You may want to follow everyone hoping that they’ll follow back, but this is not likely to be a strategy that works. Say in your niche - the accounts pinning within your niche are more likely to be your kind of people. Plus many won’t be businesses, meaning you will be engaging with potential customers.

Look at how you can make your account and boards easier to follow

Make sure your account and boards are well organised, with your best boards on the top row. Consider segmenting the content in each board to make it easier for your audience to see. Remember to add key words to board descriptions considering what your audience will be searching for, as well as a few key general hashtags.

Review your bio

Check your bio to ensure it is optimised with key words that describe what you do considering what people are searching for. Rather than just your name, consider adding what you do to the title - for example ours is The Indie Practice | Digital Marketing for Creative Businesses.

Check out your competitors followers and engage with them

Like with any platform a great way to find new people to engage with, is by looking at who your competitors follow. We are not suggesting spamming anyone, nor copying anyone, but this is a great and simple way to find new interesting accounts that are likely to be similar to yours. When you find them, take the time to like and follow boards, re-pin any relevant pins as well as leaving comments on their work. Be authentic, and don’t leave generic words such as “Nice Pin” which is likely to be flagged as spam.

Review your content

Take the time to check that your pins are worthy of being followed. Are you creating story pins (UK accounts can do this in Carousel mode) or video pins which are getting more engagement than static pins? Do your pins have clear Call To Actions on, or headlines that your customers will want to click. Do you have Rich Pins set up? Are your images great - optimised and good quality? Are they the right size?

Want more help with this - check out our Pin Design Masterclass here.

Share your account to other platforms

Share your latest boards or pins to other platforms such as Instagram Stories. Rather then simply telling people to follow you, get them interested in the content you may be sharing there. For example, how about creating a poll asking which board to create next. Or share your latest pins on a theme that your instagram audience will love. If you have the swipe up function, make sure you remember to add your Pinterest link and tell people it is there.

Add a Pinterest button to your website

Seems like an obvious one but many businesses only add their Facebook and Twitter buttons to their website. Go and add the Pinterest one to encourage people to click through and see all your inspiration.

The best thing you can do to grow your followers on Pinterest, is to create great fresh content with SEO rich descriptions. This way you won’t need fancy tactics to grow your followers - they will love you for what you do and follow anyway!

Want to find out more? Or want more support with Pinterest. Our Pinterest Design Masterclass is here, or alternatively let’s talk about is managing your Pinterest for you.

IF YOU FOUND THIS USEFUL, WHY NOT ADD IT TO YOUR PINTEREST BOARDS TO REFER BACK TO LATER!