How To Sell Products On Pinterest
Pinterest is an excellent social media tool to market and sell your products. Hundreds of Thousands of people use their service daily and you can get a piece of the pie, gaining that traffic to your products and services. This guide will show you how to sell products on pinterest.
We will go over finding a niche, creating or having a Pinterest business account, branding, and optimizing.
Note: To sell on Pinterest using “rich pins” and “shopping pins” you must have a catalog that you link to Pinterest AND then be set up as a verified merchant.
Affiliate Products Are NOT Allowed through the shopping features. You can sell affilate products on Pinterest just not through shopping pins.
Pinterest Shopping Features
To sell your products or service on Pinterest you will be utilizing the Pinterest Shopping features. Here is a rundown of what the features are and how they work.
1. There is the visual search option which allows you to look for products with an image. (Like Google image search but within Pinterest.) It will show you pins of that product and related products.
2. Use the “Shop Similar” feature (located on shoppable pins) to find products that are similar to a pin you’ve saved. If you don’t have an image, you can use the search bar to look directly for products.
3. Save Product Pins and Shop Later Feature. See the details of the products you’ve pinned. There are also reviews and/or shipping information.
4. Browse products by category or brand.
5. The style guide option.
When searching for certain products you can compare it to your (existing décor if it is in pin form) so that you can make a purchasing decision based on style. It also helps you compare prices.
How to Sell on Pinterest
- Picking A Niche
- Branding
- Upload a catalog
- Use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) For Pins
- Pin Tips
Picking A Niche
Start by picking a niche. Since Pinterest is predominantly used by women that is where we would start looking for ideas. You are looking for a niche where there will be customers everyday.
Who is your target audience?
Women? Men? Animal Lovers? Automobile Lovers? Home Decor Enthusists?
Now what category will you choose?
Pinterest is mainly used for home decor, fashion, beauty, recipes, pet and animal stuff. There are of course other categories but those are the big ones.
Below is a screen shot of “Categories and Interests” in the analytics of Pinterest. It is just a small sample of the categories and subcategories available.
We thought you might also be interested in the age and gender statistics of Pinterest.
Once you have chosen a niche you will need to create a brand for the account and optimize accordingly.
Branding
Make sure to optimize your profile and make it visually appealing and (hopefully) enticing.
Use SEO-friendly keywords and variations and write a compelling/interesting description that explains what makes your brand unique, different, valuable, and why you stand out from the crowd. It will help your followers understand your brand better, make them want to buy from you, and help your account get found by the search engines.
Branding Tip 1: You will want to use your own logo or create one for your brand.
Branding Tip 2: You will also want to pick your brands colors to stay consistant.
Upload Your Catalog
After you sign up for a business account you will be prompted to add your catalog. Follow the steps and fill out the form.
If some how you do not see the prompts or you are adding products as a later addition to your Pinterest account, go to the “Ad’s Tab” and click “Catalogs” which will then take you through the same process.
Use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) For Pins
You will want to create visually appealing pins so that customers want to click on the image. Then the image will pop up with a description. If you have done your job right when uploading the pin and pin info, the description will include keywords but sound natural and be readable. You basically are making your pin(s) readable to search engines and your readers. This will help your pin get found!
If you are using “rich pins” some of the information from the website will populate on the pin. What we mean is if you have your pin linking to a store page on a website, the details that are listed on that page such as price, description, cooking times, etc will apear on the pin.
Pin Tips
Pin Tip 1: Pins should be natural and readable – keyword stuffing will not help. People visually see a pin first then click. They don’t want to be looking at something indescribable in the description. They want it short and sweet, but to the point.
Pin Tip 2: Use a content calendar or scheduler to manage your time on Pinterest so that you get the most out of the platform.
Pin Tip 3: Make sure your pin descriptions are interesting and include keywords naturally.
Pin Tip 4: Always fill out the “alt text” for the pin. Not only does this repeat the product keywords but it helps Google to index the pin. Finally, and perhaps the most important, it is for the visually impaired. Software is used for the visually impaired that reads this information out loud. It needs to make sense and be uncomplicated.
Pin Tip 5: If your pin is an advertisement or a sponsored post you do need to make sure it is marked accordingly. If it links to a blog post that has affilate links you don’t need to do anything. You only need to do this if it leads straight to an affilate link.
A hashtag of #advertisement or #sponsored will do the trick nicely. With Rich Pins this information (“sponsored post”) shows up automatically.
Sources
https://later.com/blog/brands-on-pinterest/
https://www.pinterest.com/marketingtoolsandprograms/branding/
Conclusion
Since Pinterest is a visual platform, you must create stunning eye catching pins that attract and entice potential customers. The description is just as important so that the pin gets found with in search engines. Make sure to brand your profile and pins not only for continuity, but also because people have been known to steal pins that are not labeled.
We have an interesting quote from a friend of ours that we would like to leave you with.
“Just remember what sells is the life after the product rather than the product…why do you buy a drill…for the fluting, the material…nope for the holes it can make and the shelves you can put up….”
