I have spent approximately seven hours on Pinterest today. My post title is a bit misleading, but I liked the sound of the double ps. I wasn’t really playing or just pinning posts. I decided to work on blog “stuff” after lunch, thinking I would do another project late in the afternoon for tonight’s post. However, hours later, I realized working on my Pinterest page had become my project! And it was about time.
As a blogger, I rely on social media to push out my posts and connect with readers. Now in my fifth year of blogging, I have built up a nice readership base that continues to grow. The majority of my readers come to my blogs through Google searches and a site called StumbleUpon. However online places such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest continue to funnel a steady stream of readers my way.
I’m in the process of updating my social media sites and cleaning them up. Here is what today’s “to do” list for Pinterest looked like:
The first section was easy enough, involving minor but important changes. My Pinterest page name now matches my primary blog name…Cindy Goes Beyond. I updated the profile pic and added info about myself.
The second section is what occupied much of my day and it felt so good to clean up my Pinterest page. I eliminated a dozen or more old boards. Pinterest began as a site to collect ideas by “pinning” them to boards. It still functions that way. Pinterest is more than a virtual idea board creator though. It is a great place to also find articles and posts about a broad range of topics. I began pinning every blog post on Pinterest in January of 2016.
As I worked on each board, I checked first for duplicate pins, then created a cover photo for every board. The app WordSwag (its free in the app store) was a great help here. I immediately liked the cleaner look of the boards. The energy flow was better. And it was especially important that the boards that contain my blog posts have a cover photo that includes my blog address.
Here is a quick tutorial if you would like to freshen your boards.
This board just has one pin so far. It will likely contain pins from others and not just my own posts. I created a cover photo, using WordSwag.
Touch the pencil symbol on the upper left side of the page. That is the EDIT button.
Click on the Board Cover tab with the + sign in the middle. This allows you to load a photo from your board. You must have your new cover photo on the board to use it. I can send pics to Pinterest directly from the photo section of my phone. When I create on WordSwag the finished work is saved to my photos.
Under the board name are two other sections that I filled out on every board today…Description (what the board is about) and Topic. When you click the arrow for Topic, it opens up a list of categories to choose from. Click the Done button when finished editing.
My cover photo added and the sections filled out.
The completed board.
I went through this process on all of my boards. And I discovered a very helpful feature.
I had not added a board yet for the Italy trip I enjoyed last year. I created the cover photo. And created a new board. Here is the cool part…
You can now categorize within each board! I added a Blog Posts section and one for Photos. Each post could then be easily dropped into the blog section while the photos went into their own area. I like this feature!
I have a hundred more photos from Italy to add…but you can see how nicely this works. The finished board will look like this…
That section feature works well for organizing blog posts within their boards. I tried it on the Journey With Healthy Me one.
My pins on that board are now divided into seven sections. I don’t know that I will attempt to categorize the last three years of daily blog posts. That would be an enormous undertaking. I might set up this year’s board though, since so far there are less than 30 pins.
I am satisfied with this day’s blog work. I learned new things and organized and created better looking boards. I have more to move onto Pinterest. I have two complete years of blog posts not on Pinterest yet…2014 and 2015…plus additional photos from last year’s travels. And I have more to do to optimize my reach on Pinterest, and give my blog posts maximum exposure, but this was an excellent start today.
If you have a Pinterest account, come find me! Search for Cindy Goes Beyond. I will follow you back. Or you can leave your Pinterest account name in the comments. I will find you.
Happy pinning!
