New Updates to Pinterest and What You Need to Know

Feb 19

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The interwebs are a buzz with new changes Pinterest has made to how its prioritizing content.

Let me tell you. I was freaked out at first.

I know how aggravating it can be to work and hone your method and workflow just to have some wild and crazy change throw everything off.

Makes you want to throw in the towel sometimes, right?

Well don’t do that. As I’ve done some more digging and learned more about what’s happening, it makes sense and I don’t think it’ll change your workflow very much.

So let’s get to it.

Create Fresh Content

This is the most important thing. Pinterest is prioritizing fresh content over shared and reshared pins.

The first thing I read about these changes said you now need to create a new pin image for every single board you want to share content to. My mind immediately hit the panic button!

“So if I write a new blog and want to share it to 10 group boards and 5 of my own boards, I need to make 15+ images for it? And how is that going to affect my SmartLoops that are pinning for me”

After I got my heart rate back under control, I did some digging.

Fresh content is preferred. Period. That means a brand new pin image will do better than resharing an old pin image. BUT, that does not mean sharing the same image to multiple boards will kill your swagger.

MY PLAN

When I write a new blog post, I make 4 Pinterest images to go with it. One becomes the main image for the post, the other 3 go at the bottom so readers can pin their favorite image. (Plus, more images let’s me sneak in more keywords for SEO 😉)

Then, in Tailwind I add all 4 images as drafts. The same day, I choose 2 (one being the main image) pins and write titles and descriptions for them and add them to the proper SmartLoop.

That’s 2 pieces of fresh content scheduled to the appropriate boards with 2 more pieces waiting to be shared at a later time.

Here’s where my workflow will change a bit. I’ll add those other 2 pins to the rotation in a week or so. Then a month or 2, I’ll check to see how they’re doing. How many times have they been pinned? Are they getting shared? Are they getting saved or clicked?

Depending on those answers, I’ll make a few more pin images for that same blog post and put them into rotation. And possible remove some of the older ones. I probably won’t remove pins from the rotation after only a month or 2. They need time to gain traction. But that’s when I’ll start looking to add some new images for that blog post.

Don’t forget to grab your FREE Organic Traffic Blueprint here and get to rocking SEO + Pinterest!

What’s considered fresh content

New pins. New posts. New pages. Anything NEW!

You can absolutely keep sharing your blog posts. You can create multiple images for the same blog posts. You can share valuable blogs that are older but with new pins.

The key here is new pin images. Completely different images with new titles. Don’t try to change your pin slightly and get away with it. Pinterest will notice this. It may not be flagged as spam but it won’t be shared as widely.

How do I know if I’m sharing too much duplicate content

Tailwind is key for this for me. The SmartLoops make sure that even though I’m ultimately sending the same pin to multiple boards, they are pinned in an evenly spaced out manner and not all at once. This is great for making sure the pins get in front of more eyes in a non-spammy way. And that my schedule is always full!

Tailwind has another tool coming out very soon (It’s rolling out now over the next few weeks, but I don’t have it yet) called SmartGuide.

This is supposed to tell you if your pinning schedule is going to come across as spammy to the Pinterest algorithm and how to fix it! How incredible is that!

What I’ve done to prepare for these changes

I talked a little bit earlier about what my workflow will look like going forward for Pinterest. But I think it’s important to note some of the other things I went ahead and changed (or plan to change) so I don’t lose any traction on Pinterest.

The main thing was my SmartLoops. I realized that I didn’t have them set up in the most efficient way. Causing pins to sometimes end up scheduled to the same board twice close together instead of spread out.

So I redid my Loops! I will write another post soon with all the dirty details but the short of it is I had a Loop for each topic I write about, for example, I had a Pinterest Loop. That Loop included all Pinterest related boards.

I also had a Loop for Social Media and a Loop that contained my Group Boards.

So when I had a new blog post about Pinterest, I would add it to the Pinterest loop, the Group Board loop, and sometimes the Social Media loop (if it fit there).

But then I read somewhere that you shouldn’t have a pin in more than one loop. 😱

So I changed them so that now my Pinterest loop included all relevant group and Pinterest boards. And if a pin fits in another category, like Social Media, I add those boards to that specific pin when I add it to the loop.

Don’t worry, I’ll get into more of this soon! But if you’re looking for a little help with Tailwind, check out this post about why it’s my favorite Pinterest tool!

I also adjusted my schedule. I was pinning ~40 times a day. That was about 50/50 my content and other people’s content.

When I updated my SmartLoops I set the schedule for each one back to what was recommended by Tailwind. This cut back my number of pins per day a LOT. I’m a little nervous about that, truthfully, but I’m trusting what Tailwind is telling me. (You can always go back in and make adjustments later on). With that, I cut back how much I’m sharing each day of other people’s content so the percentage leans a little more towards my own stuff. For now anyway.

Don’t forget to grab your FREE Organic Traffic Blueprint here and get to rocking SEO + Pinterest!

What’s the bottom line

The bottom line is that there are always going to be changes. And we have to learn to roll with them!

So here’s the Cliff’s Notes version of what I recommend for this go round.

Keep making new pins for your old blog posts. When it’s time to reshare an older post, make a new pin for it rather than sharing the old pins again.
Add new pins to your SmartLoops weekly. These can be new pins for new content or new pins for old content. Just keep the new pins coming.
Every month or 2, check the stats of your pins to see if any need to be taken out of rotation for underperforming. No sense to keep sharing it if no one is saving or clicking it.
For crying out loud use Tailwind to help you keep track of all this!