Pinterest Growth Toolbox: Software to Keep You Pinning

Pinterest Growth Toolbox: Software to Keep You Pinning

by | Mar 10, 2024 | Pinterest

Hey there, social media aficionados! Are you ready to turbocharge your Pinterest presence? Well, buckle up because today we’re diving into a treasure trove of Pinterest growth tools designed to make your account thrive. And I’m not just talking about Pinterest’s in-built features. Nope, we’re venturing beyond the Pinterest realm to explore some fantastic third-party tools in three exciting categories: design, keyword-rich descriptions, and scheduling. Let’s roll up our sleeves and get pinning!

Design

Design: The Visual Powerhouse

First up, design – the secret sauce that can make or break your Pinterest game. Now, the heavyweight champion of design tools is, drumroll please… Canva! Whether you’re crafting still pins or diving into the world of video pins, Canva is your go-to design studio. It’s versatile, user-friendly, and basically the Swiss Army knife for Pinterest creators.

But let’s talk about the workflow. You’ve got to upload your images to Canva, design your masterpiece, then download those pins, before finally uploading them to your chosen scheduling platform. Phew! That’s a lot of uploading and downloading, right? And while Canva does offer a scheduler, it’s kind of like that one exercise bike in the gym nobody uses. It’s there, but the other machines just offer a better workout for your content.

Now, if Canva’s not your cup of tea, or you just love to have options, there are plenty of other design contenders in the ring. We have the likes of Stencil for still images, PicMonkey, VistaCreate, and for the design black belts out there, the almighty Adobe Photoshop. Variety is the spice of life, and when it comes to pin design, it’s no different.

a wooden block that says seo on it

Keyword Rich Descriptions: The SEO Juggernaut

Moving on to the secret language of Pinterest – keywords. If you want your pins to whisper sweet nothings into the algorithm’s ear, you need to get cozy with keyword-rich descriptions. I’ve got a little gem for you: Pin Inspector. This nifty tool is like having a direct line to Pinterest’s very own brain, helping you generate a killer keyword list for your clients or personal account.

But wait, there’s more! Ever thought about enlisting an AI sidekick? Enter ChatGPT, your friendly AI assistant that can whip up pin descriptions faster than you can say “Pinterest perfection.” Just feed it your keywords and content, and voilà – you’ve got descriptions that will make your pins pop. Speaking of voilà, there’s also, well, Voilà, another tool that can digest your blog posts and turn them into irresistible descriptions. It’s like having your very own content chef!

Scheduling: The Time-Traveling Wizard

Last but not least, let’s talk about scheduling – the magical art of being everywhere at once without breaking a sweat. The grandmaster of scheduling is none other than Tailwind. It’s been around the block, knows all the tricks, and is still one of the best tools for getting your pins out there when it counts. Plus, Tailwind Create is like having a little elf that whips up images using their fancy templates – super handy if you’re not in the mood to tango with Canva.

If you’re after something a bit more streamlined, cast your eyes on Pin Generator. It might not have all the bells and whistles of Canva, but it’s a quick draw when it comes to churning out templated designs and has some decent scheduling chops to boot. With both Tailwind and Pin Generator, you just set your times, fill your queue with pins, and let them work their magic. And while Canva might let you schedule a tango or two, and Pinterest itself offers a one-month advance booking, these standalone schedulers will let you plan your pinning strategy like a pro.

So there you have it, my fellow pinners! These are the Pinterest growth tools I wield every day to help my clients – and my own account – conquer the Pinterest universe. Remember, with the right tools in your arsenal, you’re not just pinning; you’re crafting a visual symphony. Now go out there and create some Pinterest magic!

BB Design Skills Course: Module 3

BB Design Skills Course: Module 3

by | May 10, 2017 | Digital Nomad Skills

BB Design Skills Course: Module 3

I am enjoying BB’s Design Skills Course more and more every module! This one is all about creative briefs and mood boards. If you’ve ever wondered how designers go from getting hired to figuring out what their clients really want in a design, this gives you an inside look and a blueprint for your own initial client interactions!

The module contains 4 videos 10-15 minutes long, adding up to almost a full hour of instruction. You start out by being introduced creative briefs – a survey-like document you send to your client to fill out about their tastes and preferences. Cassie suggests using a shared Google Doc for this so you don’t have to keep emailing back and forth, and the course gives you a creative brief template you can customize for your own business!

You then learn how to analyze the creative brief, and then move to creative research – which is super fun since it’s done on Pinterest! Cassie walks you through setting up a secret board on Pinterest for the project. I was a bit concerned about copyright issues with using Pinterest images, but since the mood board is only supposed to be a reference point for both you and the client, not something you publish and make money from, it seems to fall under fair use (according to what I’ve gleaned online, I’m not giving legal advice). I do like that you can keep the project board to help track down the source of the images if you need to later (like if a client loves a particular texture and wants to use that exact one).

After using the words from the creative brief to pin a number of images to your board, you look for similarities, save the best images, and arrange them artistically in Photoshop. Cassie provides a tutorial on how to do this, then it’s your turn! Students are given a creative brief from a fictional company, and tasked to create a mood board that meets the company’s requested aesthetic.

The mood board I created had pops of fuchsia and teal mixed with gold and white. Cassie gave students 3 mood board templates to choose from, so you just had to place embedded images and create clipping masks, as well as pull colors from the images for your palette. That made the project simple enough for beginners and reinforced commonly-used Photoshop tools, but since the images and arrangements are your own, the project wasn’t cookie-cutter. I had seen several mood boards within the Facebook groups for the same fictional client before reaching this module, and mine was able to be its own thing.

I finished the module excited about doing design work in the future and even wanting to figure out how to create my own mood board template!

 

Want to hire me as a Pinterest Designer and Manager to help you get more traffic, leads, and income for your blog or business? Check out this page to see what I can do to help you grow!