Social media isn’t just for sharing memes and cat videos. It can be a useful tool to boost your sales or get more subscriptions. Just think about it: billions of users are scrolling through various social media platforms everyday. If you know how to reach them, you’ll be increasing your sales while connecting with your audience. Want to know how? Just read on!
Let’s quickly look at the benefits before we dive into the how. Because there are plenty! For example, social media is an affordable way to reach your audience across multiple platforms. You won’t need a big budget in order to have a successful social media strategy.
Social media is also the preferred platform for most people to receive news about your new products or services, according to 68% of consumers. And one of the reasons for this is that social media feels more personal. The communication lines feel shorter. Which is important, because most people say that the most memorable brands on social media are the ones that respond to customers.
1. Treat social media like a shopping mall
Because your audience is. They’re buying more and more on social media marketplaces. In 2023, sales were expected to reach $1.3 trillion dollars, which is huge. Especially compared to 2020, when sales reached ‘just’ $560 billion dollars.
It’s clear that the industry is growing rapidly, so why not take advantage and make your products or services available on social media? A few popular ones are Facebook Shop, TikTok Shop, Instagram Shopping, and Pinterest Product Pins. And there are many more, so we suggest researching which ecommerce platforms work best for you and your audience.
Example of Instagram Shopping in a meme post by Loop Earplugs
2. Try conversational commerce
Have you ever received a promotional code or discount in your direct messages (DMs)? Or perhaps you’ve asked a question about a product via WhatsApp? That’s conversational commerce.
So, why should you try this? Because for your audience, it can feel like they’re talking to a store employee in-person, except virtually. They can ask questions, and receive advice and recommendations. Conversational commerce also simplifies the buyer journey. Your audience can read reviews, explore products, ask questions, and hit the checkout button without ever having to go somewhere else.
Example of conversational commerce Source: ShipBob
The difference between conversational commerce and social media commerce
So, what’s the difference? Mostly, the place where the sale happens. Conversational commerce is your Instagram DMs, for example, and social media commerce takes place in Instagram Shopping.
3. Don’t post on a Sunday
It sounds funny, but it’s true. There are good and bad moments to post on social media, but Sunday is by far the worst. That’s not to say you can never post on a Sunday – just that you’ll get more engagement if you post on a different day.
The best time to post differs per social media platform, so it’s good to be aware of what those times are. Otherwise, your audience won’t ever see your content. And that’s a shame!
4. Don’t put your eggs in one basket
In the same vein, it’s generally a good idea to become active on multiple social media platforms. After all, you want to reach as many people as possible. Not everyone in your audience uses Instagram – some might be very loyal Facebook users!
However, a large part of your audience uses more than one social media platform. This gives you plenty of opportunity to connect with them multiple times a day. Just don’t spread yourself too thin! You don’t want to copy and paste your content on every platform. Instead, it’s better to focus on a maximum of three social media platforms, and create good content for those.
5. Post what your audience likes
So, what is good content? In the world of social media, this means content that your audience wants to share and engage with. Generally, this also means: images and videos. Last year, for example, online videos had an audience reach of 92.3% among internet users worldwide! The most popular videos were music videos, memes, and tutorial or how-to videos.
Most popular video content type worldwide Source: Statista
Of course, this doesn’t have to be the case for your audience. Perhaps they really like funny product pictures, or customer testimonials. Simply look at how many people like, comment, and share your product pictures versus your other content. Is it a lot more? Then you should make more!
And don’t forget to make your post accessible, so everyone can read and engage with your content.
Relevant content usually does well too
If you keep up with trends, you’ll never be lost for content to create and post. Granted, you should be aware of what trends appeal to your audience. Referencing an exciting new change in the Lego company, for example, might not interest your audience of horse enthusiasts.
Global news, however, generally speaks to a lot more people. By referencing a recent global event, you could attract your audience’s attention and keep your brand relevant at the same time.
Don’t overwhelm your audience
Always choose quality over quantity. If you worry that you might be prioritizing quantity, simply ask yourself the following questions:
Is this original?
Does this content help my followers?
Is this inspiring or entertaining or actionable?
Another tip that might help is creating a social media calendar. If you plan in advance how many times a week you’ll post and what you’ll post, then you don’t risk overwhelming your audience. Just keep some space for spontaneous posts. For example, when a meme has gone viral and you want to jump on the bandwagon.
Hopefully, you’ll feel inspired about how you can use your business’s social media in new ways. Perhaps you want to try conversational commerce? Maybe you want to create more content that references memes. Whatever it is, just be sure that you pick what fits your brand. Because in a world with millions of posts, you want your content to be uniquely yours.
Cindy is a content manager at Yoast. She writes and optimizes blog posts, and enjoys writing content that will help people create better content for their site and users.
Merchants often overlook Pinterest, the self-described “visual discovery engine” with 460 million monthly visitors — 94.6 million in the U.S., per Comscore. Pinterest users skew heavily female, Gen Z (ages teens to 20s), and Millennial (20s to 30s).
Users typically access the platform while planning a project or event. They’re seeking inspiration. They pin content from outside the app with very little created on the platform itself — until now.
Pinterest Shuffles
Pinterest’s new Shuffles app allows users to create and share collages — digital mood boards. Launched in 2022, the app surged in popularity when users began setting their creations to music on TikTok. Shuffles is now available in 15 countries, including the U.S., but only on iOS devices. An Android app is reportedly in development. Even so, TechCrunch reports 607,000 installs to date.
Pinterest Shuffles allows creators to assemble collages from cut-out images, such as in these two examples.
Each image in Shuffles can link to a source — a direct route to buy — similar to Pinterest generally. Shuffles’ focus is cut-out images that can appear alongside backgrounds and effects. These cut-outs can come from images in Pinterest’s library or the user’s — all by using the app’s tools. The functionality and scrapbook aesthetic remind me of Polyvore, the fashion mood board platform that closed in 2018.
Visitors on Pinterest discover the Shuffles content via the app’s “For you” recommendations feed, which opens at launch. Additional discovery methods are searching for hashtags and keywords and accessing “Followed,” “Popular,” and “Recent” feeds.
Visitors can comment, like, save, and remix other users’ content by copying the layout and adding their own items.
Pros
Organic reach. Shuffles’ creators can benefit from early organic growth and reach a greater proportion of consumers than on established platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.
Target Gen Z females. Shuffles has much less competition than TikTok and is helpful for merchants targeting Gen Z females.
Unique editing options. The Shuffles app includes content creation tools and effects, including shake, spin, and pulse options.
Cons
Cut-out functionality. iOS 16 launched in September 2022 and includes its own image cut-out feature, reducing the appeal of Shuffles’ version.
Growth has slowed. The initial popularity of sharing Shuffles on TikTok has waned. Visitors’ interactions with Shuffles are small compared to the primary Pinterest experience.
Clunky shopping journey. To shop on the Shuffles app, visitors must click the image, then the information button on the top right, then the source “Open link.” That’s a lot of clicks. But Pinterest is reportedly improving the experience, including featuring the brand and price on the initial image click.
iOS only. Shuffles is available only on Apple devices with a waitlist for Android.
Dominated by pop culture. Shuffles viewers are confronted by a wall of Taylor Swift and Harry Styles content. Merchants must look for ways to cut through the fandom.
The Apple Watch example from Best Buy at left links to the company’s product page. User “Josie” cut-out that image at right.
Getting Started on Shuffles
Shuffles’ audience, while small, is an opportunity to target young females. The first step for merchants is pinning their full product catalog and optimizing it for search. Pinterest offers various catalog integration tools to help, including direct links with Shopify, WooCommerce, and feed platforms.
Your social media endeavors need to be a part of your SEO strategy. Especially now that the younger generations (Gen Z) are using platforms like TikTok and Instagram instead of Google. This means your site’s popularity on social media ties into your SEO more than ever!
But which social media should you focus on? With so many platforms out there, you can feel overwhelmed with choices. Don’t worry, though! You don’t have to be active everywhere. That isn’t always sustainable. And if your most loyal customers are on Twitter, and you’re focusing on Pinterest, then you miss out on many opportunities.
Instead, decide which platform your audience uses the most, then find a rhythm that works for you and build on that. Once you’ve got your social strategy in place, it’s time to start posting! Below are some tips you can use to set up or improve your social media strategy.
1. Keep your account alive
The most crucial advice when using social media is that you need to keep your account alive. But what does this mean? You’ll see a lot of advice about posting daily, but that’s not always realistic, especially if you’re a small business owner.
Our advice: keep your account alive by posting regularly and going at your own pace. If you can only post a couple of times a week, then do it. A good starting pointing is:
People will be able to tell that you’re being genuine and fall in love with you for that. What’s more, they’ll want to continue to follow you if you’re posting genuine content that they can relate to.
Of course, everybody needs a vacation, but you don’t want to abandon your followers. That’s why we recommend scheduling posts for the time you are away or letting people know when you’ll be back. And be sure to share some photos of your vacay!
Save time by automating
If you also have a blog where you write regularly, Yoast SEO Premium can help you automate some of your postings. With our Zapier integration, you can automate your social sharing and stay in control of what your social link posts look like. This integration makes it possible to automatically post to your favorite social network whenever you publish new content to your site. It saves you time without compromising on the quality of your social posts.
For social media like Instagram and TikTok, there are also a number of platforms that you can use to stay on top of your schedule and keep all your media in one place, ready to post.
2. Write captivating excerpts
Depending on the type of content you want to share, you need to make sure the copy that goes with your posts is appealing enough to draw people in. There are a number of ways you can approach this. For instance, you can choose the most important sentence or the main point of the blog post you’re going to share. You could also share the introduction of the post if you feel that is captivating enough.
Depending on the platform, you could share a story behind a photo you’re posting or the failures you’ve had when testing new products. Or maybe you just want to jump on the latest trend and apply it to your brand.
Is it thumb-stopping?
You want this piece of copy to get people to click on the link in your bio or read the whole caption on the platform. But the basic formula is:
Hook: Something that is going to grab their attention.
Pain point: What is it that your followers are struggling with?
Solution: Well, it’s a good thing you have an answer!
CTA: Don’t forget to ask your readers to do something.
If you want to learn more about copywriting for social media, check out our article about social media writing tips.
3. Diversify your posts
Having a few solid content pillars is important. They are particularly helpful in keeping you on track with your content creation. Need some inspiration? Here are a few different types of posts you could create. Remember, you’re no longer limited to just posting photos!
To help you out, let’s look at a few examples. First, you could share your blog posts with a link post. This is one of the most basic post types you can use:
But don’t be afraid to change it up. Not all your social media posts need to necessarily direct people to your website. They can also be focused on informing people about a recent piece of news or simply increasing engagement on your social media platforms themselves.
And like we said in the intro, short-form videos are huge right now. They’re a great way to give your audience a few quick tips or take your fans behind the scenes.
To decide which posts do well on social media and which content you should make more of, you need to analyze the numbers. This could be the number of views, the number of comments, and how many times a post was shared or saved. Of course, numbers won’t mean anything if you don’t have a goal in mind. However, it’s a good rule of thumb to post more of the content that received numerous views, saves and shares.
Speaking of diversifying your content
At Yoast, we believe in the importance of inclusivity. In addition to diversifying when it comes to types of posts, you should also pay attention to making your content accessible and relatable, for as many people as possible. You need to show diversity to make this happen and being as visual as it is, social media is a great place for that. That being said, the topic of diversity shouldn’t be limited to your social media presence. This is a company-wide issue that you need to take seriously and nowadays is non-negotiable in both marketing and social media. Be aware of the image that you’re currently putting out there and invest time and resources into making that relatable to everyone.
But it’s not all about visuals. You should also use inclusive language, language that avoids excluding marginalized groups of people as much as possible. You might not get all of it right in one go, but becoming aware of it and changing it as you go is a great start. Not only does inclusive language help you reach a bigger audience, but it also helps all of us move toward a more inclusive society. And you might have noticed that social media platforms are being used a lot to talk about this and create more awareness on the topics of inclusiveness and diversity. So be part of the change and use inclusive language on your socials and in your website content. If you’re not sure where to start, our inclusive language analysis in Yoast SEO gives you feedback on which words might be harmful and provides you with alternatives to use!
4. Handle comments
If you share your posts on social media, you’ll get comments. This is something many people forget about, or try to do in some cases. Because sometimes comments will be good, and sometimes they will be bad. But the comment section is also where conversations are happening. Answering questions, then following up with one of your own is a great way to keep your audience engaged.
While you may get the odd troll in the comments, most of the time you’ll find your fans cheering you on and recommending you to their friends. There are some wonderful people in the comment section. Longtime followers can also become huge advocates for you and your brand, so make sure to have a chat with them.
But you should handle the trolls quickly! You don’t want your comments section to become a toxic place. Your fans won’t like it, but it can also have an effect on your mental health. So make sure your comments section is a safe space.
5. Use eye-catching photos or illustrations
Even with all the recent updates and focus on short-form video content, Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, said there is still a place for photo posts on Instagram. Just like on Facebook, where visual content is also essential. And let’s not forget Pinterest, which is all about images.
However, you might not have a graphic designer on staff or a photography department at your disposal. Don’t worry, though! There are plenty of online tools that can help you create your posts. Just remember to use clear images that either show your products or yourself. This could either be a crisp photo or a delightful illustration. Great quality will make your post stand out in someone’s feed, which can increase the post’s engagement, saves and shares.
Thankfully, if you’re using Yoast SEO Premium, you can check what your blog posts, product page or collections will look like before sharing them on social media. So you can easily adjust your content before posting it online. See how easy it is!
If you’re not already part of a community, make one! Being active in a certain community or niche can help build allies, brand ambassadors, and new ideas. In any community, you’ll soon discover other interesting people. What’s more, talking to customers and end-users can be a great way for you to develop your product. And make sure to let people know that they are always welcome to join.
Additionally, you can make these people fall in love with your brand quicker by giving them exclusive access to discounts, Betas or just generally behind the scenes.
7. Add metadata
All the social platforms are becoming their own little search engines. So in order to be found, you need to make sure that you’re including some metadata in the form of hashtags. These can help your growth immensely. For instance, if you are at an event, include the hashtag for that event in your post. Everyone searching for the event will then come across it. There are also hashtags for certain interests or technology.
Some people also have bots set up that retweet everything that is posted in a certain hashtag, which is a great way to boost your post. But don’t go overboard! Nobody likes a post that is filled with all kinds of random hashtags. Keep them relevant to your post, and make sure they are accessibility-friendly!
Note that tags on social media work a lot differently than tags on your site. If you’re using tags on your site the same way you would on social media, take a look at this post to find out why that’s not good for your SEO.
Conclusion
Social media is a key aspect of every (off-page) SEO strategy. Setting up a comprehensive social media strategy can be hard. It will certainly ask for a bit of creativity, and it’ll definitely be time-consuming. But trust us when we say that it’ll be worth it! And if you think about it, social media and blogging are very similar in many aspects. You just need to get into the flow of it! Good luck!
Marieke is the head of strategy at Yoast and founder of Yoast SEO academy. She loves coming up with new ideas and products to make SEO attainable for everyone, and ensure a healthy growth for Yoast!
Team Yoast is Attending, Organizing, Speaking, Sponsoring, Volunteering, Yoast Booth WordCamp Cebu 2023, click through to see if we’ll be there, who will be there and more!
Pinterest is one of the least popular, most underused social media platforms for brand marketing.
However, the lack of popularity is not due to the lack of potential.
Pinterest, when used right, can add immense value to ecommerce brand success.
Pinterest bursts with potential, but it also has its own playbook. It is different than other social platforms, and requires a unique approach to win.
From investing in Pinterest ads to building a consistent posting schedule, in this article, you’ll find some best practices and tips on building successful Pinterest marketing campaigns.
But before we get to that, let’s first talk about whether Pinterest is good for ecommerce.
Is Pinterest Good For Ecommerce?
“Don’t spread yourself too thin!”
This is a popular piece of advice people give to ecommerce brands starting social media marketing. And it is valuable advice.
So, is it worth going into Pinterest if you already have a Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok account?
Yes, in most cases.
Pinterest has immense shopping potential, perhaps more so than all the other social media platforms.
The platform offers fluff-free, simple suggestions. This is why Pinterest is the go-to place for customers looking for new brands or product inspirations.
80% of weekly Pinterest users have discovered a new brand or product via Pinterest.
55% of Pinterest users get on the app specifically to search for products.
More importantly, Pinterest shoppers have 85% bigger baskets than shoppers on other platforms.
All of these statistics hint at one thing, and one thing only.
Pinterest is not just good for ecommerce. It is absolutely unmissable for any ecommerce brand looking to engage its audience.
A European DIY, gardening, and furniture marketplace brand, convinced of the value Pinterest offers for an ecommerce brand, jumped on the platform and tried engaging an audience from a new market using the platform’s ad products.
Their customer outreach efforts garnered 6.6 million impressions and led to a 7.9% lift in sales.
Why Use Pinterest For Ecommerce?
Besides being good for ecommerce, many other factors make Pinterest the ultimate marketing platform for brands looking to drive ecommerce growth.
Here’s why:
Pinterest Allows Omnichannel Marketing
The modern customer’s buying journey is more complex than ever.
This is why you need to multiply your customer touchpoints and be where your audience is to increase the chances of winning them as customers.
An omnichannel marketing strategy helps with that – and Pinterest helps run an omnichannel campaign.
Pinterest is home to a unique audience, using the app with a fixed goal in mind.
Marketing on Pinterest takes your brand to this audience through a content format they love the most – engaging visuals. This helps prospects remember brands and eventually shop from them when needed.
Image Search Capabilities
The rise of visual search has increased the importance of Pinterest for ecommerce.
30% of U.S. adults (34 and younger) have used visual search for shopping as of August 2022.
The Pinterest mobile app has the Pinterest Lens feature, which users can use for visual searches. This is similar to Google Lens, but Pinterest has a more extensive image database, generating better results.
Marketing on Pinterest helps you jump on the rising visual search trend before everyone else, enabling you to gain an edge over the competitors.
An Ecosystem Built To Support Brands
Pinterest has invested heavily in building an ecommerce-friendly ecosystem.
It gives verified sellers a verified merchant tag, reinforcing the brand’s credibility.
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
The platform also has excellent ad products that can help brands maximize their reach and get closer to their goals.
Advanced Pinterest Analytics help you track your efforts and optimize them for better results.
Lately, Pinterest has also been experimenting with an in-app checkout feature that will let the buyers complete their purchase without leaving the app.
These features combine to make Pinterest a healthy home for ecommerce growth.
A Conversion-Focused Audience
89% of weekly Pinners use Pinterest for inspiration in their path to purchase. This is perhaps why Pinners are 7x more likely to buy things they’ve saved.
Marketing on Pinterest effectively helps you reach these conversion-ready shoppers and get them tumbling through your sales funnel.
Pinterest Ecommerce Strategy
Now that we have you all riled up about Pinterest and its ecommerce potential, let’s help you set up a Pinterest marketing campaign with some proven best practices:
Start With Creating A Business Account
First things first, you will need a Pinterest business account to start marketing on the platform, which is pretty easy to create.
A Pinterest business account gives you access to the platform’s merchant tools, like Pinterest Analytics and ads.
Make sure to include complete business information within your profile: your business name, logo, and website address.
You can only connect to one website on Pinterest. Preferably, choose the one you make sales on.
Identify Your Pinterest Goals
As with any marketing strategy, your Pinterest strategy will be defined by a set of goals.
Think: what is it that you want to achieve through Pinterest? Increased brand awareness? More sales?
Once you have identified your goals, it will become easier for you to define your content strategy and start pinning.
Create Outstanding Pins
Success on Pinterest – or any social platform, for that matter – comes from attention.
Unlike other social platforms, Pinterest is crowded with visuals. Therefore, it may be tougher to stand out with less-than-outstanding Pins.
Create aesthetically pleasing, on-brand Pins with eye-catching colors to help them stand out from the ever-growing Pinterest crowd.
When creating image Pins, stick to vertical images with a 2:3 aspect ratio to make sure your Pins appear high quality and look complete.
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
Consider linking the pin to a landing page to drive traffic to your ecommerce store. Make sure the landing page content aligns with what’s featured on the pin to drive user satisfaction.
Write power titles and descriptions for your Pins. Pinterest allows 100 characters for titles, and 500 characters for descriptions. Use this space to create eye-catching and optimized titles and descriptions that drive clicks and engagement.
Try to include bullets as you write descriptions to increase the digestibility of the content. No one likes reading blocks of text, especially when they are scrolling Pinterest.
Make video Pins as well to engage your audience and keep your feed from looking monotonous.
When creating a video Pin, start with a powerful hook that captures and holds the attention and includes closed captions for people viewing on mute.
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
The ideal length for organic videos is between 15 seconds to a minute, and 6 to 15 seconds for ads, according to Pinterest. Keep your videos within these ranges.
Video creatives matter as well. Eye-catching video creatives can go a long way. Cadbury generated 134% higher engagement rates while attempting to drive brand awareness for its new products, all through dazzling video creatives.
Pick a strong cover image for your video Pin that tells the viewers what the video is about.
Finally, don’t forget to use Idea Pins.
Idea Pins are like Pinterest stories. Pinterest calls them multi-stage canvases. Idea Pins are a great way to engage your audience and share ideas in a compelling manner.
Screeshot from Pinterest Newsroom, January 2023
Build Organized Boards
As you start pinning, it is crucial to stay organized.
Sort your content out in well-defined boards.
You can create individual boards for all your product categories. For example, if you sell clothes, you can create separate boards for men, women, summer dresses, formal wear, etc.
Check out how Allrecipes has organized all their recipes into well-defined boards:
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
Optimize Your Pins For SEO
Pinterest gets, and drives, massive traffic. In May 2022, around 945 million visits were reported to Pinterest.com.
The tremendous traffic that Pinterest is getting not only highlights exposure opportunities but also underscores its capabilities of multiplying your ecommerce store traffic.
But first, you will need to gain visibility on the platform. And for that, you will need SEO.
Pinterest SEO is pretty simple. Find out the relevant keywords. You can do this using Pinterest’s guided search, Google AdWords, or Pinterest Ad targeting.
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
You can also pick up good keywords by searching for relevant products or themes on Pinterest and looking at how the platform has categorized and subcategorized the Pins.
Screenshot from Pinterest, January 2023
Looking at the competitors’ Pins may also help uncover some great keywords.
Use these keywords in your Pin titles and descriptions and board titles and descriptions to increase relevance with the users’ searches.
Besides relevance, engagement is also said to drive visibility. So, try to build engagement for increased exposure.
Stay Consistent With Publishing
As cliche as it sounds, consistency is the key to Pinterest’s success.
Build a pinning schedule and stick to it.
Brands have seen their traffic spike after increasing their pinning frequency.
There’s no magic number that you need to hit. Start with as many Pins as you can manage without compromising the quality, and gradually build your way up.
Just make sure not to post too little content. You may lose your prospects to competitors. And don’t post too frequently so as to overwhelm your audience.
Strike a nice balance.
Keep Alternating Your Content
Your users might get bored of your feed if it is filled with the same kind of content. Keep things interesting by mixing up your posts.
Share informative content like blogs, infographics, guides, product-related posts, and videos.
Invest In Pinterest Ads
If you want to kick-start your Pinterest journey, consider investing in Pinterest ads.
The platform offers a powerful advertising system. Pinterest ads are 2.3x more cost-efficient and generate 2x higher return on ad spend (ROAS) for retail brands than other social media.
You also have access to a wide variety of ad formats that you can choose from.
Pinterest also offers extensive ad targeting capabilities to help you reach your audience in the best possible ways.
Track Pinterest Analytics
Pinterest offers a platform native analytics tool – Pinterest Analytics – to help brands measure their marketing efforts against their goals.
This tool offers all the metrics you need to gain insight into your campaign performance, like referral traffic, leads generated, engagement, etc. Use these metrics to determine the efficacy of your campaigns and guide your future marketing efforts.
Tips For Successful Pinterest Marketing
The best practices in the previous section are good enough to help you set off your Pinterest journey. But here are some additional tips to further fine-tune your campaigns:
Ensure Consistent Branding
Customers shop with brands they trust – and nothing builds trust like consistent branding.
This may be why consistent branding is said to increase revenue by 33%.
Ensure your Pinterest profile is consistent with the branding across all other social platforms.
Stay Current With Trends
Pinterest, like all social media, is big on trends and rewards brands that stick to what’s trending.
Find out what’s trending on the platform at any given time. If it fits your brand, jump on the trend to demonstrate relevance and maximize exposure.
Use Rich Pins
Rich Pins pull information from your website so your users can find out all they need to know about what you are featuring in your Pins.
Use the ones that are most relevant to your brand.
Follow And Engage With Other Accounts
You need to build your community to get engagement on Pinterest. And for that, you will have to invest some time engaging with other relevant accounts on the platform.
Like, comment, and re-pin posts from various accounts to engage with others on the platform and increase your own engagement.
Final Words
Pinterest is an underused goldmine of ecommerce success.
Leverage its potential by creating outstanding Pins and sharing them through your business accounts.
Make sure your content aligns with your audience’s preferences and goes out regularly and frequently to stay on top of your customer’s minds.
Track your Pinterest analytics and use your findings to optimize your Pinterest marketing strategy for continued growth.
Writing a successful blog post all comes down to the proper preparations. It starts before you even begin writing: what do you want to say and to whom do you want to say it? You might want to get going right away but remember: writing takes some time. And once you’ve written an awesome blog post, you’ll need to invest time in promoting it and keeping the content up to date. Today, we’ll cover all you need to do to write a successful blog post, from the first inception, to long after publication. So let’s dive right in!
Before we get going with our step by step guide, have a quick look at this image that depicts the three phases of a proper writing process:
In total, there are 6 steps you should take when writing and publishing a blog post. Does this sound a bit overwhelming? Don’t worry, at the end of this post, you’ll find a practical (and downloadable) checklist with an overview of these steps!
Let’s say you’ve taken a good look at your keyword research and decided upon a topic for your next blog post. Don’t start typing just yet. First, it’s time to prepare the post! That means you have to answer a few questions. And trust me, answering these questions will definitely help you write a great blog. So, let’s have a look at the questions you should ask yourself:
What is the purpose of your post?
Before you start writing, you should first take some time to think about why you’re writing and what you want to achieve with this specific article. Articles can have different purposes:
You can write because you want to persuade people. You want to convince them to buy your product or adopt your ideas.
The aim of your article could also be to entertain and amuse people. A column is a good example of an entertaining text.
Your blog or article could also be informative. In this case, you want to share knowledge about a certain topic.
Different articles on your website can have different purposes. A blog can be informative as well as entertaining. In any case, it’s important to think about the purpose of your article because it will give you a direction to follow. An article that intends to persuade people should be written differently than an article with a solely informative or amusing function.
You should also think about what you want your readers to know or take away after they’ve read your text. We refer to this as the message of your text.
For example
If you want to write a post about the importance of well-structured texts, the central question of the post could be: ‘Why is it important to write well-structured blog posts?’
The message of a post about the importance of well-structured texts could be: ‘It is important to write a well-structured text because it will allow people to understand your text better, it will lead to higher conversions and higher rankings.’
In order to formulate your message, you could try to phrase a question which your text should answer. We refer to such a question as the central question of a text. And the text you write should give an answer to your central question. So make sure that your central question is clear. Try to come up with a summarized answer to your central question in one or two sentences. This summarized answer is the message of your article.
We usually put the message in the introduction of the post (where you tell readers what the post is about) as well as in the conclusion of the piece. Making your message explicit is, in our opinion, especially important in web texts. It helps readers to instantly grasp the message of your article and increases the likelihood people will keep reading.
Who are your readers?
Ideally, you already thought about the kind of audience you want to reach when you started your website. But it never hurts to remind yourself before writing your text. So, take some time to think about the people you are writing for. Make sure you adapt your text to them and adjust the difficulty level of the information in your article as well as the difficulty of your style (use of jargon, long sentences etc.). A good rule of thumb is to keep things readable and accessible to reach a wider audience.
What information do you need?
In some cases, all the information you need to write your text is already in your head. For example, if the chef of a local Italian restaurant wants to write a blog post about the types and uses of pasta, they probably don’t need to open any books. But if they want to write an elaborate culinary history about 500 years of Italian cuisine, they might need some other sources. So, determine whether you need sources (the internet, books, newspapers) to get the information you need for your text.
You should take the central question of your piece and come up with a number of sub-questions you want to answer. Find and formulate answers to all your sub-questions using your sources (books, the internet, scientific articles, etc.). This will provide you with the basis of your post or article.
After this phase, you might want to make some adjustments to the (central) message of your article. Take some time to phrase or rephrase your message (the summarized answer to your central question) to make it entirely clear.
What’s the best way to structure your text?
The final step in the preparation process is the most important one. You have to decide how you’ll structure the information you want to communicate to your readers. If you don’t think about this beforehand, odds are your text will lack a logical order and will be hard to follow for your audience. A proper text structure is also important for SEO. Not sure how to begin? This post offers practical tips to create a decent structure.
Step 2: Write your blog post!
At this point, you’ll have all the information you need and an outline of the subjects you want to discuss in your blog post. And yes, this means it’s finally time to start writing. So get going! And don’t worry, your text doesn’t have to be perfect yet. You can edit things later on.
Try to stick to the structure you decided on and make sure your tone and style are in line with the audience you want to reach. Also, you don’t have to write your blog post from start to end. Feel free to switch between paragraphs, and skip hard bits to get back to later on. Whatever feels most natural to you!
Once you’ve put everything on (digital) paper, it’s time for the editing phase. Now, you should look more closely at your text and smooth out weird sentences and errors. This means checking for mistakes on a sentence and paragraph level, and also evaluating whether the structure of your blog post actually makes sense. If you’re not an experienced writer, it can be very helpful to use online spell checks or to ask someone you know to read your text. Another pair of eyes has a fresh perspective on your text and can, therefore, spot mistakes much more easily.
Optimize your post for the search engines
Optimizing for search engines should, of course, be a big part of preparing your post for publication. For example, it’s important to check the distribution of your keywords, meta description and the readability of your text. As you know, the Yoast plugin offers a lot of help with this step! Check out the SEO analysis tool, and our post on how to optimize your blog post.
Step 4: Practicalities before publishing
Before you send your new masterpiece into the world, there are a few more things to do to improve your post’s chances to do well:
Don’t forget to add images
Images are an invaluable addition to (almost) every blog post. So before publishing your post, you need to add at least one quality image and make sure your images are optimized. Some bloggers prefer to create photos and images before they start writing their texts. Others prefer to first write and then find the correct images. Whether you use stock photos or create your own graphics, make sure you have at least a header image that can also be shared on social media. In Yoast SEO Premium, there is a social preview where you can see what it looks like when your post is shared on Facebook or Twitter. Here, you can also set a different social image if desired.
Add categories and tags
Categories and tags provide an extra layer of structure for your site, so you really need to give some thought to how you use those. As you’re preparing your blog post, it’s easy to forget to add the right taxonomies. So check whether you’ve done that before you hit the publish button!
Optimize for social media
Not only can you set your own social image in Yoast SEO Premium, you can also write a different description for Facebook and Twitter than for Google. People who find you through Facebook often have a different connection with you than those who find you through Google. Make sure the description resembles that!
If Pinterest is a platform that’s relevant to your blog, you should design a Pinterest image before you launch your post. This image should have a ratio of 2:3, which means it’s vertical. Good to know: Pinterest has a scheduling feature, which means you can schedule your pin before publishing the post. Just make sure you put the correct publishing URL in!
After publishing your blog post, you can either sit back and hope people will pick up your newest masterpiece or you can take action to draw attention to your new post. It’s time to make some noise and get the story out there!
Share your post on social media
Although social media are designed to keep users on their platforms, your followers love hearing from you. Especially if you write for your social audience, it’s important to post your blog posts on your social media accounts. There are plugins that push your blog posts to social media as soon as you hit publish, but you could also do this yourself.
And although Pinterest isn’t a social medium but a visual search engine, we’ll discuss it here as well. While Google finds out about your new blog post through crawling and sitemaps, Pinterest doesn’t. So, if you want your content on Pinterest, you need to actually tell Pinterest you have a new post by posting to the platform. So if you have not used the scheduler or want to place your pins on more boards, now is the time to do so!
Internal linking to a new post from other posts
Are you aware of the importance of site structure? To improve your post’s chances to rank, you should add internal links. Internal links are links that are in your text, which tell Google all about context. It’s important to link to your blog post. While writing your post, you most likely already linked to other posts you’ve written. After publishing, make sure you check which blog posts could have a link to your new post and add those links immediately.
Step 6: A while after publishing your blog post
To make sure your blog posts don’t disappear in the large sea of content out there, it’s important to keep working on promoting and improving them even after they’ve been published for a while.
Include posts in the newsletter
A lot of businesses maintain a newsletter. If you send out a newsletter, you have to decide if you are going to share all your recent blog posts, or will only share your funniest or most informative ones. You can share your newest blog post in today’s newsletter. And if it’s still relevant six months from now, or you’re doing a themed newsletter, you can include it again. The bottom line is: If the content is still relevant, it won’t matter if the article is one week or one month old.
Repost on social media
You shared your blog post on social media right after you published it, but that doesn’t mean you cannot republish it again after a few months! The same goes for the newsletter. Of course, don’t overdo it, but you can certainly reshare something 6 months after you first shared it. You can even decide to use another social image or another introduction text to give the social media post a different look.
Analyze the post’s performance
After a month or so, you can start to analyze your post’s performance. This is something you need to do regularly, for instance, every three months. You should look at Google Analytics and check Google Search Console to see how people find your blog post, but also whether you’re ranking for the keywords you want to rank for and if you should create more posts surrounding the subject or make the blog post even more in-depth.
Optimize where necessary
SEO is an ongoing process. One month, you may rank #1 for a keyword, while the next month your competitor has created a better piece and starts ranking first. And did you know that search intent for a keyword can change over time? In short, you should periodically revisit your blog post with the data you have collected, then optimize where necessary.
Check what your competition does better than you and decide whether you want to optimize. Do you feel it’s worth your time to improve a post if you dropped from first to second place? Optimizing could mean you need to focus more on things like link building, or Schema. Check what your competitors do that you don’t. Don’t copy, but learn from them.
While updating and optimizing your content, it might be a good idea to work from a copy of the original post. This makes it possible to work on your update without bothering visitors with work that’s half-done. By using the Yoast Duplicate Post plugin, you can clone the original post. Simply edit this clone to your heart’s content, then copy the content over to the original post once you are done.
More internal linking
Ideally, you already worked on your internal linking when you just published your post. If you did and kept an eye on it over time, then you can skip this step. If not, you probably need to work on your internal linking again! Use the orphaned content filter in Yoast SEO Premium to see which articles need some attention regarding internal linking.
Practical checklist
To keep track of what you need to do to write and publish a perfect blog post, we created a checklist. You can print it out and keep it with you as a cheat sheet when you’re preparing, writing, and fine-tuning your text. We even added some empty checkboxes so you can add extra steps if we didn’t cover something you consider absolutely necessary! Download the free checklist here!
Conclusion
Writing a blog post can be a lot of fun, but also a lot of work. You need to invest time in preparing and writing your blog post. And once it’s written, it’s important that you make sure it gets the attention it deserves by sharing and improving your text. This might seem like a lot, but in the end, you’ll see your content consistently perform well. And trust us, it will be worth it!
Marieke is the head of strategy at Yoast and founder of Yoast SEO academy. She loves coming up with new ideas and products to make SEO attainable for everyone, and ensure a healthy growth for Yoast!
