I have something tragic and inspiring to share with you today.
I see so many bloggers out there lamenting over the fact that their Pinterest traffic is unpredictable. One day it’s up. One day it’s down. Sometimes manual pinning helps. Sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it seems like Tailwind is the solution. Oh wait, or is it the fact that I started using a scheduler? What about group boards? Taller pins? 600×900 dimensions?
Sound familiar? How do I know this?! I’ve been there!
I know what it’s like to live on this roller coaster of Pinterest doom.
What I’ve discovered over time
Once upon a time I fought against falling Pinterest traffic like there was no tomorrow. I wished for it to stop fluctuating, I pinned a lot, and I endlessly published new posts in order to feed the monster.
I no longer do that, though. I feel like I finally stepped off the hamster wheel, and I’m at a place where these swings and plummets no longer phase me. I’ve built my blog in a way that it can withstand the tides and keep on trucking.
I’m over here looking around seeing all these other people panicking, yet I don’t know how I’m going to get the chance to tell them what to do to fix it.
Two years ago my Pinterest traffic took a dive when their algorithm changed. In fact, some of my BEST PINS from the year prior were barely getting any Pinterest traffic.
But my overall traffic remained higher than ever. Despite not posting very much that entire year, I was (and am) still able to make a full time income from my blog. You see, I finally figured out some secrets about getting traffic and making myself immune to the ebbs and flows of platforms like Pinterest.
I simultaneously WORK Pinterest while betting against it
I call it hedging my bets. Much like an investor hedges his investments in one company by “betting against” himself with another investment, I do the same with my traffic. I bet AGAINST Pinterest all the time. I do this by ALSO OPTIMIZING my content for other platforms. For me, that’s Google.
I’ve found a groove where I know ahead of time whether or not my blog posts will do well on Pinterest (because I do in-depth keyword research and prepare them in a way that encourages Pinterest traffic).
But then I also EXPECT the fall.
What I mean by this is that I have been around long enough to know that I cannot ride the Pinterest traffic wave for any single post forever. In fact, I have never seen a viral wave last longer than 12 months.
What this means is, once a pin starts doing really well (if it does well at all), I can expect that it might continue to do well for up to 12 months through use a solid repinning strategy, but then the traffic will die down.
And it won’t come back.
Sure, a pin can do OKAY after 9-12 months of flying high, but I have never seen one regain its former glory, no matter how much I pin it.
I see other bloggers going through this and my heart goes out to them. I want to say, “I’m so sorry for your loss but here’s the truth….” But I don’t say that. I mean, who wants to be the bearer of bad news?
What’s worse is that I also know that some pins fly really high and some fly very flow. Others fly medium while others hardly ever take off. It’s just the way it is.
Sometimes a post starts doing well on Pinterest and then it just fizzles out for no good reason. It’s so frustrating! But it’s the game we play.
You may have read about my course, Adventures in SEO, that’s all things Pinterest keyword research and dual optimization for Google.
Well, that’s all well and good for a quick description, but I figured I didn’t do the course justice with my blurb.
I want to SHOW you what is possible…
See this graph? This is my traffic to a popular post of mine from from a few years ago:
See how it got great traffic, practically equal amounts from Pinterest and Google? (this was 5 months after publish)
Well – one year later – guess what happened to that Pinterest traffic?
It PLUMMETED by 85%. That means that if I was banking on Pinterest flying high forever, I would have been SORELY disappointed. Devastated even. Because I had a LOT of posts just like this one! The only solution would have been to constantly churn out new content to replace it in the Pinterest world. <<—– which is what I USED to do!!
Or keep repinning it in hopes that it would come back (which I know now that it won’t ever truly come back)
Or keep making new pins because sometimes that helps….
Or switch to manual pinning because when I live pin I see a spike in traffic….that always manages to fizzle out fairly quickly….
I don’t have to do any of that! Because this is what happened despite Pinterest’s crazy self a year later:
I still had SOME Pinterest traffic AND the Google traffic flew through the roof! This post started getting DOUBLE the traffic overall despite Pinterest traffic falling by 85%.
And it’s still going strong! I’ve nurtured it over time using the principles in my course, and the strategy still seems to pay off.
It’s over two years out from that screenshot above and the traffic is starting to slip down below 10K visitors per month due to competition creeping up on me on Google, but I also have a plan to combat that with other blog posts! Something we also cover in the course. 🙂 You gotta have all these tools in your arsenal or you’ll be left wondering what happened with no clue what to do to fix it it!
Even so, I bet you’re wondering how much traffic a dual optimized post could possibly get over time. Here’s a screenshot of ANOTHER nearly 2 year’s worth of traffic to the same post.
I mean this is a lot of traffic that would NOT be possible without Google unless I wanted to pin constantly like a maniac (which I refuse to do!)
This post has gotten over 370,000 page views since it was published.
And it’s one of the main examples in the course! I don’t mind sharing these secrets because I know how much a behind the scenes look can help.
THIS is how you win at Pinterest AND Google, ya’ll. You gotta try your best for Pinterest and hope for Google and that’s what will keep you going without a lot of hands on effort.
It works beautifully because both platforms are search based and keyword heavy. This means that you can technically DUAL OPTIMIZE for both and win!
Do you want to know the rules of getting both Pinterest AND Google traffic?
This is the crux of what Adventures in SEO is all about. Exactly how I achieve results like these. I’m gonna lay it all out so you can run with it. We’ll cover exactly how to get the Pinterest traffic in the first place and then also how to prepare for the time when it inevitably dies down.
Imagine what it could be like to understand how Pinterest really works AND know how to get traffic elsewhere!
I’ve been blogging for 11 years, so I know all the old Google tricks. And now I’ve learned the Pinterest tricks. I’ve bottled them all up to share with you so you can have long term success as well. I hope this helps you understand what the course is all about.
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