Pinterest is quickly becoming a major traffic referral for many bloggers. It can be such an asset for bloggers to showcase their own work as well as being a site to learn just about anything. As is the case with social media in general, being present is key. Whether pinning your own material or repinning others’ it is crucial to have your pins showing up in other pinners’ feeds. The problem? There aren’t enough hours in the day to dedicate keeping your boards fresh and up to date. The solution? Scheduling your pins. Today’s topic in the Making Pinterest Work for You series is how to schedule pins on Pinterest.
I have used two different sites to help schedule my pins and both have advantages and disadvantages in my opinion. The good news is that both sites allow you to test them for a free trial period. It really helped me determine which tool was best for my needs and how each one can be used best to serve its purpose. I recommend doing the same thing to see what works best for you. Please keep in mind that these opinions are my own and based on my own experiences. This post does include affiliate links. Although I may receive credit for you using them, rest assured that I would not endorse anything that I did not agree with or find useful.
Tailwind
Tailwind, in my opinion, is best used to schedule pins from your own website. Upon signing up for a free trial you are allowed 100 pins. This may seem like quite a bit (and it is, don’t get me wrong) but if you are a member of several group Pinterest boards that are similar in content, you can easily have one of your posts take up 5 pins for example (each time you schedule it for one board it counts as one pin).
Getting Started with Tailwind
First and foremost, you need to be sure that your Pinterest account is synced with Tailwind. You will then be prompted to install a Schedule It! browser extension. Once that is set up, you are good to go and able to start pinning away.
When you find something you would like to pin, use the browser extension.
This will then bring you to a screen where you will then choose the board you want to pin it to, and the date and time you want it pinned as well.
One of the advantages of Tailwind is being able to see all of your pins in your queue.
You also can see when exactly your pins are being pinned. This allows you some greater flexibility in spreading out your pins. Editing a scheduled pin is simple and easy to do if you opt to change something after is has been scheduled. You simply drag and drop your pin and you have rescheduled it. This is a great advantage for Tailwind, in that you can be sure your pins are spread out and you know exactly when they are being pinned.
Stats
One of the top advantages to using Tailwind is the stats that they provide. You can check to see how many new followers you have, how many pins you have pinned, how many repins you have received, as well as what boards of yours are performing best.
Mobile Pinning
To me, this is one of the disadvantages of Tailwind. Pinning from your phone or tablet isn’t as easy as other scheduling tools. In order to pin something from one of those devices you have to email the pin. It can be done, yes, but I would personally prefer not to have to go through those added steps.
Social Media
Tailwind makes sharing on social media easy to do. You can share your pins on Facebook, Twitter, and even on Instagram. All can be done easily when scheduling your pin; you simply have to link your accounts and you are good to go.
Cost
After your free trial expires you are given the option of purchasing a package. You can upgrade to the annual plan which is $119 (get you 4 months for free) or pay $15.00/month. You can cancel your membership at any point.
FAQ
I’m sure you may have additional questions regarding how Tailwind works. I have found their FAQ page to be extremely helpful. Their customer service is quick to answer and knowledgeable as well.
BoardBooster
BoardBooster makes scheduling pins simple as well, but in a different fashion. As I have mentioned, part of being on any social media platform is simply having a presence. By using BoardBooster I am able to step up my pinning game and take a pin it and forget it mentality.
Getting Started
Your first step after creating an account with BoardBooster is to decide which boards you would like to use. You can use all of your boards on Pinterest if you would like.
Once you have chosen your boards, BoardBooster marks their boards with a “-” in front of that newly created board and it becomes a secret board. Whenever you pin something you will now see that you have the option to pin to the actual board or the “-“secret board. The secret board holds your pins that you have scheduled.
When you create your secret boards you will choose when you want the pins to be pinned as well as how many pins you want pinned per day from that board.
You can check your BoardBooster boards right from your Pinterest account and you can easily see how many pins you have waiting to be scheduled from each board.
Looping
A feature that I love in BoardBooster is called looping. Essentially looping allows BoardBooster to take older pins from the boards of your choice and re-pin them again. It then takes it a step further and will compare the two pins and delete the pin that has been re-pinned fewer times.
Campaigns
BoardBooster takes pinning a step further by using campaigns. For example, I am a member of several blogging tip group boards. I can set a campaign up that will alert BoardBooster to pin any new blogging post I pin to be scheduled across those group boards.
Stats
BoardBooster does provide stats as well but I have found them to not be as comprehensive as Tailwind’s stats. They do email you weekly with the following information. It’s impressive to see how you are performing week by week.
Mobile
This is where BoardBooster steps ahead of Tailwind in my opinion. Once your boards are created you can access them on Pinterest as I mentioned above. That means that I can literally pin from anywhere and on any device. Simply choose the secret board and your pin is scheduled. It truly doesn’t get any simpler than that.
Pin Mover and Doctor
BoardBooster offers additional services that I have yet to test but they are worth mentioning.
Pin Mover allows you to create a new board from a larger board. If you house board, for example, but want to make it smaller you can opt to create a living room board for example. Any pins that have the term “living room” will be moved to that new board. You can also use the pin mover feature to remove low pinned items from your boards. You can find more information here.
The Pin Doctor goes through your pins and tests them for 9 things (for example spam, broken links, irrelevant content). You can find more information here.
Cost
BoardBooster allows you a 100 pin free trial period. After that you can upgrade your account ranging from $5/month (500 pins/month) to $50/month (5,000 pins/month). It literally costs a penny a pin. You can not beat the price.
In the short time I have been using both scheduling tools I have seen a huge jump in my Pinterest followers. I have over 200 new followers and that number is growing daily. Spending time on Pinterest is not a difficulty for me. Most of my pins are scheduled through BoardBooster first thing in the morning before I even get out of bed. I sometimes search for specific things to fill some of my favorite boards. I can easily schedule pins as I wait at appointments…anywhere I can have my phone I can load up my boards. Tailwind is used each morning to load my own pins from my blog.
Another perk of scheduling pins? You tend to not annoy fellow Pinterest users. Have you ever been on Pinterest and your feed is taken up by someone who seems to be pinning tons of pins to just one board? Yes, I love puppies just like the next person but I don’t necessarily want to see 15 puppy pins in a row. Scheduling pins helps with what I like to call Pinner’s Etiquette. You can pin to your heart’s content without spamming your fellow pinners’ feeds. Your pins are easily accessible on your secret boards and will end up on your public board at the time of your choosing.
As I mentioned, both BoardBooster and Tailwind have their own advantages and slight disadvantages. Give each one a try and see what works for you…I can’t recommend using a scheduling tool enough. It seriously has helped me increase my Pinterest followers.
Did you miss the other posts in this series? You can find them here, here, and here.
Have you ever tried using BoardBooster or Tailwind before? What did you think of them? If you haven’t, is it something you would consider trying?
