I’m sure you’ve heard through the grapevine by now, but just in case you haven’t, you can use affiliate links on Pinterest again! Can I get a woop woop!!!!
Pinterest banned the use of affiliate links back in 2015, which was pretty heartbreaking for some bloggers because they were making 90% of their income from the platform. Yikes. But there’s no need to cry over spilled milk any longer because IT’S BACK BABY!
This is FANTASTIC news for bloggers and online entrepreneurs. Why? Because now we can utilize the platform to extend our reach to the 70,000,000+ million yearly users! To fully grasp that number, even if you got only 0.01% of that reach, your links and posts would still get in front of 700,000+ users. Can you say cha-ching!?
All jokes aside, the possibilities are endless. In fact I made my first affiliate sale within 24 hours of posting it on Pinterest! And shortly I’m going to tell you some of the ways you can use affiliate links on pinterest for your business.
How to Use Affiliate Links on Pinterest
Okay, so since this idea of placing affiliate links on pinterest might be totally brand new to you, here’s an example of how Kelly Mindell uses her affiliate links for Studio DIY.
Below we have a total of 12 boards. Each of these boards has a clear purpose and theme and Kelly ensures that the boards stay on-brand and on-topic relentlessly.
You can see immediately she’s got a lot of fun, brightly coloured images going on here with a ton of potential affiliate links embedded in the mix.
If you take a deeper look into each board, you’ll find there’s a mix of everything. Here’s what I found:
Sweets + Treats: Features bright colourful recipes that link to the Studio DIY blog as well as others.
Want it. Need it: Lists on-brand products with embedded affiliate links through ShopStyle only.
Free Printables: A board that hosts links to free printables created by Kelly and others..
Things That Look Like Donuts: Features loads of colourful images around the topic of donuts with links to products on various images.
The reason I love what Kelly’s done is because she’s made it look natural. There are links to her blog posts, to others blog posts, pretty images she loves that relates to her brand and product images sprinkled in between that have her affiliate links. This is how you should aim to keep your pinterest account – balanced and natural looking.
To help ensure that you don’t get yourself in trouble, please make sure you read Pinterest’s requirements and follow their Acceptable Use Policy before you begin loading your account up with links. Let’s keep it legit! 😉
How to Insert Affiliate Links into Pins
Just incase you happened to skip over the Acceptable Use Policy, it’s important to note that you cannot use link cloakers, they’ve gotta be the full (super ugly) link to the product. And also place an affiliate disclosure in the description where necessary.
First, you need your affiliate link (with your unique url, or ID) and your product image. Then you can either pin the image and edit the url in the ‘Website’ row (where it says *insert affiliate link here*) or you can pre-schedule your pin on Tailwind and then add your url in before the pin is posted.
Once you’ve done that, your pin with your affiliate link is live and ready to be re-pinned! And now you can get more creative with how you pin your image..
How to Use Pinterest for Business with Affiliate Links
- The best place to start is to add affiliate links to the pins that are already posted on your account. If you’ve already got products you’ve pinned, find out whether they have an affiliate program and then link to it. Oh, and don’t forget to rewrite your descriptions to be keyword rich for people to find you image!
- Try creating a product only board, just like Kelly did. You can fill it with anything related to your niche. Are you a fashion blogger? Add your favourite style items. Are you a food blogger? Link to your kitchen equipment and cook books. Are you a business blogger? Fill your board with the products and services you’re currently using in your biz.
- If you’re promoting a software product or an online program, create your own pinnable images that also compliment your branding and then link to the affiliate product page.
- If you run an affiliate program of your own where you sell your course through affiliates, design some images that they can share with their affiliate link and a keyword rich description for each pin.
- If you’re an Amazon Associates affiliate, you can link straight to the product from amazon. Just don’t use the short amazon.to links because they’re considered cloaked as well.
Like I said in the beginning, there is so much more possibility now that Pinterest has allowed us brazen entrepreneurs the opportunity to utilize affiliate marketing on their platform. If you stick to it, experiment, learn and keep on testing, you will be seeing results in a short matter of time!
