Juggling all your social media is hard enough without trying to figure out the analytics to go with it. However, if you want to be successful in creating content that will get results, it's always best to keep track of your statistics.
If you are dreading having to learn how to use yet another platform’s stats, here is an easy overview to help you identify the Pinterest content that is working best for you.
To access analytics, you must confirm you have a business account. That is simple, and if you don’t have a business account, a suggestion to upgrade to a business account will appear in the right upper hand corner on your Pinterest page.
Just click it and follow the easy steps to upgrade. You can then claim your website to ensure that your profile photo and logo show for pins from your site. Once this is done, you’ll find 'Analytics' in the upper right-hand corner on the drop-down menu.
You will find an immense amount of information provided by Pinterest. You can eventually break into each category and get to know how to read the numbers.
However, as a beginner, there are six things you should be following on a regular basis.
Under the 'Metrics' tab, you will find pins created from your website’s content. This number is important as it shows you the average amount of daily content pinned from your website.
It will show you if your website content is worthy of pinning to your boards. If you are not showing the numbers you’d like to see, then it is time to rethink your visuals. Add visual content that will be pleasing enough to increase pins.
You should also consider moving your 'Pin It' button, so people will see it and be more inclined to click it. Alter your visual content and then keep track to see if you notice changes for better or worse. Pay attention to time periods so you can identify the content you changed at that time as that will allow you to determine what is working well and which campaigns ran better than others.
You can then use that as an example of what your content should look like to get more pins. Likewise, if content sees a drop in pins, then your visuals were not working well. Keep trying new ideas to see what works best and use that to improve your content.
You will find this metric on the 'Site Metrics' tab right below the 'Pin' metric. Repins are highly desirable as they help encourage engagement. When users repin content to their own boards, it allows their followers to see it. That provides more exposure to people not following your account.
You will see the daily average number of repins, which is a true indicator of how well your visuals are working. You can compare your pins to your repins, so you can get a feel for how well you are doing at reaching a broader audience. Repins are a bonus and needed to grow your audience.
Scroll down to 'Impressions and Reach' to access the reach of your content. You can hover over the days of the graph to look at your content’s reach. It will show you the daily average number of people who saw your pins for both pins and repins.
The graph makes it easy to see what days you did well, so you can determine how effective individual pieces of content were. The more repins you get, the more you are exposed. You will also see how large of an audience your content has reached.
Scroll to the end of the metrics tab to see what traffic Pinterest helped drive to your website. While some pins help gain followers or engagement, others drive traffic.
You can also see increases in both activities and use this metric to see what actions people take based on the content. Ideally, you want both types of engagement. You will be able to determine what pins are sending people to your website and adjust content to see improvements in this type of activity. Some examples of visuals that work well to get people visiting your site might include calls to action, how-to instructions, or stunning images.
In this case, it can be confusing as you are looking at how many visitors you had to your website as well as how many views. The same person could be looking at multiple pages which indicates a deeper interest in your business meaning you are more likely to see a conversion.
You want new and return visitors in order to gain customers and expand your reach. New visitors can also expand your reach on Pinterest with the chance of repins. Also, if they are returning from Pinterest, this means they are finding your content valuable, and that's really what you want.
You will find the 'Most Repinned' report on your dashboard. From there, you can select a timeframe to review. That is an excellent metric as it will show you what content you are doing right. It shows you your most popular content, so you can get a clear understanding of what people are responding to positively.
This tab shows the actual pins, so it is very easy to see at a glance what pins have worked. You can even export it into an Excel spreadsheet to easily access the URLs. That is probably the most important, not to mention the easiest way to review your effectiveness in reaching your audience.
Look for patterns in your content such as the types of images, the colors used, the kind of text, and anything that stands out with similarities you can use to plan more similar content. That will allow you to gain more exposure with your account providing consistent content that people consider of value. Focus on the successes, and you will have a formula that works across your content plan. Don’t be afraid to continue to experiment with new ideas just in case you can do even better. There is always room for improvement.
Click on the 'Most Clicked' tab on the top navigation of the analytics dashboard to review which pins from your website and account are helping generate the most visits to your site. You can choose the date range to review the numbers. These numbers are important because Pinterest does well when it comes to generating revenue.
According to Convertro, Pinterest drives the most revenue compared to the other major social players, Twitter and Facebook. You’ll want to leverage that fact by zeroing in on the most clicked content, so you can continue to create more of the enticing material your audience loves. You can also refer to this metric to see if your Pin It button is encouraging pins. You can look for parallels between your content and the position of your button to determine if it is helping. That can encourage you to use it more often to help drive conversions to your site.
This guide provides an excellent foundation for familiarizing yourself with Pinterest analytics.
Once you get the hang of accessing these six metrics, allow your curiosity and newfound expertise to lead you to further numbers as you develop your skills.