How to Use Pinterest to Get Massive Amounts of New Readers (Guest Post)…

Posted on by Chris The Story Reading Ape

A reader was confused.

After reading a persuasive blog post about the value of Pinterest, he inquired of the writer, “Is it possible for authors to use Pinterest to get attention to their writing.

I only have one word for this reader and anyone else wondering.

Absolutely!

Pinterest has great value for writers and anyone looking to grow their readership due to the vast amount of people using Pinterest.

More than 60% of all consumers get information visually, by looking at pictures. Pinterest is comprised of these graphics, or pins, displayed on virtual bulletin boards.

The answer for writers looking to use Pinterest to grow their audiences is simple—use Pinterest bulletin boards to get interest in snippets of your writing.

How to Use Pinterest Boards to Create Interest in Your Writing

The diagram below shows a basic plot structure. If you make a Pinterest board for each element of your plot, you will create and maintain interest in your story.

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Exposition

The exposition of the story establishes the setting—the time and place of your action—and establishes the characters.

  1. Make an account at Pinterest.com.
  2. You will have an opportunity to identify yourself as a writer and to give the link to your website.
  3. Click the + sign to create a Pinterest board.
  4. Name the board. Use hashtags, so when Pinterest users look for graphics, they can find your board.
  5. Describe the board as the time your story is set in. Past? Present? Future? Be specific—the Stone Age? The Space Age? The Age of Exploration? You get the idea. Use hashtags in front of key words, so people looking for the images you place on the board can find your pins.
  6. Find pins to add to the board.
  • Go to the search bar and type in the time period in which your story is set.
  • When you find graphics that represent your plot’s time-period, click “pin it”. Hovering over the graphic will bring this up.
  • Look for an icon of a pencil. Clicking it will bring up an editing function. You want to edit the description of the pin.
  • Use hashtags in front of relevant key words.
  • You will be asked which board you want to pin the graphic to. Click “Time Period” or whatever you named your board.
  • Continue to do this until your “Time Period” board has at least six pins.
  1. Repeat steps 3 through 6 for your “Place” board.

In the Pinterest search bar, search the place your story is set. You can be as broad or specific as you want. However, the broader the place you identify your setting as on your Pinterest board, the easier it will be to find at least six graphics to pin.

Note when tagging your “place” pins:

“Travel” is one of the nine most common Pinterest hashtags there is. Since your board is about a place, and people travel to places, this is a relevant, and extremely popular, hashtag. Use it when tagging your “place” pins. (Do people travel to places during the action of your story? Remember to tag those pins “travel”.)

  1. Repeat steps 3 through 6 for your “characters” board.

Is one of your main characters a housewife? Show pictures of housewives. Sue Coletta is a crime writer. If one of her main characters is a homicidal killer, she could pin graphics of killers, for example.

“Kids” and “pets” are also extremely popular trending hashtags. If these are important characters in your plot, be sure to use these hashtags to identify your pins.

Rising action

Rising action occurs when the conflicts begin. Two opposing forces comprise a conflict. Someone struggling internally or against nature still has a conflict.

For example, is someone in your story ill? Pin graphics of sick people. The graphics of problems you pin should represent main problems in your plot, or the people you are trying to win over to your site could feel misled.

Follow steps 3 through 6 under Exposition above and create your “Rising Action” board.

Problem Complication is the next part of a plot. These are events that complicate the problems in your rising action.

For example, if the prosecutor in a story needs to win a case or his career is over (problem), but the defense attorney is his secret crush and winning the case means his chances of winning his love are diminished, the main character’s problem has just been complicated.

The Rising Action board would showcase graphics of trial lawyers while the Problem Complication board would show pins of romance or broken hearts.

The climax is the part of the plot where the readers’ interest piques. The most intense scene of the story is described in the climax.

You walk a fine line here. You want to how just enough to stimulate interest in your literature but not enough that potential readers will start screaming “Spoiler alert!”

For example, will the defendant confess in the climax? (Spoiler alert). However, you could show a courthouse, the location of the climax. A juror’s box and a witness stand wouldn’t reveal the end to your story or book.

The Falling Action shows what happens after the climax. The action falls since the intensity has dropped.

Does the prosecuting attorney get promoted for a great effort and wins the girl? Again, choose your pins carefully to avoid spoiler alerts.

The Resolution explains how your story ends. Are they now friends or is there a lingering grudge? Do the characters go home together or separately? Showing a house will not reveal who is in the house, so you won’t be spoiling your ending.

In conclusion, there is a massive amount of people using Pinterest. The number of pinners continues to grow.

You can pique their interest in your writing by following these tips. The more boards you have, the more pins you will have. The more pins you have will generate that much more interest in your literature.

There are more tips for how to use social media to generate interest in your literature over at my site, MostlyBlogging.com, so please call over and check out my other suggestions for engaging readers, improving content, and increasing traffic as well (and I’d love it if you subscribed to the blog).

Janice Wald

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110 thoughts on “How to Use Pinterest to Get Massive Amounts of New Readers (Guest Post)…”

    • Hi Shel,
      How funny seeing you here! You want pinners to be able to find your pins when they search. If you use hashtags in your pin descriptions, pinners searching for your topic will be able to find your pins. Hashtags will not work in board descriptions or the post, but they will enable pinners to find you in the pin descriptions. If you are interested, I have many additional Pinterest articles at my site. Nice to see you. It’s been a while.
      Janice

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  2. This is great info, Janice. I do use Pinterest but don’t know if it is helping my books. I haven’t been using hashtags. Didn’t know that I could there. Thanks for the helpful hints. Learned a lot. Best wishes!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Hi Jjspina,
      Thank you so much for your compliments on my article. You can use hashtags in your pin descriptions only. You could use them elsewhere, but they’d be futile. I’m glad you foud my article informative. Nice to see you again.
      Janice

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  7. Thanks this is a really useful article I’m going to re-blog it. I’m not sure how I’m going to use it in practise as my novel is set in a fictional place and time. I’ll have a play later today and see if it makes sense.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    • Hi Eric,
      Thank you so much for your compliments on my article. I appreciate the reblog as I am always hoping to expand my readership by getting exposed to new readers. In answer to your question, I went to Pinterest and searched “fantasy” for you. Over 50 boards, all with #fantasy-related pins came up. (I stopped counting at fifty; there were far more than that.) All those pinners would be interested in your work with a #fantasy tag on your pins. I hope that is helpful.
      Janice

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

  8. The problem with Pinterest is that it’s very addictive, so it’s difficult to go there and not spend several hours, but must use some of the techniques suggested as I’ve had it abandoned…

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  10. I really enjoyed this article Janice and it has given me much to consider. I’ve noticed lots of people using my graphics on pinterest but never considered it useful for myself. As someone who is always out and about and who shares writing with travel as my main sources of income it surely is almost made for me. Also, I’m not one for shouting about my books and this seems a non-aggressive way of promotion that I’m sure is as popular or more popular than blogging in its own way.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    • Dear Stephen,
      Thank you so much for reading what I wrote and writing me. Did you read in my article the popularity of travel on Pinterest? It is one of the nine most popular hashtags. You ended your comments by alluding to the power of Pinterest. I agree it is at least as popular as blogging. I also liked your thoughts about it being a way to promote but not seem to self-promoting. Nice getting to know you today.
      Janice

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

      • Dear Janice, yes I saw that you mentioned about Travel. I will have to look at a few boards to see how other people set theirs out. Travel is very important in my writing both for my blog but also novels as having traveled to some unusual places I like to use them in my books. Also last year I started up and run my own small private tours business called Ye Olde England Tours so Pinterest looks like it could be doubly useful to me! I’m so glad that we met, Stephen

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