How to Use Pinterest for Small Business

Short answer

Create a business account, design vertical images (1000×1500px) for your products or content, and pin them with keyword-rich descriptions. Pinterest's search algorithm surfaces your pins for months or years — unlike Instagram, where posts disappear in 24 hours.

Who should use Pinterest

Pinterest works best for businesses in these categories:

• Home décor, DIY, crafts — extremely high search volume
• Food and recipes — one of the biggest categories on the platform
• Fashion and beauty — strong product discovery behaviour
• Wedding and events — Pinterest is where couples plan everything
• Gardening, fitness, travel — high engagement with "ideas" content

Pinterest works poorly for B2B, tech products, and anything without a strong visual component.

Setting up a business account

1. Go to pinterest.com and create a business account (free)
2. Claim your website — Pinterest walks you through adding a meta tag
3. Enable rich pins (shows real-time price and availability on product pins)
4. Create 5–8 boards with clear, keyword-based names: "Small Kitchen Ideas", not "My Favourites"

Creating pins that get traffic

• Size: 1000×1500px (2:3 ratio) — vertical pins dominate the feed
• Text overlay: add a short headline directly on the image
• Description: 200–300 words with keywords your audience searches for
• Link: pin directly to the relevant product or article, not your homepage
• Consistency: 5–10 pins per day (can be repins of others' content)

Canva (canva.com) has hundreds of Pinterest templates — use them to create professional pins without a designer.

Pinterest SEO

Pinterest search works like Google: find the keywords buyers use and include them in your board names, pin titles, and descriptions. Type a topic into Pinterest search and look at the auto-suggest terms — those are real searches.

Related questions

• How to create a social media strategy from scratch
• How to get more followers on Instagram
• Best social media for small business