Pinterest for Artists?
The one thing that makes Pinterest stand out from other social media networks is that Pinterest is not only a social media platform – Pinterest is also a visual search engine.
With a search bar at the top, Pinterest works like any other web search engine; you simply type in what you’re looking for. But instead of reading through the search results, Pinterest returns relevant search results in form of pictures.
You can scroll through all the images until something catches your eye.
The images are what Pinterest calls Pins. The good thing is that Pinterest Pins have a much longer lifespan than any other social media posts. Your pins will always be available and searchable, as long as you keep your Pinterest account.
Pinterest is one of the platforms that can drive a lot of traffic to your site – and a lot of sales.
On Pinterest, users pay more per order than on almost any other social media network. The average order value of sales is $50, and, according to Pinterest, an amazing 89% of pinners use the platform for purchase inspiration.
This makes Pinterest one of the best tools to build an online presence and generate sales – right after blogging.
Can I sell art on Pinterest?
How good is Pinterest for artists? Actually, Pinterest is ideal for selling all things decoration. The categories that most frequently lead to purchases from Pinterest are fashion, beauty, and home decor, which includes fine art prints and other merchandise.
Related: → Best Paper For Printing Digital Art
And because it’s a visual-driven platform, it’s perfect for all visual creatives, such as digital artists, photographers, designers, painters, and so on.
Unlike Facebook and Instagram, you won’t get instant likes and comments on your pins the moment you upload them. Pinterest will rather give you the opportunity to build an online portfolio of your artwork. While Facebook and Instagram posts have a lifespan of about a day, your pins remain visible for a very long time.
So Pinterest is definitely worth investing some quality time to create a sales hub for your digital art!
How Do I Sell Digital Art On Pinterest?
7 Steps to get you selling online FAST
This guide will walk you through all the steps necessary to use Pinterest as a sales hub for your creative business and show you how to sell art online fast.
These are the seven steps you’ll need to follow in order to sell your digital art on Pinterest:
Set up a Pinterest business account
How do I sell digital art on Pinterest with a business account?
Setting up a Pinterest business account is the first tip for artists using Pinterest to sell digital art.
While a personal account and a business account look exactly the same, a business account has some major advantages:
- A business account will give you access to all the analytics you need to track the performance of your profile. You’ll learn about your audience’s demographics and interests, engagement on individual pins and pin boards, and you get insight into the traffic to your shop site.
- A business account will allow you to apply for Pinterest’s Rich Pins. Unlike normal pins, Rich Pins contain additional data and information from your online store that make your pins stand out and easier for visitors to find your shop.
- A business account will allow you to link your online store to Pinterest, which is kind of important if you want to sell digital art on Pinterest…
- Last but not least, Pinterest’s terms of service state that everybody who wants to use the platform for commercial purposes must create a business account.
A Pinterest business account is easy to set up and free to use. Just go to the Pinterest business signup page and follow the steps.
You can also convert your private profile into a business account, if you have already built up a following that you want to keep.
Make sure your profile is complete
As you want to sell digital art on Pinterest, it’s important to let people know who the digital artist behind the creations is.
Upload a profile picture to your Pinterest account, fill in the description, and keep your contact info up to date.
Also make sure to add a link to your online store, and other social media platforms!
Related: → Best Sites to Upload Art – Artist Guide To Posting Art Online
- Stay in touch!
Our Newsletter is packed with creative tips, free tutorials, art tool reviews, and looaads of inspiration!
Link your shop website to Pinterest
How do I sell digital art on Pinterest directly from my online store?
Once your business account is set up and complete, it’s time to link your shop website to your Pinterest profile.
Remember that you can only link one website to your account, so make sure it’s the shop website you want to sell from on Pinterest.
Linking your website to Pinterest will require you to add a meta tag or upload an HTML file to your site. Pinterest has a helpful step-by-step guide explaining how to claim your website.
With your online store linked to your Pinterest account, you’ll be able to access all the product information directly from your store that you need to start creating buyable pins!
Start using Rich Pins
How do I sell digital art on Pinterest with Buyable Pins?
Rich Pins are a special form of pins that contain more information than regular pins. They pull extra data from your website that is displayed alongside the normal pin info and stored within the pin’s invisible meta data.
There are several types of Rich Pins you can choose from: app, article, product, and recipe pins. To sell digital art on Pinterest, the Product Pin is what you’ll be using the most.
If you pin a product straight from your online store, price, product description, and a direct backlink to your store will be automatically added to the pin. If you keep inventory management for your store products, the pin info will even let viewers know whether the product is in stock or not.
You can use Rich Pins for digital art prints and other products that you sell on platforms like Squarespace, Shopify, BigCommerce, and WordPress. Those platforms feature easy Pinterest integration. Similarly, it’s also possible to use product pins for your Etsy shop, or you sales channels on Saatchi Art, Fine Art America, Red Bubble, etc.
In order to apply for Rich Pins, all you need to do is go to Pinterest’s Rich Pins Validator and enter your website URL.
Get your Pinterest visuals on point
What images work best to sell digital art on Pinterest?
This is important. After all, Pinterest is a visual platform. And this is where you have a clear edge as a digital artist. You want to make sure that your pins are visually appealing and enticing people to click on them.
That means you’ll need to use:
- High-quality images
- Bold colors
- Optimal pin dimensions
- Design or logo that helps create brand awareness
Bold Colors
Uploading high-quality images of your digital art is a no brainer if you want to drive sales.
Related: → Best File Type To Save Digital Art
However, nothing works better to draw attention on Pinterest than adding a nice bold splash of color to your pins. As statistics show, the most repinned images have multiple dominant colors, and are repinned 3.25 times more than those with a single dominant color.
Optimal Pin Dimensions
You’ve surely noticed that most pins are tall and narrow. That’s because long images tend to stand out more and get more engagement as a result.
Pinterest recommends using images that have a 2:3 aspect ratio, with an optimal resolution of 1000 x 1500 pixels.
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with pinning images in other dimensions as well. Pins in all forms receive attention on Pinterest. And sometimes, your digital art images will be larger in width than height.
Nevertheless, it’s worth experimenting with pin dimensions. Try uploading your art on a 1000 x 1500 background and fill the extra space with text, your logo, a product description, or link to your website.
Over time, you’ll see what works best for you to promote your digital art on Pinterest.
50 High-Conversion Pinterest Pin Templates
Keyword Research for Pinterest SEO
How do I get my digital art rank in Pinterest’s search results?
Just like Google, Pinterest is a search engine. And just like with search engine optimization, keyword research is an essential part of selling digital art on Pinterest.
People visit Pinterest and type in keywords that relate to things they are interested in. Pinterest will then suggest pins that relate to the search topic.
The great thing about Pinterest is that your pins have a much longer lifespan than posts on other social media platforms. Your pins remain up and searchable as long as you have them posted.
Of course, traffic to your older pins will become less over time, as Pinterest gives priority to new content. However, doing some keyword research is key if you want your content to rank in the search results.
How to find the perfect keywords for your digital art?
Finding relevant keywords for selling digital art on Pinterest is very easy. Simply go to the search bar and type in the term that fits your art best. You will see a number of auto-suggestions come up, showing you what Pinterest thinks to be related keywords to your search term.
Use as many of those keywords as you can in title and description of your artwork. Because this is what people will be looking for!
It’s also a good idea to include some of the most relevant keywords in your Pinterest bio.
Another way to find out what people are searching for is by going to Pinterest Trends.
Tip: As usual, the shortest keywords have the largest competition. Therefore, it’s oftentimes better to target longer search terms, especially when you’re new to Pinterest. For example, instead of tagging your pins with just ‘digital art’, you could go for ‘digital Photoshop art’ or ‘digital photo collage’.
With long tail keywords, you have a better chance of ranking, and of being found by those users who are looking exactly for what you have to offer!
Dive into the Pinterest game
How do I sell digital art on Pinterest to a wide audience?
With your keyword research done, it’s time to dive into the Pinterest game and start creating exposure for the digital art you want to sell on Pinterest!
There are a couple of ways that can help you grow your audience and eventually drive sales from Pinterest.
Pin your artworks
Step number one is to pin your own artworks. As soon as you have your works pinned to your profile, people that follow you will get to see them.
If they consider purchasing an item, they can click the pin and will be taken directly to your online store. If they want to save your pin for later, they can add it to one of their boards, which will show the pin to all of their followers and, in return, increase exposure for your artworks!
Create Pin boards
Pin boards allow you to organize your portfolio on Pinterest.
You can create different theme boards for your artworks, sort them according to style, media used, color, date, you name it.
On your profile, you can arrange the boards according to importance. The boards featuring your artworks should be first, the less important ones should be last.
That way, visitors are able to immediately see what you are about as an artist, and they are more likely to follow if their interests align.
You can change the order of your boards at any time.
Pin Board Ideas
Apart from creating pin boards for the pieces you want to sell, you can create more boards on different themes and topics.
For example, you can create a board that shows the progress of your work or before-and-after images of your digital creations. Many people are interested in seeing the creative process of an artist. Plus, it’s an excellent way to show off your editing skills!
You can also create a board for artistic inspiration or different styles of digital art. This will not only allow you to share works of your favorite best artists on Pinterest, but also to create content for you to pin on a regular basis.
Share other people’s pins
Sharing other people’s pins will bring more attention to your art and help you build your network.
It’s a win-win for everybody. The artists you are repinning will take notice of you, and many will return the favor by repinning your content or following your profile or one of your boards.
Pin regularly
Like on any other social media platform, it’s important on Pinterest to post regularly. Users are more likely to follow someone who is active and posts fresh content and new ideas on a steady basis – instead of in large heaps with big gaps in between.
Try to pin at least once a day; you will get better results when pinning on a consistent schedule.
Schedule Pins
People are visiting Pinterest throughout the day. If you post pins consistently every day, you have a better chance to reach a wider audience.
There are a few tools that allow you to schedule your pins automatically. Tailwind is one of the best and has already helped lots of people grow their Pinterest followers.
Check out the Tailwind Review to learn more about the app.
Tailwind calculates the best posting times for you and allows you to schedule your pins at different times throughout the day so that your account remains active all day long.
Show your collectors
Many artists who are selling prints get pictures of their art hung on the walls in their collector’s homes.
Create a board where you exclusively post photos of your art taken by buyers. This is a huge selling point for you. It shows how nice your prints look on a wall and that people are keen to buy your products!
Offer Pinterest discounts
Track your performance with Pinterest Analytics
With a business account, you will get detailed insights into Pinterest’s analytics. You will see which pins and pin boards perform well, and which do not resonate so much with your audience.
Over time, you will recognize a pattern that will give you a clear idea of what people are interested in. Once you’ve figured out what works best, stick to it and do more of it!
Pinterest also allows you to check the performance of your website or online shop. If you enter the following URL into your browser with your particular domain name at the end, like http://pinterest.com/source/yourdomain.com, a page will come up and show you exactly which posts are being pinned from your site and who is pinning them.
These stats will help you know which images people like best among your digital artworks.
I hope this post was able to help you start selling your digital art on Pinterest! If you enjoyed, please consider liking, commenting and sharing the post with others! See you soon, Angie 💞
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Hey Barry, thanks for the comment! Good to have you around (: