How To Use Tailwind Communities For Pinterest Growth (+ How To Grow Your Own)
All hail Tailwind Communities! No seriously! When Pinterest announced a couple years back that they would be reducing the effectiveness of group boards we all cringed – but then came Tailwind Communities (formerly called Tribes) and we could all breath a sigh of relief again.
Now, I’m assuming most of you haven’t been living under a rock. But, just in case there are still some of you with a heavy strategy on group boards I thought I would share everything I know up to this point about Pinterest’s stance on them. So here goes!
Disclosure: this post may contain affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, i may earn a small commission from any purchases made through them
Group Boards Are So 2014, And Here’s Why
If you’ve been around for a while, Pinterest group boards use to be THE PLACE to get your pins seen by a wider audience. When you joined a group board your pins had the potential to show up in the feeds of followers of every other person in that board – it was magical.
In 2014, Pinterest changed their algorithm from one focused on your followers to one on based on your interests and the Smart Feed. Pre-2014, your feed would consist of pins from the people you followed, and in chronological order based on when the pins were published. Post-algorithm change, your feed is made up of content based on your interests, previous searches (similar to interest based advertising), and to a smaller extent your followers.
When this change happened, Pinterest users who relied on these group boards saw them become useless overnight (well, not that fast but you get the point).
Since then we’ve been trying to find ways to make group boards work for us, and failing.
Pinterest has made it clear they will be making them less useful over time. It seems they’ve followed through as it’s rare to get any engagement from pins added to these boards in 2021.
So, if you haven’t yet, it’s time to break up with your group boards. It’s going to be tough, but your engagement will thank you for it! And you won’t be left in the dark either. Keep reading for what you’re going to do next!
Don’t Stress! There’s A Better Alternative
Tailwind! My favorite Pinterest scheduling and management app. I get giddy just thinking about how helpful this tool has made my life as a Pinterest Manager.
If you’re sweating bullets over archiving your group boards you will be happy to know there is an alternative – Tailwind Communities.
What Are Tailwind Communities?
Like group boards, you join Communities relevant to your niche, add your content in the hopes that other users will share it, AND save other users’ content too. That’s the biggest difference in my opinion between GBs and Tailwind Communities – they are monitored and you need to reciprocate or risk getting kicked out (the ladies in my Community are doing pretty good following that rule!).
Community hosts can see the ratio of pins you add and share, making this marketing tool very transparent!
How To Join A Tailwind Community
It’s very simple. Once you log into your Tailwind account, find the icon that looks like two people. This is your Tailwind Communities dashboard.
On the top of of the page you will see 3 options:
- Your Communities (this is where you will access the ones you already joined)
- Find A Community (this is where you can search for Communities to join)
- Insights (important analytics for how your pins perform in them)
Select option 2, “Find A Community”. From here you can search for specific keywords related to your niche, or use the suggestions provided at the bottom.
Communities Is For (Almost) Everyone
I’ve already gone over the basics of joining Communities, sharing your content, and understanding analytics. If you’re just getting started with them you might want to begin there.
If you’re interested in getting more out of Tailwind Communities then keep reading!
First, it’s important to note that promoting to Communities works for some niches and not others. If you’re a food blogger there are so many to join that are very active with high repin rates. Blogging and entrepreneurship is also a big one.
If you find you’re not getting anything out of Communities, and you know for sure it’s not your pin designs or copy, then it might not be for you. Thankfully, for the majority of us, Communities is a great way to increase pin engagement and traffic.
Build A Tailwind Communities Strategy That Works
Ready to take Tailwind Communities to the next level? I’m going to share with you the exact strategy I use that got me from here…
To here…
It’s actually pretty simple once you create a system for discovering the best Communities, always showing up, and building your brand within them.
Join the best Communities
Every Community you join isn’t going to drive huge engagement. Some Communities contain members who don’t have a lot of reach, while others contain members with huge audiences and therefore can generate a lot of repins for you. It helps to join Communities with members who also target your key audience.
If you have Tailwind Pro or Free Forever plan you probably have a limit of 5 Communities. That is okay, it just means you will be leaving and joining Communities until you find ones that give you a lot of repins. On the other hand, if you have the Advanced or Max plan you get unlimited Communities, and this will be a lot easier for you.
Each month search for and join a new Community in your niche. Pin to that Community and pay attention to the engagement your pins are getting. Is the reshare and repin number higher than the number of pins you’re adding? If nobody is pinning your content after 30 days leave the Community. If it is benefiting you stick around. It’s that easy.
Now back to those with only 5 Communities. You can definitely do this, it will just take you longer to build up a good list since you can only test 5 at a time.
Show up every day
My second piece of advice for a good Communities strategy is to always be seen. The best way to achieve this is to share every day.
If you have unlimited Communities submissions you can add a pin to each every day of the week if you wish. If you’re limited to 30 submissions per month, I’ve found 1 pin per day kept me consistent throughout the month and eyes on my pins.
When deciding how often to share, take into consideration that you are also expected to reshare other users content as well. The more you add to your Communities the more user content you will be repinning to your Pinterest account.
The key is to give Community members as much opportunity as you can give them to share your content. The best way to do that is to have your pins appear every day!
Start your own Tailwind Community
A good Communities strategy means being in the right groups and showing up every day. You could even take your strategy further by starting your own. Anyone can create a Community. It’s great for brand awareness. And, in my opinion, can provide even more engagement for your pins. Because it’s your Community you can share your content as much as you like. The trick though is getting it in front of the right people.
How You Can Grow Your Own Community (and drive massive amounts of traffic in the process)
I have a Community called “Personal Development and the Laptop Lifestyle”. I will be honest, it started off very slow. I wasn’t entirely sure how to draw people to my new group. But I’ve learned with experience. It’s this information I’m including in this section to help you build your Tailwind Communities and get the most benefit in return.
How To Attract Pinners To Your Community
One of the biggest mistakes I made when I launched mine was expecting people to discover it and join. HUGE WASTE OF TIME!
The best way to grow your Community is to invite people within other Communities.
You’re probably spending a lot of time in there anyways and come across users whose content you love or also target your key audience. There is a way to invite them to your Community so they can engage with YOUR content (and vice versa).
To invite someone simply hover over their name and select “Invite To A Community” in the popup window!
Didn’t I tell you it was easy?
One of the biggest benefits of hosting your own Community is the control you have over it. You get to control the quality of its members, the content, and you can REALLY push your content without any repercussions.
Serious About Advancing Your Pinterest Strategy with Tailwind Communities?
You’re now ready to rock a new Communities strategy that will increase your website traffic!
Start with a Free Forever plan and get 5 Tailwind Communities + 30 Communities submissions each month.
