Tips for Organized Pinterest Boards

Like many bloggers, I really love Pinterest.    I once loved Pinterest a lot more than I do now (probably because I'm no longer planning a wedding, and I'm not planning a baby anytime soon), so a lot of what circulates through Pinterest is no longer relevant to me like it used to be or might be in the future. 

Never-the-less, it is a great place to dream and waste time, and also to promote your blog.  I've been using Pinterest to do so for quite a while, but nothing pains me more than how unorganized Pinterest boards can quickly become.

While I had some forced free time (recovering from the flu) I worked on making my Pinterest board names more cohesive by renaming, organizing them by category, deleting unnecessary boards, and keeping with a consistent formula for the titles. Here are some tips I thought I'd share for any of you looking to clean up your Pinterest account.

TIPS TO GET COHESIVE PINTEREST BOARDS

Board titles are important.

• Keep with a consistent theme when titling your boards.  Use space and lines to make your board titles feel clean, and keep them as simple as possible while conveying the appropriate category.

• I set a general theme of naming boards with an initial category, in this case "home."  In all my board titles, I used lowercase letters to keep the titles all at one height, and added a space between each letter in the initial category.  For example:  h o m e
• Between the initial category, I broke other boards into sub-categories.  I separated most of the categories with two forward slashes.  For example:  h o m e  //  kitchen + dining

• Remember, when naming your boards that Pinterest organized the drop down list alphabetically.  So when you are browsing home pins, and first you pin a kitchen, but now you're pinning a bathroom, if you do not preface the board name with "home" then the location of the board in the drop down list is drastically different.  This is why I prefaced my board names with categories.

Keep your favorites or the most important boards toward the top.

• This is especially important if you are primarily using Pinterest as a business or blog.  Keep the boards that relate most to your content (not necessarily boards with JUST your content) at the top.  So if you are a home decor and DIY blogger, then put those boards in the first two rows.  If you're a food blogger, put recipe boards at the top.  If you don't blog, but just want to organize your account, put the boards that best represent your interests at the top.

• Some bloggers and businesses may have a separate account for their business than for personal use.  I don't promote my own blog on Pinterest enough to feel the need to separate the accounts, so I wanted to make my account look more geared for my blog, but still keep my personal boards on there.  I opted to keep the personal boards at the bottom, and my more blog related boards at the top.

Board cover photos can help tell the story of your board, and good photography helps.

• When choosing board covers, choose colors that relay the type of board this is.  A good example I have from my boards is for d i y // projects and d i y // crafts.  One might not know how to differentiate between these boards, however my board covers makes it clear that crafts are about softgoods, and projects are larger scale.

• Choose good photographs for the cover photos of your board.  Usually a landscape photo works best since you'll crop a large portion of portrait oriented photos.

Take some time and go through your boards. 

• If you're like me, most likely you started your Pinterest with general boards like "home" and then made new boards with more specific categories like "kitchen."  And in the past, Pinterest didn't have the amazing option to MOVE multiple pins from one board to another.  Now that they do, go through and make sure all your pins are on the correct board.  It is easier than ever now.

After you've renamed your boards in a consistent and artistic format, reorder the boards on your account page, choose great looking and informative cover photos, and go through your boards to look for pins that have gone astray, then you'll have a wonderfully organized Pinterest account!  This can take a lot of time, so I suggest getting the flu and having all the time in the world to do it!

Okay, I don't recommend the flu on any of you, but maybe take advantage of a cold winter day to stop pinning about organizing and start actually doing it!  

How do you keep your Pinterest account organized?


P.S.  If you aren't already following me, you can find my Pinterest and other social media buttons to your right!