**UPDATE April 2019** Pinterest has confirmed that they are doing away with Pinterest Communities and folding them all back into group boards. More on what this means when I get the full details. Ah well, it was good while it lasted. 🙂
Pinterest is one platform that it is practically impossible to master and I say that without any malice whatsoever. 😉 Pinterest Communities are the newest thing to emerge from the search engine and in this post, I will try and break down what it means for Pinterest users and content creators.
Fair warning: This is a BRAND new feature, so I will be updating this post as and when I get fresh information.
Late last month, Pinterest quietly rolled out the invite-only feature called Pinterest communities. Now the invite-only is a bit of a misnomer, because it really isn’t that hard to wrangle an invite.
Joining Pinterest Communities
All you have to do is accept the invitation to an existing Pinterest Community. At the moment, only community creators can send out the invite, but it’s a direct link so it’s no big deal to access the invitation.
For example, if you want to join one of my communities, you just have to click on one of the invitation links below.
This one is for my Community on Pinterest, Social Media and Blogging Tips.
This one is for the community on Productivity and Time Management Tips.
Here’s my Community for Positive Parenting Tips and Ideas.
Creating a Pinterest Community
This is really simple. Once you’ve joined the community (any community), you will see the ‘Communities’ tab enabled on your Pinterest home page. This is how it looks on the desktop.
I recommend creating the community through the desktop because the interface is easier to understand. See the image below.
On the app, you will see the communities tab in the centre of the menu at the bottom of the app. You can even search for communities by name to join the ones in your niche.
Once you create the community, you can add a name.
*Important Tips:
- Names of communities once assigned cannot be used for other communities. Choose well and keep SEO and key words in mind while naming your community.
- Do not create TOO MANY communities. The idea is to build engagement and be social. Pinterest has also confirmed that they will delete communities if the number of created ones per user exceeds 5.
Upload a Cover image for the community
This one is effectively to let users know what the community is about. There isn’t absolute confirmation on this yet, but it appears that the following dimensions are recommended by the Pinterest team. Use Canva to create a free cover image.
1440 pixels wide and 300 pixels high
Create a Pinned or Sticky post with guidelines
If you’re familiar with Facebook groups, you’d know that you can pin a post as a sort of introduction to the group, complete with rules you expect community members to follow.
In a similar fashion you, as the community creator, can create a post with guidelines and pin it to the top of the group, so it’s the first thing that people see when they join the group.
Share your Pins in a Community
This is a very interesting process and I hope they simplify it with time, but here’s what you need to do.
- Open a pin of yours on desktop or app. You will see the ‘share to community’ option or the heart in a dialogue box icon (on the app).
- Click on it and it will ask you which community you’d like to share it with.
- Finally, add a short note about the pin so other community members can see what the pin is all about.
Be Social in a Community
The whole idea of Pinterest communities is that it should encourage people in a similar niche to get together, discuss ideas, share pins and organically provide value to Pinterest users and content creators.
For instance if you belong to a group of Pinterest Virtual Assistants and Managers, like I do, the expectation is that we help each other when it comes to promoting each others’ work. At the same time, the community should not be JUST about self-promotion.
Ask questions, offer help, be responsive and courteous. In short, be a community and team player. Organic engagement like this will go a long way towards building your profile strength on Pinterest.
How to Remove a Member
Under the ‘People’ Tab in your community, click on the 3 dots next to a user’s name. You will see the option to remove the member or promote them to admin.
Do not SPAM the community
Do be judicious in your use of the community. Don’t drop links to your pins and run.
For instance, in my Pinterest community, I have dedicated days for promotion of one’s content, requesting feedback on Pins and sharing other people’s pins that we feel can help us grow on our respective journeys. Questions are welcome any day of the week and all members are encouraged to help one another out.
Click here to pin this post on Pinterest
So, are you ready to try out Pinterest Communities? Have any other questions? Ask away in the comments! 🙂
Pin image courtesy Shutterstock
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This is completely new & I’m going to think really hard to make it churn things out for me now. Thanks for always being there to tell us how things work on Pinterest, Shy.
It really is new 🙂 we’re all going to have to wait to see how this plays out. As usual, things on Pinterest will take time to take effect so I’d advise caution but interest in the feature 🙂
Pretty new feature and I read Megan’s article and one by Pinterest and dived in a couple of days ago. Created a couple of communities and invited a few friends who I thought were suitable. Seems similar to FB groups. I do hope they give controls making the communities private going forward and controlling what goes on the wall. Eventually every platform has to go for the ‘social’ aspect.
Yes they are pretty similar to FB groups. The advantage here is the owner can control the kinds of pins that get added to the group and will hopefully help with quality re-pins to relevant boards. I too hope that they set the groups to private soon. Will make it more valuable.
I read an update on Pinterest, and followed the conversation on Kate’s group from the past few days. And yet, it took this post for me to take the plunge and get started on it. Thank you!
You do know that makes me VERY happy! Thank you so much for the vote of confidence 🙂
That’s a lovely post, Shailaja and gives out all details too. Will dedicate one day on understanding how it works and make my own community too. It should be fun, informative and helpful too.
I’ll start using Pinterest for blogging at some point…at the moment I mainly use it to pin tattoo ideas! 😀
I so need to attend your Pinterest workshop. If you’re having one after the 15th of this month I’d love to join in even if it’s a weekend. Perhaps then I’ll follow all of this.
You should . I’ve put a hold on group training sessions. But am open to one on one sessions. Let me know if you’re keen and we can set it up at a mutually convenient time. 🙂
I love Pinterest communities!