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How to
Get Started on Tailwind
And Skyrocket Your Blog Traffic
I’m just going to say it- the thought of learning a new platform sucks.
If you’re anything like me, you love to learn but the thought of learning another new platform makes me want to run for the hills. All of a sudden anything and everything on your To-Do List is more important than learning yet another platform.
This was the case with Tailwind. I’ve heard how wonderful it is (especially Tribes) and how fast it can help blogs gain traffic but one of the first courses I took as a new blogger suggested Boardbooster so that’s what I’ve been using.
I’ve always known Boardbooster was an unapproved scheduler for Pinterest but I never had any issues so I continued to use it. Unfortunately, Pinterest came out last week and encouraged people to discontinue using Boardbooster because accounts using Boardbooster were being marked as spam and shutdown. Yikes!
I turned off Boardbooster and within a few days my traffic plummeted which meant it was time to suck it up and learn Tailwind.
Tailwind to the Rescue
Once I got started with Tailwind I realized it was easy. *Facepalm* I should’ve convinced myself months ago to make the switch.
I haven’t figured it all out yet but just in the last week I have seen a nice little bump in traffic which is motivation to get it all figured out sooner rather than later. There is a lot to learn when it comes to Tailwind but it seems pretty simple over all.
Getting started has been super easy so I wanted to share with you how this Tailwind Newbie (aka me) did it so you can get up and running with Tailwind ASAP too.
What Is Tailwind
Tailwind is a Pinterest and Instagram scheduling platform. Both Pinterest and Instagram want businesses and creators to use their platforms consistently and they often reward consistency with more traffic. As much as we love blogging, no one wants to be on the computer all day sharing pins though and that’s where Tailwind comes in.
Now that we know what Tailwind is, let’s talk about how to set it up. One small disclaimer though- this is how I set up my account. My reach went from growing by about 1,000 a day to 3,000 a day so I’m happy with this setup but I’m sure there are other ways to schedule your pins. If you have any suggestions or want to pipe in about what has worked for you leave a comment at the bottom of this post.
Want Some Tips to Help You Boost Your Pinterest Game? Check Out These 19 Tips Directly From a Pinterest Rep.
Getting Started on Tailwind
Step 1: Sign Up and Sync Your Pinterest Account
Signing up with Tailwind and syncing your Pinterest account is simple and self-explanatory. Check out this screenshot above taken directly from Tailwind below.
Step 2: Create Board Lists
I am all about ease so the first thing I wanted to learn after starting Tailwind was how to group my boards. I was happy to learn it’s super easy to make a list of similar boards so that you can schedule a pin to all of them at once if you choose.
To make a list of boards go to the left side of Pinterest and select ‘Publisher’ then ‘Board Lists’ from the box that drops down.
Once on the page you can click the ‘+’ to create a list of boards. At the top of the board that pops up highlight the words ‘New Board list’ and change the title of the board to something easy to remember.
You can then either type in the name of the Pinterest board or scroll down until you find the board you want to add. You can add as many boards as you want and they can be group or personal boards.
Do this as many times as you need to cover all of the categories on your Pinterest account.
Step 3: Create Your Pinning Schedule
Tailwind has made setting up your pinning schedule easy as well.
Go back to the left side of the page and select ‘Publisher’ and then ‘Your Schedule’ from the dropdown box. Tailwind has a pretty handy feature that looks at the times your Pinterest account gets the most pins and then auto-populates them for you. The times in green are scheduled and the times outlined in green are additional pin times you can schedule.
At first Pinterest will give you a random schedule. It will open up with 4 pins scheduled per day (on average) but you can change that by selecting ‘Generate New Smart Schedule’ at the top and you can select how many pins you want scheduled a day. Pinterest likes to see between 12-30 pins per day from a business account.
Step 4: Select Pins to be Scheduled
When you first start up Tailwind it will force you to go through a quick tutorial. This is great for getting started but I’m not a fan of being forced to do anything so I pretty much just clicked wherever I had to to get through it.
However, one of the things it has you do is upload the Chrome Extension ‘Tailwind Publisher’ and that extension is the easiest way to schedule pins.
In order to schedule a pin, go to any page and select the Tailwind symbol that’s now at the top right hand corner of your web browser. For convenience, I will go to a popular board or trending page and select several pins to schedule at once.
Once you are on the page you want to schedule from you can either hover or the pin or picture and click the Tailwind icon that appears or (and this is what I prefer to do) select the Tailwind Publisher app added to Google Chrome which will then show all of the pins available for pinning.
When you select a pin a blue outline will appear around it. Select as many as you like. To schedule the pin you can either choose a board at the top of the page and all of the pins selected will be scheduled to that board (at varying times) or you can select which board or group boards within each individual pin.
Once all of the pins have boards selected, click ‘Go Schedule’ at the bottom right-hand corner of the page. Your pins are then scheduled to your boards!
Step 5: Shuffle Your Boards
The following step is a tip I picked up from Raelyn Tan, a blogger I love because she knows her stuff. Once you schedule your pins, go back into Tailwind. Select Publisher on the left-hand side and go down to ‘Scheduled Pins.’
On the right you will see all of your scheduled pins. Above that you will see a button labeled ‘Shuffle Queue’. Click that button and all of your pins will re-order. This is important because you don’t want Tailwind sending out the same pin 10 times in a row which can look spammy.
You are now set up to start pinning on Tailwind! Awesome and easy, right?
But there’s more- Tailwind Tribes.
Tailwind Tribes
Tailwind Tribes are really what make Tailwind shine. Tribes are free with your subscription to Tailwind and you are allowed to join 5 tribes and schedule 30 pins a month.
Join a tribe is similar to joining a group board on Pinterest except you can see who is pinning and who isn’t. This makes having a healthy tribe much easier than having a healthy group board because it holds people accountable. Tribe owner’s can set rules for their boards (like one re-pin for every pin) and kick out anyone who doesn’t follow them.
Tailwind Tribes are a great way to grow your engagement in Pinterest because you are practically guaranteed re-pins on your pins. The more engaged people are with your pins, the better chance you have of a pin going viral or at least getting good reach on Pinterest.
To join Tribes click on “Tribes” in your Tailwind dashboard on the left side of the page and then click ‘Find a Tribe’. Type in your blog niche and you’ll get a list of tribes you can join or request to join.
Scheduling pins to tribes is very similar to scheduling them to post. The only difference is instead of selecting a board to schedule the pin to you will select a tribe. A list of your tribes will pop-up and you can schedule your pin to go into that tribe. You can either do this from directly from your blog article or within your Pinterest account.
Learning Tailwind... or Any New Platform
Learning a new platform is always something I will think of as being a pain in the butt. However, Tailwind has made their platform ridiculously easy to learn and use. I can honestly say I am glad I was forced to make the switch.
Hopefully you’ll be able to get up and running on Tailwind and start seeing increased traffic to your blog.
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