5 Reasons Why You Should Be Using Pinterest in Your Therapy Practice
There are a lot of different ways you can market your services and encourage clients to work with you - Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, TikTok - but one that is often mistakenly overlooked is Pinterest.
Is Pinterest relevant?
In a nutshell, yes!
Unlike Instagram, in particular, which has a very short shelf-life for content, Pinterest content stays relevant for a long time. In fact, it’s what is called ‘evergreen’ - it’s always there and always searchable. Although commonly mistaken for a social media platform, Pinterest is actually a search engine. Whenever someone searches for something like your pin, it’ll come up - it’s similar to how Google works.
Instagram content, on the other hand, loses pretty much all of its potency after a few days, if not hours.
The goal of Pinterest is for people to save other people’s images to their boards, whereas for Instagram it’s to share your own content, Pinterest has much more of an inclusive energy. It’s about sharing and discovery, plus, because you can link directly through your pin to your website, it’s much easier to get people onto your site compared with Instagram.
This is just a small snapshot of why Pinterest is the marketing tool you’ve been missing out on, so keep reading to find out why you should be incorporating it into your strategy.
#1. Pinterest is a search engine
As we mentioned, the goal of Pinterest is to use it like a search engine - this sets it apart from other platforms as it encourages new or insightful information sharing. As it’s a search engine, you can use Pinterest SEO (in a similar way to SEO - keywords, image descriptions, etc.) to help increase the number of people who will see your posts and help you find your ideal clients.
Use keywords in your pin titles and descriptions to ensure you’re making the most out of them, and make sure you’re always including a link to your website.
#2. You’re creating evergreen backlinks
The more websites that link back to yours, the better (this is also why it’s great to do guest blogging). The more pins you create, the more backlinks you create, so get creating, get pinning and you’ll quickly see your Pinterest monthly views, and eventually, your site visits, increase.
As we said, your pins will always exist out there on Pinterest, which means if you have 100 pins that all have links, you’ve got 100 potential opportunities for people to visit you.
Instagram doesn’t have this feature as you cannot provide a link directly on an image, making it more complicated for people to click through.
#3. Pins have a longer lifetime than social media posts
Unlike Instagram stories that have a lifetime of 24 hours or Instagram posts that have an average lifetime of 48 hours, Pinterest pins can show up in a user's feed for weeks, or even months, after you originally post them.
This means that you don’t have to keep creating content to the extent you might with Instagram, because it will remain visible for much longer. This takes a lot of pressure off you from having to be a social media manager as well as a therapist and means your website will keep getting views from pins long you’ve shared in the past.
#4. Pinterest wants to share your content
It can feel like some social media platforms are designed to make you feel frustrated rather than grow your business and it can sometimes feel like you’re shouting into the abyss. Pinterest, on the other hand, wants to show your content to its users to meet their searches - it actively wants to show people!
Much like Google, the platform prioritizes sharing helpful, informative or valuable content because this is what will keep people using it. So, make sure that what you share on Pinterest is one of these, and that it links to a helpful or informative page on your website, and you’ll be on to a good thing in no time.
#5. Free marketing
Yes, it’s free! How often do you get free marketing help, especially from a global brand? With Pinterest, the hard part is done and your content will (with the right keywords and as long as it’s good quality) be shared and will be seen.
The platform will market your pins to their viewers for free, so long as you’re uploading consistently (note, consistent, not regular. You don’t have to be posting every day or even every week, but as long as you post in line with your content plans, this is enough) you can sit back and relax while Pinterest does the work for you.
3 Bonus Pinterest Tips
Boost your exposure to potential new clients.
If you’ve not yet used it then by opening an account and posting you’re expanding your potential client base by roughly 433 million people (the number of active users in 2022, source).
It’s not just the number of users, though, it’s also about how engaged they are. Research shows that 87% of Pinterest users have bought something because of the website (source). That’s a heck of a lot of engaged users just waiting to work with you. Add this to the fact that every single pin you create will have a link to your website, and it’s really a no-brainer.
It makes people feel good
8 out of 10 Pinterest users say that using the website/app makes them feel happier. Not many other social media platforms can say that, can they (source)?
Contribute to group boards
This is an often-overlooked Pinterest hack that will mean your pins get even more eyes on them. Pinterest has the option of having shared boards that anyone who’s part of can pin on. You can request to join a board or may be sent a request if someone wants you to join theirs. You’ll then be able to pin to it, meaning anyone on that board will be notified of new activity.
We highly recommend starting your Pinterest journey today if you’ve not already tried it out as it’s guaranteed to bring new potential clients to your virtual doorstep. It’s also fun, easy to use, and effective, so why not give it a go in your therapy business?
