Geek or tech bloggers don't usually think of using Pinterest to drive traffic to their blogs.
There are some geek or tech accounts, but from what I've seen, a lot of them are not following the right strategies for Pinterest growth.
And the fact is that Pinterest strategies for 'male niches' can be very different to the strategies we use for 'female niches'.
(I don't want to be stereotypical, but there are fewer women in male-dominated niches like programming or engineering.)
Anyway, if you're in a geeky or techy niche or an awkward niche that doesn't seem to work for Pinterest, I am going to give you some tips.
And some of them will go AGAINST everything you've ever learned about Pinterest marketing.
More...
[Disclaimer: Some links in this post contain affiliate links. This means I get a commission if you purchase the product through my link at no extra cost to you. As an Amazon Affiliate I earn from qualifying purchases.]
How to organise and grow your Pinterest
Use your own photo for your profile
From experience, you're more likely to get repins if you put a face rather than a logo on your Pinterest account. It is also rare to see geeky accounts with a face.
Follow boards, not people
When you start with Pinterest you're going to need to get followers, and one of the quickest ways of doing it is to follow people in your niche for one or two weeks.
When you do that, you also appear in their lists of followers and you're more likely to be followed.
So if you have Pinterest profiles in your niche, then great.
But that works well for general niches, not for techy niches.
For the very specific or geeky niches, you will surely find people that are interested in your niche and they may have several boards that are relevant. #pinterestforgeeks #pinterestmarketing
But they are also interested in BBQ ideas, holiday destinations, DIY, etc. And you don't want to see those on your Smartfeed when you're trying to pin other people's stuff.
So ONLY follow the boards you need.
Don't join group boards, create one instead
Using group boards on Pinterest as a way to increase your Pinterest traffic might not work for you.
There's more and more bloggers dropping them altogether because recent changes on Pinterest mean that they're not as important.
But you still want to create your own and invite any relevant profiles to contribute.
To invite people go to one of your boards and click on the Invite button to get a list of people you can invite. If you don't have anybody in your list, copy the invite link and use it on social media, emails or message relevant profiles on Pinterest.
SUPER IMPORTANT TIP: DO NOT join ALL niches boards.
Niche down your boards
There's no point having a board called Great Stuff I found on Pinterest, cos it means nothing, and nobody will know what's in it.
So make sure all your boards are relevant and specific to your niche.
And don't forget to include a Best of... Board for your own content!
Is your website pinterest friendly?
You could be missing out on Pinterest engagement and traffic if you don't set up your website and your blog posts the right way.
Get How To Set Up Your Website For Pinterest Success today and boost your Pinterest traffic.
Use multiple boards for the same thing
Since group boards are not likely to be very helpful, you have to rely on your own boards and followers for repins and clicks.
But you don't want to spam your boards with the same pin.
And not everybody is going to follow your whole profile, lots of people follow single boards and Pinterest also recommends boards to follow.
So create several boards from the more specific to the more general or join two topics in one board to create several boards to use for each of your pins.
So you can have boards for Learn to Code, Programming Tips, Python Tips, Python for beginners, Python Programming Tips... or Robotics, Robotics Projects, Robotics Design, Robotics Design Projects, How to Design a Robot...
Use keywords and hashtags
Pinterest SEO is important because it helps Pinterest users find your stuff. So use keywords for naming your boards, your board descriptions, your profile description, your pin titles, your pin images and your pin descriptions.
If you can write a description in a couple of sentences, fantastic!
I know, I know, depending on the niche, it can be a bit harder to come up with a few sentences to describe what's in the board...
If you can't come up with anything add a few keywords and the odd hashtag.
Make the Most of Pin Titles
Changing your Pin titles as well as your Pin Descriptions and Images can help you reach more people, not just because different people will react differently to each pin but also because they're looking for different keywords.
In this blog post from Tailwind you can get some great SEO tips for crafting Pin Titles for your blog posts and products.
Pin other people's content
When you start pinning and don't have enough content of your own, you should pin other people's content. Look for niche profiles and boards.
It's usually a safe bet to use one of these to repin from and you can fill up your Tailwind queue easily.
And prioritise pins that are well designed, as I explain further down or infographics.
This will help you to get more followers and will also help you with consistent pinning. You don't want gaps in your Tailwind schedule.
Pin even if the pin sizes are all wrong
If you're pinning from other people's sites, it's OK to pin square pins or horizontal pins. If they're colourful or useful for your readers, go ahead.
Cos there are fewer pins in the right sizes and it's harder to find great content.
If you think something is worth pinning, pin it. No matter the size.
You can reduce the amount of other people's pins as you get more of your own pins.
Pin only relevant pins to your boards
It's important that you only pin relevant content to your boards, cos Pinterest needs to learn where your pins go and what keywords are associated with them. Then it can show them and your boards to the right people.
Get the right people to help you
In case you want to outsource your Pinterest marketing to somebody, you need to make sure they understand Pinterest and they understand your niche.
If you have a technical niche and the person designing and writing your pin descriptions doesn't understand it, it will be much harder for them to come up with the right SEO, hashtags and Pinterest descriptions that sound natural and can get your readers clicking.
Pin, pin and pin some more
Pins have a long life, but to help them reach more Pinterest users, they need to be pinned regularly and you need to pin them to all your relevant boards, not just one.
It's not enough to pin your new blog posts or content once.
And Pinterest wants their users to be active. That's where my next three tips come in handy:
Use Tailwind
I'd recommend this for anybody starting with Pinterest, to be honest. If you're not sure if it's your thing, you can try Tailwind for free here.
Using Tailwind you get more shares, more followers and more traffic to your site. But it makes it much easier for you to share your own pins as well as other people's if you are in a geeky niche.
Start your own Tribe
There are some geeky tribes in Tailwind, but if you can't find one for your niche, start one. Here are some tips to make the most of Tailwind Tribes.
Then invite any relevant profiles to your tribe. You may even get some money off your next Tailwind invoice!
You can invite people you see in other Tailwind Tribes or contact them directly through Pinterest.
Use SmartLoop
Get your best pins and add them to your Smartloop.
So you're pinning them consistently and can focus on creating new content.
Tip: Don't forget to remove poorly performing pins and add some new ones regularly or you could see your Pinterest traffic drop.
Promote your pins
I am pretty certain that you will find the right people in Pinterest, but to make sure you get to them, consider promoting your pins.
I haven't tried this yet, but here's a blog post by Tailwind with tips to set up your Promoted Pins Campaigns for maximum impact.
Make lots of pin variations
There's no set number of pins you should create for each blog post. Some people do one, some people do 3, some do 10, some do a lot more.
I'd go for something between 3 and 5 to start with. If you have several templates, it's quite easy to put them together once you have your image.
I use templates in Stencil, but when I want to create a set of 10 or 20 pins in minutes, I use RelayThat; the designs there are better suited for male niches anyway.
Pinterest design tips for geek and techie niches
Bear in mind I am not a designer, so I am not going to discuss whether somebody used typography the right way or not and stuff like that.
As I was saying, what you're trying to do is to get people to pay attention to your pins when they appear on their feed.
And the following tips will help you.
Photos or text only?
You don't always have to use photos or images for your pins. You can have a simple coloured or textured background and your text and that's OK.
And some pins without images do really well because the wording in the pin is spot on. I mean it's very clear to the reader what it does.
But there is a danger that even though people will recognise your pins, they'll ignore them, cos they all look the same.
See?
Claire's got other templates where she uses photos as well, btw. But the Python pin is much clearer than the other.
Do not use irrelevant images
But what you shouldn't do is to use photos of things that are not related at all with what you do. Like these ones:
Cos
1 - What the heck?! What's a cottage got to do with string theory? Or am I missing something? Any Sheldon out there? and
2 -It gets Pinterest confused as well. Because Pinterest looks at the images to know what you're talking about. And because it puts similar pins together when it recommends pins for you to look at.
As it happens, in relatively small niches this won't matter so much if you do your Pinterest SEO right.
But if you have the wrong style or image of pin for other niches, your pin won't come up in the right people's feed!
Use stock photos
If you cannot use your own photos, having awesome stock photos for your pins is going to make them stand out.
Not only that, it will save you hundreds of hours looking for free images in Unsplash.
I like DepositPhotos for the geek or tech niches, though they also have some great photos for feminine niches too.
For instance, I did a search for chemistry and got lots of images that you can't find in other sites. You can even use some of them as backgrounds for your pins! And the vectors are soooo helpful!
See?
Something else you can do is use patterns like these or these other ones from The Hungry Jpeg to create your templates for your pins.
Forget your branding
Branding your pins with your website and/oryour logo is a must. And you should always have a couple of templates showing your brand colours and fonts.
But...
What you're trying to do is get people to pay attention to your pins, so forget about your colours and your fonts for a while. Feel free to experiment with different fonts and colours and see which pins get you more traction.
For example, this pin by MUO uses a raspberry colour cos it's a pin about Raspberry Pi, but it's not one of their usual colours. But lots of Raspberry Pi pins do use the colour.
I am not convinced it works in this case, but I see the point.
And if your colours don't work with the background photo you're using, DO NOT USE THEM.
You might end up making people's eyes water.
Don't try to be clever with your design
I saw a pin a while ago about a clash of something with something else with the two lines of the text clashing into each other.
Some of the text was green.
Some of the text was red.
Let's say it wasn't easy to read, and I am being diplomatic here...
Shame I forgot to take a screenshot, cos I would have loved to show you but it was ages ago and I can't remember where I saw it.
Keep it simple
Readability is important so make sure your fonts are large enough and use simple fonts and designs.
Cos the geekier the niche, the more likely they're to use a mobile see your pins. This is is based on my own experience running geeky and non-geeky profiles, by the way.
And big fonts make your pins easier to read.
Make your pin designs lighter and brighter
One thing I have noticed is that a lot of the geeky pins have dark brand colours, dark photos and dark overlays.
And when you're in one of these smartfeeds, it can feel quite depressing. 
2 reasons why you want to go for brighter pins
One reason is that you want to make your pins stand out in a feed that is populated by dark pins.
And the second reason is that your pins may be competing with stunning, professionally-designed infographics and book covers.
So using bolder, colourful, lots of contrast or lighter colours can help get people to notice your pins.
If you're stuck for backgrounds, something I usually do is go to my Stencil and do a search for Colourful or Abstract Images I can use. And if I have to, I can blur the image a little bit so you don't have to know what it is.
Experiment with faces on your pins
One common theory is that pins showing faces do worse than pins without faces. I'd say you need to experiment.
I don't want to be a tommy-opposite but the usual rules don't apply, so try pins with and without faces.
Be aware of the gender of your followers
As I said in the intro, the percentage of women interested in geeky niches is slightly higher on Pinterest than on other social media.
So I did an experiment to see if using images that were more feminine and showed women would work better.
The answer was no, less frilly pin designs showing men performed better.
So bear this in mind if you're a woman in a male-niche.
Hope you found those tips helpful. If I think of any other tips, I'll add them later.
Are you in a geeky niche and want me to help you with your Pinterest strategy? Get in touch with me.
Did you enjoy this post?
Would you mind sharing it on Pinterest so it can reach more people?
Thank you!
​
Thanks for all of these wonderful tips. My Pinterest profile is a bit of a mess, since I use it for saving links under a variety of topics.
Never considered using bright colours to make my pin stand out. I may have to experiment with that sometime!
Thank you! I’d keep an eye on what your competitors are doing and try to make your pins stand out in the feed.