Depending on how you found me, you may already know this: Pinterest isn't just my addiction; it's my job. I run the Pinterest division for a social media management company, so memes like the one below pretty much apply to me…except I save the wine for when I'm working on my own account.
Actually, I do most of my pinning in the a.m. with a Chai Latte now, but hey…a girl can dream right?!?
Not only do I love my job (who wouldn't love to get paid to play on Pinterest?), but I love hearing feedback from my clients. One thing I encourage all my clients to do is set up rich pins. Not only are they great for SEO because of the additional information shown on the pin, they really stand out to pinners. Setting up your rich pins is so easy too! You can do it in about 3 minutes!
First, you need to have open graph enabled. This is a metatag code that Facebook reads too, so it serves a double purpose! My favorite way to set it up uses Yoast SEO, which I always install on my blogs. If you don't have it, you can install it in less than a minute using the steps below. Yoast serves many purposes, so I prefer it over plugins designed to only enable open graph. While I love the plugins I use, I know I need to keep them limited, so my site loads fast and to avoid any plugin conflicts.
Go to Plugins > Add New – Search for Yoast
Find WordPress SEO by Yoast (it shows up first) and click install. Once it's installed, click activate. Now you're ready to enable open graph. This is literally only a couple clicks and you don't need to open any other tabs.
Mouse over SEO in your blog's dashboard and click Social.
Click the checkbox that says “Add Open Graph meta data” and save. Yes, it's really that easy! Now your posts are easy for Facebook to read and you are ready to tell Pinterest to turn on Rich Pins!
Apply for rich pins in 2 easy steps!
Click #4 to validate, since you just added the right metatags for article rich pins.
Copy/paste the url for one of your articles in. It doesn't matter which one, just grab whatever link you have handy & click validate. The green checkmark shown will pop up and you hit apply! In a couple of days (some have reported it taking up to 2 weeks) you'll get a notification that Pinterest has approved your application and rich pins are enabled!
Want more ways to boost your Pinterest Power? Check out my Pinterest Tips & Tools for Bloggers!
If you've already enabled rich pins, how well are they working for you?
Kathy
Thank you so much Savanah for making Rich Pins so simple to install. I have been searching everywhere and nobody else has explained the process clearly and with pictures. YOU’RE AWESOME!!
Savanah
Thank you. I discovered how easy it was when trying to see why mine worked and someone else’s didn’t and had to share!
Jen
Thanks for the step-by-step directions – I didn’t realize it was that simple! The only thing I didn’t see in your post was the link to where to go in Pinterest to apply for the Rich Pins. The picture was great, but if you have the link of how to get there that would save people the step of having to search under “help” in Pinterest, which I did (maybe I missed it in your post?). But otherwise, awesome post with simple step-by-step directions – thanks!
Savanah
I think it blended in! You can click the image or underneath where it says “Apply for Rich Pins”. The direct link is http://developers.pinterest.com/rich_pins/
Sarah
Thank you so much for posting this. Extremely helpful! 🙂
Performance Review Coaching
When I originally commented I appear to have clicked the – Notify me when new commennts are added- checkbox and now each time a comment is added I receive 4 emails
with the exact same comment. There has to be
a means you are abke to remove mee from that service?
Kudos!
Savanah
Considering I marked your first comment as spam, I’m not sure how that would have happened, but the bottom of any email from my site has an unsubscribe button.
Dawn Zipper
I am very new to blogging and I am trying to find the plugin for youst and there is many and I am not sure where to find the one you are talking about. I want to add rich pins to my Pinterest
Savanah
Yoast SEO by Team Yoast is the plugin. If you use WordPress, you can search for it under Plugins – Add New. If you do not use WordPress, I’m not sure if you can get it.