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Feeling discouraged, trying to gain new followers? This is for you!

michaelbliss
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

When I began creating content in late 2013 and early 2014, it seemed it took forever to gain 50 followers, then a hundred followers and after the first year, maybe 400 or so.

I remember spending hours searching online for the easiest and quickest way to gain more followers.

As of today (2-26-22) I have about 475,000 followers and a much larger, healthy, community. Only a small percentage of my community actually follows me, and the vast majority of my followers aren’t actually followers at all, but they visit, and consistently engage with, my Pinterest profile every single day.

I’ll like to share with you what steps I took along the way to grow my following, and more importantly, an engaged community.

Hopefully in the next couple of minutes, you can find tangible methods which can be applied to pretty much any business, service or blog you might have to grow a large, healthy and engaged audience, that are eager to see your content.

In the beginning, I was feeling discouraged of how slow my follows would come (and quickly go) and whatever I found online to grow new followers seemed superficial to me; I wanted a following that would engage with my content, rather than a number next to my name.

I wrote a ‘mission statement’ or ‘purpose’ or whatever term I used, and I made it simple:

“If I can create a positive experience, a positive place, and touch only one life in a positive manner, I will be successful”

Today, Pinterest is defined as ‘being inspired and inspiring others’ which is absolutely true. It’s as simple as that.

When I see ‘hey, I’m trying to get to 1000 followers’ or 5000 followers, or whatever the magic number is, I ask myself why?

Let’s say that if tomorrow morning, you woke up with 10,000 followers, 50,000, 100,000 or half a million, what would be different? What would change?

Would you post more often, would you post less? Would you use more video in your Idea Pins, what about music? Would you have one slide, 5 slides, 10 slides on your Idea Pins?

What about static pins? Don’t ever discount the reach of static pins!

What about engaging with your community, comments, messages, emails? Would you be put off by negative comments and feedback, and you WILL have tons of negativity as your community grows.

How would you spend your free time? Practicing and learning new ways to create engaging content that your community, audience, customer base, whatever you call it, would love to see? What about new software or even trying out an online service?

Whatever your answer is, then start doing that now. Today. Right now. Your content should appeal to 10 people or 10 million. Start acting as if you have a million followers because you may have even more in the years to come.

I asked myself these questions (with the exception of Idea Pins back then, but I do include them now), printed them out, and put them in my office, my bathroom mirror, in my car, right next to what I feel is my purpose being on Pinterest in the first place.

“If I can create a positive experience, a positive place, and touch only one life in a positive manner, I will be successful”.

When I took my focus off the number of followers I had, wish I had and what I didn’t have, and placed it on the quality of my content, I noticed a steady stream of new followers that came for my content and are still following me today.

I began to reach out to my community, no matter how small it was, and asked them what they would love to see more of, and less of, my following increased. My focus was on engagement.

“If I can create a positive experience, a positive place, and touch only one life in a positive manner, I will be successful”.

When I noticed my numbers were completely tanking off and on over the years for who knows why, and I began feeling discouraged, I returned to my goal of making one person’s life change in a positive way. That’s all I can do and it’s what I do best. I do my very best each day to create the most engaging content I can.

And so can you!

I see amazing, inspiring content from many of you here, on the PBC. I love seeing the dyi’s, the beautiful pictures you take, the before and afters, the behind the scenes of how you create your products, how you eagerly offer your expertise to help grow a business, how you are helping others ease into a healthier lifestyle, how you laugh putting on makeup, mix and match clothes, showing videos of your pets doing crazy things, how you are making interior design look way too easy, asmr type videos that help me sleep better, and even how to order the hidden, off menu items, at Starbucks (yes, you know who you are).

I see Idea Pins from many of you that open up to your struggles in life for the purpose of making sure someone else isn’t feeling alone with theirs. We all need to have this every now and then.

Pinterest isn’t social media, it really is all about inspiration.

Pinterest isn’t about numbers, it’s about inspiration.

Pinterest exists with the hope you leave feeling inspired and hopefully will inspire someone else in return.

You can do this in your business I saw, the service you offer, your blog I’ve read that has beautiful ways to improve life.

My experience will prove to you that if your focus stays on creating content that will engage a possible client, customer or reader, you will be successful, the right people will find you and be a follower for years to come.

If you stay true to yourself, and place the focus on how your business can enrich just one person today, my experience will prove to you that success will come quickly. Your following will grow and you will enjoy having a loving, engaged community that absolutely loves what you offer.

When you bring out the best of you, the best of your business, your service and blogs, and share it with us, the only possible outcome is success and a large, engaged community.

“If I can create a positive experience, a positive place, and touch only one life in a positive manner, I will be successful”.

40 Kudos
36 Replies
ALittleNicheShop1
Just visiting

I agree @tkstudios! I know it is good to extend my social media presence to other sites but Pinterest has such a unique community and environment. I feel like other social media sites are so focused on how many followers you can get in a set amount of time. Besides, Pinterest has a pretty nice user interface!

2 Kudos
simplepinmedia
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

@michaelbliss This is so good! Thank you so much for sharing this. True words! And the Podcast episode came out today! So enjoyed it. Thank you for coming on the podcast with Kate. You gave much value ❤️ 

-Tabby

1 Kudo
michaelbliss
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

Thank you @simplepinmedia!! I was super nervous, but Kate made me feel at home and I had lots of fun! (Episode 275, right?) Thank you for having me, I'm going to make an Idea Pin later this week about the podcast (Episode 275, right?). Hopefully it will encourage others.

2 Kudos
simplepinmedia
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

@michaelbliss Yes! Ep. 275 🙂 You were fantastic! 

-Tabby

1 Kudo
simplepinmedia
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

@michaelbliss I guess we're having tech issues with it on our website 😕 
But I listened to it on Stitcher. I'll let you know when it's up! 

-Tabby

1 Kudo
michaelbliss
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

@simplepinmediano worries! I'll look for it later in the day.

0 Kudos
AmyFergusonCFD
Just visiting

Such great advice! 

1 Kudo
JourneyForBeauty
Just visiting

Great read and inspiring to just push for making someone else’s life a bit easier with your ideas. Followers are followers but engaged people taking an beautiful impact from pins is where you feel successful. 

2 Kudos
michaelbliss
Pinterest Pioneer
Pinterest Pioneer

@JourneyForBeauty  That's absolutely right! Engagement matters the most!

1 Kudo
anonlineguy
Just visiting

Sorry, to me "I need Pinterest as a true social media with all about inspiration." Thank you @michaelbliss  for sharing your long-way story to achieving a "successful" point on Pinterest. But now Not, I need Pinterest to have a revolutionary template of design and algorithm that is able to compress successful duration from years to months or weeks and achievable to more users. My full curiosity about Pinterest is on my thread here  . Have a nice day, guys!

 

0 Kudos