How To Pin on Pinterest

I’ve had quite a few readers email me because they can’t figure out how to pin a photo onto Pinterest. Other than providing inspiration for your own life, by looking at other people’s boards, you can create your own boards, by adding photos you find on the internet. But how?

To pin photos you find, you will need a Pin button loaded onto your Internet browser. It doesn’t matter what you use — IE, Firefox, Chrome or Safari. To get one, simply go to this Pinterest goodies page, and drag the words, highlighted in light blue, that says: ←  Add this link to your Bookmarks Bar. Drag it straight to the top of your search bar, and place it where you want to button to appear. Once you’ve found the sweet spot, a little plus sign will show up.

It is VERY important (for copyright reasons), and if you want to find the post again,  that your browser address is to the page that contains the post that holds the picture you want to pin — rather than the website’s home page. Read on to ensure you are pinning to the correct URL.

Pinterest allows you to create a virtual bulletin board around any topic you heart desires. You can view other’s boards for inspiration, and collect those pins onto your own boards. Pinterest can help you solve life’s pressing problems. You can also pin any image or video you find on the Internet to post to your own board, share with friends, tweet about it, or share the pin on Facebook.

However, this “incorrect” pinning that is covering the Pinterest boards is driving me crazy. I feel compelled to reach out and try to correct the madness, because it isn’t doing anyone any good if we can’t find the link you are pinning.

The problem centers on the “permalink” of the post that features the image or the words you are trying to pin. The permalink is located in the address bar of the page you are on — the url, or web address. While the url of susiej is susiej.com, the look of the posts on that page will vary as I add more stories. If you want to remember how to make a lemon aid shakeup, you will want to save this url address:

https://www.susiej.com/make-fair-style-lemon-shake-ups-at-home/

The permalink of the post you are seeking to pin is unique to each specific post. That permalink is where the exact photos and text are located for the story you want to pin –and this does not change.

How do you find the permalink? Simply click on the post’s title… your screen will refresh, and the url in your browser will get a bit longer (sometimes it includes the post title or date, or both) but it is distinctly different from the home page url, and all of the other stories will drop off the page once the permalink is revealed. That’s where you pin.

Here’s an example of how this works.

I pinned this image onto my lighting board, on how to turn a Clementine into a candle. To read more about how to do this, I click on the source of the pin, which is in the upper right-hand corner of the pin. See Exhibit A.

However, when I clicked on that link, this is what appeared.

This link was actually an “email” that was sent to someone’s private email address… and I couldn’t open it, becuase it was not sent to me.

Determined to find the source, I googled, “how to turn a clementine into a candle, ” and found that the post originally appeared on Apartment Therapy. Problem solved.

Or is it? Now, we run into another problem with pinning on Pinterest and Permalinks. If you click on http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/, I can guarantee that you will not see a burning clementine. Did they pull the post? Where is it? As more posts are added and updated, the home page changes. Apartmenttherapy.com is not the permalink on how to turn a Clementine into a candle.

But this is the permalink:

 

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/how-to/how-to-make-a-clementine-candle-001453

Notice, that the permalink includes the post title, and a number… much different from http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/

But this is the permalink:

 

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/ny/how-to/how-to-make-a-clementine-candle-001453

Notice, that the permalink includes the post title, and a number… much different from http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/

How did I find it? I simply clicked on the title of the post. When you are sure you are on the post’s permalink page, then, and only then, do you hit that little P button circled in the image below, on the upper right hand side. To learn how to get that P onto your task bar, which the Pinterest video tutorial.  Easy.

By using permalinks, you will be able to find the exact location of all of your pins, and so will your followers.