When I started my online business offering Pinterest management services, I was looking for a means to finally quit my 9-5 and work for myself. While it didn’t look AT ALL as I had planned it, nearly a year to the day after I filed my business paperwork, I was able to do just that! 

As I hit my 3rd year in business, I took some time to reflect on some of the biggest lessons I’ve learned in my first 3 years as a business owner and entrepreneur. 

If you are looking to start an online business or if you’re still in the early stages of entrepreneurship, I’m hoping that a few of these lessons and tips will help you push through and keep going!

 Invest in your Growth

We’ve all heard the term, “you have to spend money to make money” and it’s true. You do need to invest in your business in order to move it forward. 

When I got serious about making my once Pinterest side hustle into a full time gig, I knew that in order to get to where I wanted to be, I needed to learn from someone who was already there. Someone who had been in my shoes but was a few steps ahead of me and could guide me in the right direction.

In June of 2020, I began working with Pinterest Queen, Kathryn Moorhouse, in her mentorship program and with her help and guidance, I was able to build a solid foundation for my business, learn even more about Pinterest plus, systems and process for everything from client acquisition to client onboarding. I can honestly say that had I not made this investment, my business would most likely still be a side hustle. Instead, I have replaced my 9-5 income and am booked out with client work!

There are plenty of other ways to invest in your business outside of working with a mentor or coach. Early on, I realized that to maximize my available time, I needed to focus on my zone of genius (Pinterest and systems:) and outsource everything else.

In the early days, I spent hours and hours trying to design my website. Google search after Google search. Three months passed and I still had no website to launch. Now, I’m the first to say that you do not need a website in order to launch your online business, but I knew I would need one eventually. So, after 3 months on the struggle bus, I outsourced it. And in just a few weeks, I had officially launched my new site.

Outsourcing is one of the best ways you can help your business grow. Time is our most precious commodity and when you stop wasting it on arduous tasks, you’re freed up to focus on money making tasks that add to your bottom line.

Network, Network, Network

I come from a corporate sales background, so networking wasn’t necessarily new to me. But Online networking was!

One of the best things I’ve done for my business is find a few Facebook groups that promote relationship building and networking and then schedule regular coffee chats with other business owners to learn about them and their business. 

Coffee chats alone have provided numerous client referrals, speaking opportunities and overall, brand visibility.

To get started, create an online calendar (I love Calendly), find a few groups that allow this, post that link and get some calls set up! You’ll be amazing at how your network grows.

Work on your Mindset

Before I started my business, I was not a journal-er. I didn’t read a lot of self help books. But when Kathryn and I began working together, she taught me the importance of having a solid mindset as an entrepreneur. 

I began journaling with provided prompts and uncovered mindset blocks that I’d been holding on to since SECOND GRADE! What?! It was mind blowing how identifying things that were holding me back ultimately allowed me to move forward.

So, I highly suggest you grab a notebook and find some journal prompts on Pinterest and see what you can uncover.

Collaborate

Along the same lines as networking is collaboration. By collaborating with other business owners, whether it be in their Facebook group, on their podcast or a live on their Instagram, you open yourself up to a brand new audience. Their audience! 

When you open yourself up to a new audience, you’re also opening yourself up to new potential clients. Through collaboration, I’ve received several referrals OR the people who saw my presentation/talk, have then referred me out to others. 

Networking and collaborating has lead to a trickle down effect in my business that has helped me gain both visibility and new customers!

Collaborate often!

Build the Funnel

This one takes a little longer, but it is worth it in the end. Setting up your sales funnel, and using a source like Pinterest as a traffic generator for that funnel, can lead to new leads, more exposure, email list growth and incremental sales if you have a digital product.

My best tip for building your funnel is to start with the end in mind. What do you want them to buy? What steps would they need to take to get there? And what freebie would relate to the end offer?

Starting with the end in mind will help you understand your customers journey which in turn will help you build a successful funnel.

If you’re in the beginning phases of funnel creation, check out my Pinterest Sales Funnel Roadmap! In this roadmap, I show you what the process of creating a funnel looks like, what you need to do on Pinterest to get traffic into your funnel, plus tips for your landing page, email sequence and how to pitch your offer so that it converts!

This is the process I followed as I created the funnel for my mini-course, Pinterest Plan on a Page! This course will help you get all of your Pinterest systems in place, plus it’s literally a plan on a page that tells you what to do each month to implement your Pinterest marketing plan!

Honor your Pace

I don’t know about you, but I’m impatient. I always have been and it will always be a work in progress.

And it’s no different when it comes to my business. Instead of going through the processes and steps, I wanted to be fully booked with a full income overnight:) Plus, we are bombarded with images on social media of people hitting $10k days and $50k months. It’s hard to avoid imposter syndrome when we see these things over and over.

But, we all know that it doesn’t work like that. Someone else’s middle or end cannot be compared to your beginning.

Once of the best pieces of advice I was given early on was: “Honor your pace.”

Honor your pace. Don’t rush through it just to get to someone else’s end. Honor where your at and take pride in how far you’ve come.

Building a solid and successful business takes time. Don’t rush it!

Keep moving forward

As an online business owner and entrepreneur, you will undoubtedly experience obstacles. You may have a full client load one day and then 2 clients end their contract the next.

But don’t let it destroy the mindset you’ve worked so hard to build! 

When I experience a difficult obstacle, I like to journal about it, identify the truth and the lie in the scenario, and decide to let it go and MOVE ON.

Keep moving forward. Keep taking the next best step, and I promise your business will continue to grow.

No matter what stage of online business you’re in, I hope this has provided you with some tips and tricks that you can apply as you build and grow as an entrepreneur. Drop me a line and let me know what your favorite tip is!

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If you’ve landed on this blog post, chances are you’re looking into how to become a Pinterest VA or Pinterest Manager. But if you’re anything like me when I started out,  you’re not quite sure what services to offer. Narrowing down your Pinterest management services can be tough when you’re first starting out but don’t let it paralyze you. Start by making a list and defining what you like to do most. Pin design not your thing? Outsource it for your clients, you don’t have to offer it! That’s the beauty of owning your own business AM-I-RIGHT?!

I used the Become a Pinterest VA Today course to help package my services and if you’re looking for a comprehensive guide on services, packages and pricing to offer as a Pinterest Manager, I highly recommend it. You can read more about how I became a Pinterest Manager here. 

Now, let’s dive into those services! 

Pinterest Management Service #1: Pinterest Account Set-up

If you’re just starting out, Pinterest account set-up is a great first service to offer. It gives you a chance to put your training into action by starting with an account from scratch.

With this service, you’ll be responsible for creating a Pinterest Business account (or converting a personal account), claiming your client’s website, applying for Rich pins and then optimizing the account for success.

When I talk about optimizing the account, I’m referring to the following:

• Extensive keyword research for your client’s niche
• Profile title and bio creation with use of keywords
• Board creation for your client’s niche specific content – don’t forget board descriptions with your keywords here!
• Filling each board with at least 10 pins, both your clients and curated niche content

Without account optimization through your SEO and keyword research, the account will not perform as well. This is one of the most important steps in Pinterest account management.

Pinterest Management Service #2: Pinterest Monthly Management

Pinterest monthly management is my favorite service to offer! It allows you to really understand your client’s niche and/or products and then help them strategize in order to meet their overall goals. Through Pinterest monthly management, you will be responsible for all the things:

1. Monthly pin scheduling (couldn’t do this without Tailwind!)
2. Account optimization
3. Pin design
4. Tailwind Tribe management
5. Group board management
6. Monthly reporting

This is just the tip of the iceberg! The beauty of monthly management is that you can tailor your packages to include what you love doing best. Or even update them to match your potential client’s needs. 

Pinterest Management Service #3: Pin Creation

If you have an eye for design, then pin creation is right up your alley! This can be offered along with a full management package or as a one off service. A lot of business owners like to have bulk pin images on hand for each blog post. 

To meet this need you can offer packages of 10, 20, 30, etc., for owners to choose. You can offer template creation or create pins in a previously designed template. 

Pinterest Management Service #4: Pinterest Account Audit

A Pinterest account audit is a full account review. This is a service for Pinterest Managers with a little more experience. You’ll want to be able to review every aspect of the clients account and provide a detailed report on where they can improve. You can perform the actual audit yourself as well, just be sure to charge for your time here!

The audit will review areas like profile description, pin design, board titles and descriptions and the use of their niche specific keywords throughout their account. I also like to review their analytics to see what’s working and what’s not and provide them with a few insights on what may be working for their competition. You’ll also want to analyze any group boards and recommend leaving those that are performing poorly. 

Some of the most common issues you may find through an account audit are:

• Incomplete business account set up
• Improper SEO or keywords in board titles, descriptions
• Improper SEO or keywords in pin titles, descriptions
• Not enough boards
• Too many boards
• “Off brand” boards

Most importantly, when agreeing to a Pinterest account audit, be sure to place parameters on the work you’ll be doing. You don’t want to agree to updating all the boards and then find out the client has over 100 boards to review! 

Pinterest Management Service #5: Keyword/SEO Optimization

One of the best Pinterest tips I talk about with clients is SEO and keyword research. It’s one of the top reasons many accounts are underperforming. 

This is another Pinterest management service that can be offered in a monthly package (I offer it in high end packages only) or as a stand alone service. There are business owners who prefer the DIY lifestyle of managing their own monthly schedule, but may not have the time or resources to properly optimize their account. 

When offering a Keyword/SEO optimization service, you’ll first want to start with detailed research of the client’s niche specific keywords. I like to make a list for each blog post they want to focus on. After that, go through and update the following areas with SEO:

• Profile name and description
• Board titles
• Board descriptions
• Review pin titles/descriptions and provide suggestions for future pins
• Hashtags

You’d be surprised at the impact just a few SEO tweaks can make on an account!

Pinterest Management Service #6: Pinterest Ads Management 

Promoted pins, or Pinterest ads management, is a service for the more experienced Pinterest Manager or Pinterest VA. You’ll want to make sure you’ve worked with several clients, and maybe practiced on your own account prior to offering this as a service.  

When running promoted pins for your client, you’ll need a full understanding of their audience, interest, keywords and demographics. It’s also important to have the flexibility to monitor the ad performance daily/weekly/monthly and adjust as needed. 

You’ll want to make sure that you follow these best practices:

• It can take up to 24 hours for a pin to be approved
• It can take anywhere from 2-4 days for results to start displaying under the reporting tab
• It’s recommended to run the ad for a full 30 days to get the best results
• Monitor campaign daily and make tweaks or changes as necessary

And there you have it! Six Pinterest management services you can offer as a Pinterest manager or Pinterest VA. Are you already offering some of these services? What’s your favorite? Drop me a line and let me know!

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When I decided to start my Pinterest Business, there were two big obstacles that held me back. The first was knowing where to start and the second was the website. Sound familiar? If yes, then keep reading! For months, I was ready to start my business and make money but I was nearly paralyzed by these two things, specifically the website. How could I have an official “launch” if my website wasn’t built? How does an online business find clients if they aren’t ONLINE? 

I finally decided to break it down, step by step and brick by brick. I took messy action and just got started! I realized that a website didn’t determine the fact that I was a legit business! Yes, I would need this eventually, but waiting to have this, and all things, to be my version of perfect, was holding me back from making money. And who wants to delay that? 

So today, I’m breaking down the steps I took to get my business off the ground and how I started making money without a website! Let’s do this, shall we?

Determine the ideal client for your Pinterest Business

This sounds a lot easier than it actually is. As an aspiring Pinterest Manager wanting to start a Pinterest business, it’s easy to say “blogger” when it comes to your ideal client. But what KIND of blogger? What NICHE blogger do you want to work with? You must ask yourself some questions to help define who your ideal client is. Doing this helps you target exactly who you want to work with when you start reaching out to potential clients. It also helps you become an EXPERT in one particular space!

• What industry or professionals would you like to work with?
• What are you interested in?
• What does your ideal client like to do in their free time?
• What is their age?
• Male or female?
• Where do they hang out online?
• Where are they overwhelmed in their business?

Once I went through this process, I knew exactly who I wanted to work with! You can read more about how I became a Pinterest Manager, but it wasn’t until I niched down and defined my ideal customer that my business took off. 

Create your service offerings and determine your rates

This is another one of those areas that paralyzed me. How do I package my services and what in the WORLD do I charge? Ultimately, I invested in the Become a Pinterest VA Today course to help me with this, but it didn’t stop there.

Ultimately, your packages should include services that you enjoy performing and services your ideal client needs. For example, if you love creating Tailwind schedules but graphic design isn’t your thing, you don’t HAVE to offer pin design! If this is the case, perhaps your ideal client has a pin designer on his/her team but only needs you to manage their schedule. See how that works? This is the best part of owning your own Pinterest Business! 

Deciding on your rates is a simple backward equation. 

1. Establish how much money you need to make per month
2. Don’t forget about taxes! Determine your rate and build that in
3. What are your monthly business expenses? FYI this should be relatively small if you’re just starting out.
4. How many hours do you have available to work?

Let’s break this down. Say you need to make $2000 per month as your “take home”. We’ll assume your tax rate is 30% (better safe than sorry here!) and you have approximately $100/month in expenses. Now to hours. 

Let’s assume you have approximately 20 hours per week, or 80 hours per month, to spend on client work and it takes about 10 hours per client to manage their Pinterest account. The breakdown looks something like this:

• $2000 + 30% = $2600
• $2600 + 100 (business expenses) = $2600
• 80 available hours / 10 hours per project = 8 potential clients
• $2600 / 8 clients = $325 per package

If you want to work hourly, use the same process then divide the price by the number of hours. WA-LA – you’ve priced your Pinterest management packages!

Choose your entity and register your business 

This is a step not to be missed, most importantly when it comes to tax time. For purposes of truely establishing your business, I recommend applying for an EIN and creating either a Sole Proprietorship or an LLC. Let me define the differences:

Sole proprietorship –  is a type of enterprise that is owned and run by one person and in which there is no legal distinction between the owner and the business entity.

LLC or Limited Liability Company – a corporate structure in the United States whereby the owners are not personally liable for the company’s debts or liabilities.

Basically, the main distinction with the two is what happens if you are ever sued. If you are sued as a sole proprietor, your personal assets are up for grabs. However, as an LLC, they are suing company assets and personal assets are protected. 

There are financial distinctions between the two. It does cost to set up an LLC and in most states, there is an annual fee to maintain. Personally, I started out as a sole proprietor, but created an LLC as my business grew and the liabilities became greater. Check out your state’s website for more information on how to establish either entity.

Create a business portfolio – Download my portfolio template!

As I said from the start, a website should not be a deterrent from starting your business and making money. The longer you wait to have your website perfect, the longer you’re waiting to make money. 

Once I decided to put the website aside, I created a Services Portfolio, and started pitching clients. And you know what, I was hired! Three times to be exact. Yep, that’s 3 clients for my business WITHOUT a website. And at this point, I had the cash to outsource because let’s be honest, building a website takes TIME. And it was more time than I had to give.

I want you to be able to start TODAY, so I’m sharing my portfolio template with you. This template was designed in Canva, so you will need a Canva account to access and edit. But once you do, it’s completely customizable. You can edit anything to fit your brand!

Create your processes and systems

One last step before sharing that portfolio and getting clients and that’s making sure you have your processes and systems in place. I am a process NERD. I love setting up systems and creating timelines to help me manage my business. If there’s something that aids efficiency, I’ll find it!

My favorite system for organization and workflow is Asana. I have each of my Pinterest management packages built out, step by step, to help me stay on track. I will have many more posts about Asana in the weeks and months to come, but for now, check it out and see how it can work for you. Assigning due dates assures that I never miss a task or deadline. 

Asking yourself a few questions will help you start the process and workflow planning:

• How will you onboard your client, and what questions will you ask?
• If you do a discovery call, on which platform will that take place (i.e. zoom, phone, Skype, etc)
• How will you send your service contract?
• How will you invoice your client?
• How will you gather passwords (i.e. LastPass)?
• Lastly, what steps are necessary to deliver your service, or what is your service process?

Defining these processes and systems early on will help you better provide your service and keep your clients coming back for more!

GET CLIENTS

It’s time to get some clients for your Pinterest Business! Now that you have your newly created portfolio, let’s put it to use. You can use any or all of the following resources to start reaching out to potential customers. 

• Create a pin image (I love using Canva!), upload to Tailwind or Pinterest and link it directly to your portfolio! You can do this by saving it as a .pdf in Google Drive. Bam, links directly to your services!
• Sign up for Upwork, start submitting proposals and attach your portfolio. You can read more about how I was hired on Upwork within a week! I also have a free proposal template available for download!
• Once your determine where your ideal client hangs out, go there! For instance, if it’s Facebook groups, join that group and share your knowledge! Many groups offer “promote your goods” days where you can link to your portfolio. One piece of advice, I find the small to medium size groups are more beneficial that the gigantic ones. It’s easy to get lost on a group that has 5,000+ members.
• Tell your friends and share your portfolio!
• Post it on your LinkedIn profile!

If you go through this process, get your portfolio set up and land a client, drop me a line and let me know!

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How to become a Pinterest Manager without any experience

A while back I decided that after almost 20 years, my regular 9-5 job was no longer appealing. I was tired of working for someone else’s dream so I began to scour the internet, looking for something I could do from home. After stumbling upon a few blogs, I learned about all the things you could do as a virtual assistant and thought, I can totally do that and specialize in Social Media!! So I began researching even more and realized “social media” is VERY broad. I would need to learn ALL THE THINGS for ALL the platforms. It was a little overwhelming but I needed to start somewhere so I created a Skillshare account and saved some classes I thought might help me learn some new skills. This is where I found a Pinterest course from Peg Fitzpatrick and realized this little platform that I had been saving recipes and home decor on, was actually a MARKETING platform. And a darn good one at that! People were using Pinterest to market their businesses and low and behold, they were HIRING people to manage this process! Getting paid to play on Pinterest? Yes, please! And that’s where my desire to have my OWN Pinterest Business began. 

This article may contain affiliate links, which means if you make a purchase through the link, I may get a small percentage at no additional charge to you.

Pinterest business: is this a real thing??

After doing more research, I learned that there really are people who want to hire a Pinterest manager! While I knew how to use Pinterest and the basics of Pinterest Marketing, I had no idea where to start when it came to starting my Pinterest business or what Pinterest manager services to offer. 

While searching for a Pinterest manager course (on Pinterest, duh!), I stumbled upon How to become a Pinterest VA Today. While the course offered modules on the basics of Pinterest (which I felt I already knew), it offered several things that other courses did not, like how to set up your business successfully and the steps to finding clients and managing their accounts. 

PVA course 

So let’s recap. I finally realized I wanted to start a Pinterest business, managing other business accounts, and I had a basic understanding of Pinterest and Pinterest marketing.  Outside of that, I was completely clueless on how to become a  Pinterest manager for OTHER people or how to start and manage my business. I needed Pinterest manager training!. 

Not gonna lie, it took me at least two months to decide to purchase this course! The price was something I had to work through, but I finally came to realize that if I didn’t take leap, I would continue to delay. SO, I took messy action (I didn’t even have a website yet!), hit that “purchase now” button, and never looked back. What some people don’t realize is that BECAUSE of the price, I was more invested than ever to earn BACK that money. I completed the course in about two weeks (while still working my 9-5), signed my first client within a month and earned back my entire investment in 3 months! It can be done!

What you’ll learn from the course

1. Pinterest, Tailwind and Canva tech training
2. What services you can offer as a Pinterest Manager
3. How to package and price your services (this was the ticket for me!)
4. How to cold pitch potential clients (email templates included)
5. How to onboard your new client (onboarding template included)
6. That I didn’t need all the things to begin (like a website!)

What I love the most is that once you’re a student, you get lifetime updates to the course for FREE. So when Pinterest makes changes and they update the course, you’re already in. I refer back to the course all the time for continued learning!

Pinterest Manager Services 

I wanted to detail out some of the services you can offer as a Pinterest Manager. I think this was a big misconception for me. I originally thought overall account management was all I would be doing, but MAN was I wrong! All of these services can be offered as a SEPARATE, one off service OR you can package some of them together, i.e. Pinterest AND Tailwind account set up.

1. Pinterest account set up
2. Tailwind account set up
3. Pin design
4. Pin description writing
5. SEO Research
6. Account Audit
7. Monthly Maintenance

This list only scratches the surface. I’ve seen Pinterest managers charge for image searches (for pin creation) and even account management training for the DIYer. Pin design not your thing? You don’t have to offer it! Ultimately, it’s your business and it’s all up to you!

Take messy action and start today!

This course gave me the confidence I needed to get my Pinterest business up and running. If you’re still not sold, read some of the other success stories and watch the videos. After I saw so many amazing women seeing stellar results, I knew it could be done. 

I absolutely LOVE being a Pinterest Manager and having a business that is my OWN – and you can have that too! These days, there is no need to be stuck in an unfulfilling 9-5. Stop working for someone else’s dream and build your own!

Bottom line: you can scour the internet for weeks, or even months, and MAYBE find what you need to start your business. OR, you can purchase this course, have all the necessary tools in one place, and get started ASAP on building your Pinterest business. If you’re ready and willing to work hard to get through the material so you can start earning back your investment, then investing in this program is the right decision! 

More questions? Don’t hesitate to drop me a line and ask!

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