This email was sent to my email list on December 15, 2022.
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Hey!
I hope you’re doing well and feeling as stress-free as possible, especially as we head straight into the holiday season! 🙂
There has been a LOT going on with the internet lately. Some Pinterest related, some non-Pinterest related (but still notable because it may change…well…everything!)
In this email I just want to lay out all of the different things happening and some of my thoughts on them. (I don’t know about you, but I love hearing peoples’ thoughts/commentary on things…especially when they may pertain to me or my business!)
The end of Pinterest Creator Rewards
The first major update is that the Pinterest Creator Rewards Program is officially DONE. Yup. This announcement came just a few days before Pinterest actually ended the program. Its last day was November 30, 2022.
To be honest, I have a lot of mixed thoughts about this decision.
While it was a nice way for Pinterest creators to make some extra cash, it makes sense that Pinterest ended it because it didn’t seem sustainable long-term to pay creators so much.
From the beginning, the Creator Rewards Program just seemed like an incentive to get more Idea Pins and original content pushed out on the Pinterest platform. Of course, when you offer people money to create Idea Pins, they’re going to do it, but my guess is that they always planned for it to be temporary.
On the other hand, there were so many creators that never had a chance to participate in Creator Rewards (and Pinterest said on their website that they were still rolling it out, which clearly they weren’t). So I wish Pinterest had handled things a bit differently there.
With this announcement comes two more Pinterest updates: (1) Links on Idea Pins seem like they might be here to stay (YAY!!), and (2) rumors are going around that Pinterest is scaling back on the amount of Idea Pins in the Pinterest feeds.
Links on Idea Pin
I sent out an email quite some time ago to share that some people were beginning to see the option to add links to Idea Pins. I could see that on a few of my accounts, but not everyone could see it.
Now, it seems like links on Idea Pins might be here to stay! This may provide some great opportunities for us. I’m not sure exactly what this would like like/how to utilize it OR if the outbound click rates will even compare to that of Standard Pins, but it’s definitely something worth watching. We will just have to see what happens as it evolves and if it’s something worth incorporating into our own strategy.
I think the biggest issue that we might see with them (at least initially) is that pinners are so used to there being no link that they might not even know that there is this ability now. So if you’re creating Idea Pins, using call to actions might be helpful to encourage outbound clicks. But who knows — users could adjust real quick because this has been a long-requested feature!
Idea Pin limits & the return of Standard Pins (finally)?
The next piece of news is that it is rumored (I haven’t seen confirmation about this from Pinterest, but a reputable Pinterest marketerssaid this) that Pinterest is scaling back Idea Pin distribution. In turn, this means that Standard Pins will likely be seen more in the Pinterest feed.
This is REALLY great news for bloggers, because more Standard Pin views = more traffic = more ad income + affiliate sales (theoretically)!
I know I’m really excited about this because Idea Pins were never my cup of tea. I find Standard Pins far less time-consuming and laborious to create, plus Standard Pins have a much greater return on investment for my business type.
For some, this may not be such great news.
Pinterest may just be testing things out and we have no clue what they’ll do moving forward or long-term, but the Pinterest marketer who reported this DID SAY that she’s seeing the positive effects of it as her Pinterest traffic is climbing and climbing.
This is bringing me back to the old Pinterest days, and I’m pumped!
AI & ChatGPT – This might change online business
Hopefully I haven’t bored your ear off yet, but there’s one more thing that I want to talk about that has taken the internet by storm (and a few key takeaways I think it we should have).
It all has to do with ChatGPT.
Recently, an incredibly powerful AI software was released. It’s insanely impressive and shows the power of artificial intelligence.
If you haven’t heard about ChatGPT, I highly suggest looking into it because it may change our future. (Plus, the things people have been doing with it — crafting essays, poems, grocery lists, jokes, etc. is like nothing I’ve heard of or seen before.)
As a blog content creator, this especially intrigued me (and many other bloggers) for a few reasons because developments like this may really impact our business model. Here’s why:
People are using AI softwares like ChatGPT to create content at insanely fast rates. In one group I’m in, someone mentioned that they’re creating 40 posts per day. (For me, I’m happy if I get 2 up in a week.)
If people are able to create content so fast, I think we will see a few things: (1) It’s going to be harder and harder to rank for some keywords in Google, and (2) there is going to be so much spam on Google and record numbers of pages and posts for Google to index.
I also people are going to think they can “game the system” by creating new sites and quickly uploading hundreds of blog posts. Theoretically, this could work if you’re targeting all the right long-tail keywords. But this doesn’t sit too well with me, and I have a feeling that Google will feel that same way.
Google is going to have to respond (at least IÂ think). How they will do that, I have no idea.
AI & Google – Lots of questions
What I’m interested to see is how Google’s response to all of this AI written content. Right now, Google’s stance is that they don’t want AI written content. (I know I would rather read content written by real humans with expertise and experience, but that’s my preference.)
However, some have argued that since Google’s primary goal is to provide the best user experience, if AI content is written better than human-generated content, then Google may be fine with keeping it.
My hunch is that things such as E-A-T (which basically your authority on a topic) and quality backlinks will become more important.
The other thing that people are debating is whether or not Google will even exist in a couple of years. Will AI answer engines like ChatGPT completely replace Google? After all, they provide quicker and more in-depth answers (the only problem right now being that sometimes they are factually incorrect).
Then, some people have talked about the legalities of developments like ChatGPT. AI has to grab its information from somewhere, and that ‘somewhere’ is us and our content. People are grappling if this is okay for softwares to do.
All in all, it’s pretty interesting and some food for thought.
No better time to use Pinterest
As you can probably tell, I’m really interested in this, and I think it may eventually have some pretty big impacts on online businesses. (There’s so much more I could go into but I’ll save you from that lol!)
With all of this news and concerns about the future of Google search traffic, many people have already talked about seeking to diversify their traffic sources — which means going back to good old Pinterest, Facebook, YouTube, etc.
And if you’re a business that heavily relies on Google traffic, I encourage you to think about this too!
If your niche is relevant on Pinterest, that may be a great place to start because you can still get insane traffic with Pinterest.
These changes have also made me reflect more on what it means to be a content creator — specifically the constant changes we have to adapt to. Just when we think all is stable, it can all change (and there are SO many examples of this!)
To me, Google always seemed like the “constant” in online business. I always heard people say to focus on Google SEO because it was the most reliable. But looking towards the future…is it?
I guess we all need to turn back to that old saying and don’t put all of our eggs in one basket! My key takeaway is to DIVERSIFY and think towards the future and the things that we can be certain in.
Talk to you soon,
Leah Marie
