Your complete guide to Affiliate Marketing on Pinterest in 2023 and beyond!
{This post contains affiliate links. That means I make a small commission at no extra cost to you. Visit my disclosure to learn more.)
Can you now use affiliate links on Pinterest?
I see this post so often in my private Facebook group and many other business Facebook groups I am a part of.
Since the launch of advertising on Pinterest in May of 2014, Pinterest has been a little back and forth regarding affiliate marketing on the platform.
So it makes sense; there still needs to be some clarification. But today, I am here to tell you that you can, in fact, utilize Pinterest for affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing can be a great way to make money by sharing products that you use and love. Before we dive in, let me give a quick rundown on exactly what affiliate marketing is.
(If you already know, you can skip head!)
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is the process by which an affiliate earns a commission for marketing another person’s or company’s products.
I am sure you see a lot of this on Instagram already. While many posts from influencers are sponsored, a lot of influencers share links to products they love.
99% of the time, those are affiliate links. And if you purchase that product, or even a different one, via that same affiliate link, that affiliate earns a commission. Usually 10-20% of the sale, sometimes more.
The concept of affiliate marketing is, “What if you can share the products you love and make money while you sleep?
When it comes to Pinterest and affiliate marketing, it’s essentially a win-win situation. As you know, when you pin something on Pinterest, it circulates the platform for LIFE, potentially reaching tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of users. If you know what you are doing.
If even 20% of those users clicked on that link and made a purchase, well, you would be making a pretty penny with little to no effort.
Sounds pretty good, right?
Is affiliate marketing only for bloggers?
Gone are the days of needing a blog to promote affiliate links/content on Pinterest. So all of you non-bloggers out there who are looking into this avenue, you are in luck.
There are a few different ways to drive traffic to your affiliate links on Pinterest. With MOST programs, you can directly link a link to your affiliate link or direct traffic from the pin to your blog post containing the affiliate link.
You can even try both. That is the beauty of Pinterest!
Pinterest is an ideal place for affiliate marketing.
Why is that?
In 2022 Pinterest came out with some pretty sweet and reassuring stats.
They noted that Pinterest converts more browsers into buyers. And visitors from Pinterest are more likely to convert into leads or sales faster than other social media platforms. Yes, even Instagram.
Not only does that platform have over 445 MILLION MONTHLY active users, they also noted this:
- Pinterest trends take off 20% FASTER in the first 6 months than trends on other platforms.
- Shopping engagement grew by 20% in 2021, and that’s expected to triple by the end of 2023.
- In that same report, Pinterest said that 75% of Pinterest’s monthly users are always SHOPPING.
Making it THE ideal place to promote your affiliate links.
Here is what is in my ShareASale account today. I haven’t written a post with an affiliate link in it (until this one) Since 2019.
That means, due to my old pins circulating Pinterest and sending me affiliate traffic, I made over $2,000 this month alone and did ZERO work to get there.
This money is coming from two old posts I wrote nearly FOUR YEARS AGO. Because my account and content are correctly optimized, it keeps circulating and trending off and on throughout the year without me having to do a thing.
This is why proper Pinterest SEO is SO important!
Now, to the good stuff.
How to do affiliate marketing on Pinterest
Whether you have a blog or will be directly linking affiliate links, there are a few things you want to keep in mind and a couple of steps you will want to take.
- Find affiliate programs and networks with products you want to promote. (I’ll talk more about these coming up)
- Create pins and add your affiliate links.
- Add proper disclosures and publish your pins.
However, there is more you need to know; stick with me!
You want to make sure you are staying in compliance with the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) So, here are a few important affiliate rules for Pinterest:
- Do not use URL shorteners like bit.ly to hide your affiliate link. You have to be transparent about affiliate links.
- Only operate one Pinterest account in which you promote your affiliate links.
- You must disclose an affiliate link when one is used. More on this in a minute.
- Do not create affiliate pins repetitively or in large volumes, as this can look like spam, and it also can get your account flagged and possibly shut down.
Ensuring you are 100% up-to-date on Pinterest’s CURRENT best practices and guidelines is extremely important. (More on this in a min too)
Disclosing affiliate links
Staying in compliance with the Federal Trade Commission is extremely important. But also very easy.
If you are directly linking affiliate links to pins
You need to make sure in your pin description, at the bottom, after you leave your description AND optimize your pin, you must note at the end that this is an “Affiliate link.” Or even better, “This is an affiliate link or sponsored product.”
In Pintererest’s community guidelines, they say:
Pinterest says: “All applicable disclosures are required to indicate the commercial nature of your content (such as the use of #ad to indicate that your content is a Paid Partnership).”
So adding #ad or #affiliatelink is fine too. But, if you want to play it super safe, I would indicate, “This is an affiliate link or sponsored product.”
If you are using affiliate links in your blog post
There are a few things to keep in mind. At the VERY beginning of your blog post, you need to have an affiliate disclosure before you even start typing.
This is what I say when my blog posts contain affiliate links, “This post contains affiliate links. Which means I make a small commission at no extra cost to you.”
Just remember, no matter how you are linking an affiliate link, you need to make sure you are noting that it is one.
Pinterest Account Guidelines
You need a Pinterest for Business account to successfully affiliate market on the platform.
The reason is that Pinterest is a search engine operating on an algorithm. If you are just posting pins with affiliate links that are not properly optimized or saved to non-optimized boards, your reach will be in the single digits, and that drastically brings down how much money you can make.
Here is what you want to make sure you have set up BEFORE you start with affiliate marketing:
- A PROPERLY optimized Pinterest account. From your handle to your profile to your boards. Using proper Pinterest SEO is extremely important if you want your content to be found. So many Pinterest for business users give up because they can’t get a good reach, and they aren’t getting a good reach because their account wasn’t optimized properly.
- Current best practices and guidelines. It’s essential you are up-to-date with how Pinterest wants you to be pinning. Pinning with outdated strategies will not only get your account flagged as spam, but it can also get it shut down.
If you want to learn more about setting up a successful, properly optimized Pinterest account AND ensure you are up-to-date with current best practices and guidelines,(so you can rock your affiliate marketing) click HERE.
Below is a list of Affiliate programs you can join! Just be sure to read the rules to make sure they don’t say anything about not being able to promote on Pinterest.
And also, be sure to check out Pinterest’s Community Guidelines pertaining to affiliate marketing for more in-depth information.
Happy Pinning,
xo Megan
