Rich Pins on Pinterest: What Are They and How To Enable Them on Squarespace

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’m a firm believer that Pinterest is a non-negotiable must-have for all business owners and entrepreneurs as part of their overall marketing strategy and lead generation. There is so much more to Pinterest than home decor, planning a wedding, or finding quick & healthy recipes for dinner. Pinterest has an enormous audience of highly engaged users that are looking for an answer or solution.

That’s where your business comes in.

Before you begin executing your Pinterest marketing strategy, your account must be set up for optimum success. We’ve already discussed the importance of a Pinterest Business Account and how to easily set yours up. Next, is setting up Rich Pins.

Rich what?!

Rich Pins. Think “super pins” packed with additional information, keywords, and all that jazz to make your pin stand out and rank higher on Pinterest.

Let’s dive into the world of Rich Pins a bit more.

(psst: are you following The SM Collective on Pinterest yet? If not, click here!)

What Are Rich Pins on Pinterest?

Simply put, Rich Pins contain additional information directly from your website that helps your pin stand out and rank higher on Pinterest. Pinterest describes Rich Pins as:

“Rich Pins are a type of organic Pin that automatically sync information from your website to your Pins. You can identify Rich Pins by the extra information above and below the image on closeup and the bold title in your feed. If something changes on the original website, the Rich pin updates to reflect that change.”

Pretty neat, huh?

Once you have Rich Pins enabled, Pinterest does the rest of the work for you when something is pinned from your website. From your keyword-packed meta description (aka blog excerpt) to recipe ingredients, Pinterest automatically pulls this information for you and anyone that Pins from your website. We call that a win-win!

The Different Types of Rich Pins

There are 3 different types of Rich Pins: recipe, article, and product. Based on the type of Pin, Pinterest will pull in and sync different information from your website.

Recipe Pins

For Recipe Pins, Pinterest pulls in information like ingredients, cook time, serving size, ratings, diet preference, and more directly from the recipe on your website. Recipe Pins are great for food bloggers, cookbook authors, recipe developers, etc. If any changes are made to the recipe on your site, Pinterest will automatically update the Recipe Rich Pin.

Article Pins

For Article Pins, Pinterest pulls in the headline or title of the blog post, the author of the blog post, and the description or excerpt that describes what the article is about. Pinterest classifies an article as a page on a website that contains text, like a news article or a blog post. Listicles or pages that contain mainly images are not classified as articles. If any changes are made to your article or blog post, Pinterest will automatically update the Article Rich Pin.

Product Pins

For Product Pins, Pinterest pulls in the most up-to-date price, availability, and product description. For US and UK-based businesses, Pinterest will only show Product Rich Pin information if your business is on their list of merchants and the product is in stock.

How To Enable Rich Pins on Squarespace

Before you go ahead and enable Rich Pins on Pinterest, you first need to claim your Squarespace website. Don’t worry, this is an extremely simple process and I’m going to walk you through each of those steps. For enabling Rich Pins, I’ll be highlighting Article Pins but the process works the same for them all. Let’s get started!

Claiming your Squarespace website on Pinterest

1. Log in to your Pinterest Business Account
2. Select Settings from the drop-down menu on the right-hand side
3. Select Claim
4. Enter the URL of your website; click Claim
5. Select Add HTML Tag from the pop-up window; click Next
6. Copy the HTML Tag (note: keep this page/tab open – you’ll be coming back to it in a few steps)
7. In a new tab, login to your Squarespace account and select your site from the main dashboard
8. From the navigation panel on the left-hand side, select Settings > Advanced > Code Injection
9. Paste the HTML Tag into the Header Section; click Save
10. Go back to the Pinterest tab you kept open; click Next > Submit > Done

Note: You’ll know that your site is claimed and verified on Pinterest when it shows a globe with a checkmark on your Pinterest profile.

Enabling Rich Pins

1. Go to one of your blog posts and copy the URL (note: it’s important to make sure you’re using the URL from a blog post – it can be any blog post – and not your homepage)
2. Paste the URL into the Pinterest Rich Pins ValidatorClick Enter

Note: You only need to validate one blog post URL to enable Rich pins across your entire Squarespace site. As a heads-up, it can take some time for the Rich Pins to activate and successfully start pulling the designated information. We usually like to wait for 24-hours after enabling them to check and make sure they are working properly.

That’s it! Pretty simple right?! Once you have claimed your Squarespace website on Pinterest and enabled Rich Pins through the Rich Pins Validator, you’re one step further on the road to Pinterest success! With Rich Pins enabled, be sure to focus on keyword-rich articles and blog post titles and descriptions so that Pinterest can do the work for you and get your Pins showing up in search results.