Using Pinterest Maps: Tips & Ideas

Sarah Shuda

Pinterest has released a new mapping feature this week that may change the way travel & tourism businesses utilize their boards.

Location is everything when it comes to travel marketing. Being able to share trip itineraries is just one of the many ways I can see businesses using this feature. If you already have great content on your website it’s another way to repurpose your content in a new way with an existing community.

Here are a few ideas on how you might use Pinterest Maps to your advantage…

Pinterest Map Ideas

Travel Itineraries: By length, by category (outdoor addicts, shopping lovers, historic sites), by season & more!
Food Guides: Plot restaurants by type (fast food, five-start dining, by culture), create your own food or wine tour or plot recipes by where they originated.
History: Create a then & now board by pining historic “before” photos for locations that are now vastly different.
Photo Contest: Run a photo contest based on the locations you’ve pinned to a map board on Pinterest. Update each pin with the best photo submitted for each location.

Pinterest Mapping Tips

Here’s a few tips on using this new feature…

Missing Locations: Currently Pinterest is using the FourSquare database to bring up businesses and photos. This is a challenge for those of you who might have locations that aren’t found in this database. This has been clearly stated as an issue by many users and hopefully they’ll be offering a more robust way to add your own items and locations apart from FourSquare.
Changing the URL: After you’ve found your location you may notice that the website is automatically selected for you. To change the URL you need to edit the pin after creating it.
Pin Order: Like any other board on Pinterest, the order of the pins is based upon creation time. Older pins will be displayed last, newer first. Keep this in mind if you are creating a trip itinerary that is order dependent and pin wisely 😊