Pinterest is a fantastic place to find niche travel information you won’t be able to find anywhere else. In fact, I would say that these days Pinterest is one of my favorite sites to go to when I’m planning a trip. There are a lot of ways to use the site so I’m going to go through how to use Pinterest to plan a trip.
The first thing you should know is that Pinterest is a search engine, similar to Google. Where it differs though is that it is focused on images and user-submitted content. Also, unlike Google, you can save things that interest you to find later.
Before you start your adventure on Pinterest you should create an account if you don’t already have one. You’ll want one so you can browse through the site and save anything that catches your eye.
Search
The easiest and most familiar way to use Pinterest to plan a trip is to do a search. Let’s say you’re planning a trip to Birmingham. If you search just for Birmingham you’ll get search results that look something like this.
You have some great search results to pick from at the start. In the top row alone you have five different articles to pick from, including mine. But if you scroll down a bit you’ll find that the content in this search varies wildly and even includes photos of Harry Styles. So, you’ll want to narrow it down and make it a little more specific. Pinterest gives you some suggestions on how to do this in between the search bar and the search results. So, for the sake of this article lets say you want to narrow it down to Birmingham, England you click on England and get new search results. But you still have a lot that isn’t travel related so click on travel to narrow it down even more. Now you have search results that are entirely about traveling in Birmingham, England. Each one of these results is a link to a blog post, many of them written by travel bloggers like me. You can even find incredibly niche results like a Pet Shop Boys inspired trip to Birmingham.
You could have seen the same results simply by searching for “Birmingham England Travel” but by following the suggestions from Pinterest you’ll be able to find things you might not have otherwise thought to search for.
You also don’t have to limit yourself to searching locations. Pinterest is a fantastic place to get all sorts of information from saving money to packing tips for a trip to Europe.
More Like This
After you’ve found a Pin that you like, (that’s what images on Pinterest are called) you can click on it to make it larger and to direct you to the website the Pin comes from. But that isn’t the only thing you can do on that page. If you scroll down past the image you’ll see a section called More Like This. It has, as you might have already guessed, more Pins that are like the one you’re looking at.
Boards
When you find something you like and you want to save it for later you can click on the big red Save button. This will allow you to create boards where you can save everything you like. When you’re creating boards it helps to be specific, otherwise, you end up with a board like one of mine with more than 600 pins saved on it!
You can also follow boards that other people have created that you enjoy. This way every time a pin is added to that board you will see it in your feed.
Feed
Your feed is a fantastic place to get inspired if you aren’t sure where you’d like to travel to. To find it simply go to pinterest.com, the pins that load are a combination of suggestions based on things you’ve pinned before and the boards that you follow. The more you use Pinterest the more things will appear in your feed as the algorithm learns what you’re interested in.
Explore – Travel
Another way to get inspired by random pins is to explore the travel category. At the top of the website on the right side is the Explore button. This will take you to the trending pins at the moment and also offer you a variety of categories you can explore. Select the Travel category. Here you’ll find all sorts of pins related to travel from all over the world.
Tips
Here are a few tips for using Pinterest to plan a trip.
- Be specific. (Christmas Markets in Germany, not just Germany)
- Don’t be afraid to be vague. (You never know what you’ll miss out on)
- Consider who is going. (Kids? Seniors? 20s? Couple?)
- Consider when you’re going. (Winter? Christmas? Easter? Summer?)
- Search for specific interests (Filming locations, hidden spots, botanic gardens)
- Follow creators you love. (Like me!)
- Save everything. (It’s so much easier than doing the search again and hoping for the best)
Search Suggestions
Here are a few search suggestions to get you started
- Dublin Things to Do
- Kids in Japan
- Cologne Christmas
- Ireland Travel
- Wheelchair Travel
- Cheap Travel
- Packing Tips
Be sure to follow me on Pinterest if you don’t already! If this article has helped you learn how to use Pinterest to plan a trip then please consider pinning the image below to share it with others!
