One of Your Boards Was Categorized on Pinterest

With so many new people joining Pinterest over the last few months there are from time to time emails, posts, messages, or other happenings that newer users may not understand. One of the most common questions people new to Pinterest have is why they are getting an email or emails saying that some person has “categorized” one of their boards. Does the text from this email sound familiar?

Hi [Your Name],

Your pinboard ‘Name of a Board You Have‘ was categorized by Some Person you May or May Not Know as belonging to ‘Category Name‘.

Click here to change it.

- Ben and the Pinterest Team

What That Email from Pinterest Means

Very simply: If you haven’t already categorized your own boards, a message will pop up for anyone who visits that board offering them an opportunity to categorize it for you. New people on Pinterest in particular are not in the habit of clicking or viewing one of their own boards. In fact most people starting out rarely click on entire boards, choosing instead to click on individual pinnings. That means that most new people never see the drop down window available when looking on a board that has not been categorized.

So why are you getting this email from Pinterest?

If you notice at the top of Pinterest you can look at “pinners you follow”, “everything”, “videos”, etc – when you hover over “everything” there is a drop-down list of choices.

When someone categorizes your board it puts the board in the category selected by that person. Then you get an e-mail telling you they did it.

Then, when Pinners searches for DIY & Crafts or some other category your board will provide some of the results for that search. It’s like a filing system to make it easier for people to find what they are searching for.

The best way to avoid getting this email is to go back and take a look at each of your boards. Look at the settings and see if a category has be chosen for each one. Select a category for all of your boards and then no one will be able to select a category for you, and you will not get this email.

If you have additional questions about how Pinterest works please leave it in the comments below. Either other visitors or other we will get the answers for you. If it is a juicy question we will maybe even just do a whole blog post about it.