If you’ve not already heard of Pinterest Shuffles, where have you been? Since launching earlier this month it has hit the Gen-Z generation by storm with thousands of people searching for that lucrative invite code. I was one of them.
If you still don’t have access to the app and are looking for an invite code, check out my last post which details how you can get a Pinterest shuffles invite code.
After getting to grips with the new app by Pinterest I thought I would post a how to use Pinterest shuffles blog with 5 top tips on helping you to get traction on those initial shuffles you put out!
How To Add Images To Pinterest Shuffles
There are four different ways to add images to your Shuffles collage.
- Search Pinterest – this is one of my favourite ways to find exactly what you’re looking for. Literally press the bottom left search icon. You can then enter any keywords you want to derive the search. Once you’ve found what you’re looking for just press the image and it will appear on your collage.
- Import your own images – perhaps you have your own images on your camera roll or you’ve taken a screenshot from Google that you want to use. Just select the camera icon on the bottom of the screen to select your image. Just ensure your settings have allowed access to share images to Shuffles.
- Stickers – there are oodles of stickers to choose from within the shuffles app from quotes and celebrities to cutesy backgrounds. I was scrolling for ages and I still didn’t get to the end!
- Import from your Pinterest boards – after all, your Pinterest boards are a reflection of the things you love. If you have a connected Pinterest account with Shuffles you can click on your profile icon on the bottom right. This then brings up every board you have, you can click into any you want and select your chosen pins from there that you want to add to your collage.
How To Create Your Own Shuffles Stickers
It was day 2 when I worked out you could create your own stickers. When you’re on your profile page you’ll see at the bottom that there are two icons. The one on the right is the stickers tab.
Click into this and you’ll see a ‘+’ icon. If you select that you can bring any of your own photos into the app and cut parts of the images out to form your own stickers.
As you can see I tested this little feature out with a picture of Papi, my chow chow! I can now add Papi as a sticker to any of my future collages. I mean, who wouldn’t?
How Do I Edit Images In The Shuffles App?
There’s a few different ways you can edit images, first import a photo from your camera or choose an image from Pinterest to use. Once the image has been imported to the collage, click on it again and it will open an editing view. On this there are a few different options for how you can choose to edit the photo.
As you’ll see on the image below you have the following from left to right;
- Borders – you can choose from a selection of different borders and frames to jazz up the photo on your collage. This helps to add a little bit of texture and depth rather than adding flat images.
- Gradients – you can choose to add gradients or levels of transparency to the photo.
- Filters – add a good old fashioned filter. There is currently 12 different filters you can use to enhance the photos.
- Animation – there’s even an option to add a subtle bit of animation to the image, this creates an animation that constantly moves subtly on the moodboard.
- Cut outs – the last option is to create a cut out from the image. This is one of the most popular editing features on the app as you can cut pieces out of pins you want to use without have to use the full image.
How To Layer Images On Shuffles
The most frustrating thing I found when creating my first moodboard is that my wotsit fingers on the app kept ending up moving pieces I had already placed, and I’d realise I had layered something on top that I then needed to place underneath and I had NO idea how you could freeze layers and move objects in front or behind.
The introduction to the Shuffles app doesn’t provide any of the info surrounding this, either that or I skipped it thinking I knew better! Anyway… These are the two things I wish I knew from the start.
Freeze Layers
Once you have set an image down you can choose to freeze it. This is purely so when adding in other images you don’t end up accidentally moving it. You can unfreeze it at any time.
To do this you just add the image where you want it to be and then click on the image. This then brings up this screen and you just need to click on the little ‘Lock’ icon to lock it into place, it’s that simple!
Send Images To Back & Front
Once you’ve added your images, you may find that you actually want to send something to the back, and you want to bring something forward. The positioning of that picture as a layer can easily be changed.
You simply do this by pressing down on the image, leaving your finger in that position, this will then bring up a sliding scale of dots on the left hand side, as shown on the image below.
You then just drag your finger in an up or down motion, depending on where you want to position it (all without releasing your finger from the screen).
Dragging it to the top dot will position it as the top layer/bring it to the front, dragging it down to the bottom dot will position it as the bottom layer.
How To Add Text To A Shuffles Collage
There’s a few different ways you can add text to a shuffles collage. The first and easiest way is to simply click on the ‘a’ on the bottom right hand side when you are creating the collage. Slightly similar to Instagram stories, you can select the alignment, what font style, the colour of font and if you want to highlight the text.
If you wanted to use little quotes you could click on the stickers icon at the bottom of the screen which has the two faces covering each other. There are plenty of cool stickers and little quotes in here that you can use on the image too.
Additionally, you could go straight into Pinterest on the search button on the bottom of the screen and search for some word art that you could select, cut out and add onto the collage.
Top 5 Tips For Creating On Pinterest Shuffles
Use Popular Hashtags
On the Home Screen click on ‘Hashtags’ so you can see what the top trending hashtags are AND use them in your descriptions!
Every time a new shuffle is posted it goes to the top of this hashtag section (also to the Recent tab) so it provides a great opportunity for your shuffle to be discovered and loved.
It’s still super early days on the app and new hashtags are appearing all the time, so keep checking for new ones, or start your own hashtag trend!
Post Regularly
There’s no surprise that consistency is going to win you those followers on this platform. I posted 7 shuffles in the first 24 hours and started to gain a little momentum. As new shuffles go to the start of queue, continually adding them is what appears to be the best way to grow right now.
Follow Accounts
Start following accounts that are posting stuff similar to you, and that you love! You never know, they might even repay the favour!
Stick To A Niche
Whilst this platform is not monetised yet and you can’t really drive traffic anywhere expect to the pin images you have used, this platform could go anywhere.
Start posting about one specific niche, it’s one of the best ways to grow an account across social media because people that choose to follow you know what to expect. If they followed you for home content they don’t want to then see a myriad of Marvel collages.
Experiment
People seem to purely be posting collages with no text or little words currently. This could change.
TikTok used to be just dancing videos, then educational content for every niche started. So, experiment. You don’t need to be following what everyone else is doing. Think outside of the box and it might just take off!
Shuffles by Pinterest is an exciting new app and I’m really looking forward to see how it evolves over the next few months.
It’s currently only available on iPhone, sorry Android users. Whilst it’s invite only, there are codes out there still and you can also choose to join the waitlist, but we have no idea when doors will be fully opened to the public. Happy shuffling!
