How To Promote Your Affiliate Link On Pinterest 2022

People getting blocked. People getting banned. It keeps coming up, and it all traces back to the same mistake: pasting a raw affiliate link into a Pinterest pin. Alston Godbolt was fielding this exact question from his audience for weeks, so he pulled up his own Pinterest account, which was sitting at 368,000 monthly views, and walked through exactly what works, what fails, and why the failure happens before the post even goes live.

This is not a theory post. Every step in this guide comes directly from a live screen recording where the right way and the wrong way both play out in real time. By the end you will know which link types Pinterest blocks on sight, which ones slip through, and, more importantly, why you should not be linking directly to any affiliate network even when it technically works.

What You’ll Walk Out With

The exact error message Pinterest shows when it blocks a ClickBank affiliate link
Why Amazon links sometimes pass through Pinterest while ClickBank links never do
Why posting direct affiliate links is a bad strategy even when Pinterest does not block them
The three destinations Alston recommends sending Pinterest traffic to instead
How AWeber lets you start building an email list for free up to 500 subscribers
How to get a WordPress blog running for about $2.95 to $3.95 per month through Bluehost
A step-by-step action plan for turning Pinterest into a reliable traffic source for your affiliate offers
Not sure which affiliate niche fits you? Answer a few quick questions at finder.platformproof.com and get a clear match

The Mistake That Gets Affiliate Marketers Blocked on Pinterest

The single most common error beginners make on Pinterest is treating it like a direct-link traffic machine. The idea seems logical at first: make a pin, drop your ClickBank hop link in the URL field, and let Pinterest send buyers straight to the sales page. Fast, simple, no middleman.

Pinterest does not see it that way. The platform’s spam detection system has gotten good at identifying affiliate link structures. ClickBank hop links follow a recognizable pattern, and Pinterest flags them automatically. The pin never goes live. Instead, you get an error notice the moment you hit publish, and your ability to post can be restricted if you keep trying.

There is also a second problem that goes beyond Pinterest’s spam filter. Even on platforms where direct affiliate links do get through, building your entire strategy around them is fragile. Affiliate programs get shut down. Products get pulled. Your account at the affiliate network could get closed. Every pin you built around that direct link becomes dead overnight, and you have no way to redirect the traffic.

What Happens When You Post a ClickBank Link on Pinterest

In the video, Alston demonstrates this live. He opens his ClickBank account, navigates to the e-business and marketing category, clicks promote on a product, generates a hop link, and copies it. He then goes over to Canva, makes a quick test pin, returns to Pinterest’s pin creation screen, pastes the ClickBank hop link into the destination URL field, and hits publish.

The result: “Sorry, we blocked this link because it may lead to spam.”

No delay. No review period. Pinterest kills the pin immediately. The platform reads the link structure and recognizes it as an affiliate hop link before any human ever sees it. This is an automated filter, and there is no appeal process for a standard account. You simply cannot get a raw ClickBank link through the Pinterest pin creation tool.

This is why so many people show up in Alston’s comment section saying they keep getting blocked. They are not doing anything wrong in terms of their offer or their image. They are just using the wrong link type in the URL field, and Pinterest shuts them down every time.

Does Amazon Work on Pinterest?

Alston tests Amazon next. He grabs a short link from the Amazon Associates dashboard for a product he had been featuring that week, pastes it into the Pinterest pin URL field, and publishes. This time, the pin goes through.

So for anyone who has heard that Amazon affiliate links do not work on Pinterest: they do, at least at the time of this recording. Pinterest appears to treat amazon.com links differently from third-party affiliate network links. The domain itself carries enough trust that the pin publishes without issue.

But Alston’s recommendation is still not to rely on direct Amazon links, even though they work. His reasoning is the same fragility argument: if Amazon shuts your Associates account, every pin with your direct affiliate link becomes a dead link. You lose all the traffic value from every pin you ever posted, with no way to recover it. Worse, if you later find a better product on a different network, all those pins are locked to the old product with no way to redirect.

Working does not mean wise. A direct affiliate link can pass Pinterest’s filter today and become a liability tomorrow.

Three Destinations That Pinterest Will Not Block

The principle behind every alternative Alston recommends is the same: send Pinterest traffic somewhere you control. When you own the destination, you can update the affiliate link at any time. If a product gets pulled, you change one URL on your site and every pin you ever posted still works. The traffic is yours to redirect.

He walks through three specific destinations during the video, in order of his recommendation.

Option 1: A Landing Page That Collects Email Addresses

This is Alston’s top pick. When someone clicks your Pinterest pin and lands on your email opt-in page, you capture their email address. Now you can follow up with them directly, send them recommendations, and make money even if they did not buy on the first visit. A landing page gives you the best long-term return on every click because you are building a list, not just sending visitors straight to a sales page they may close immediately.

He shows his own landing page at alstongodbolt.com/start as an example during the video, pointing out that Pinterest accepted that URL without any issue. Your own domain, pointed to a landing page, will almost always pass Pinterest’s filter because the domain itself is not flagged as a spam source.

For the email platform itself, Alston points to AWeber. AWeber is free for your first 500 subscribers. You can build landing pages directly inside AWeber without needing a separate website, and you get access to email automation, drag-and-drop email builder tools, HTML templates, RSS integration, and more. Once you cross 500 subscribers, the platform costs $16 per month. Alston’s take: if you have built a list of 500 people and you still have not made $16 from it, that is a messaging problem, not a cost problem.

Option 2: Your YouTube Channel

If you have a YouTube channel in the same niche as your affiliate offer, sending Pinterest traffic there is a legitimate play. Pinterest accepts YouTube links without issue, and YouTube gives you a platform where you can embed affiliate links in descriptions, update them whenever you need to, and build an audience that keeps coming back.

The trade-off compared to a landing page is that you do not capture the visitor’s email. They may watch your video, enjoy it, and never see your channel again. But if you are already creating video content and your YouTube channel has strong watch time and subscriber growth, the referral traffic from Pinterest can meaningfully boost your video views and channel authority.

Option 3: Your Blog or Website

A blog gives you the most flexibility of all three options. You can write individual posts for each product you promote, update affiliate links at any time, add multiple offers to a single page, and capture email subscribers using a plugin. Pinterest traffic landing on a blog post with strong internal linking can flow through multiple pages in a single session, increasing the chance that someone buys something before they leave.

Alston mentions Bluehost as a hosting option. At the time of the video, Bluehost’s WordPress hosting started at $2.95 to $3.95 per month. That is a low enough entry cost that it should not be the reason someone avoids building a site. A single affiliate commission from almost any program will cover months of hosting.

Even a simple one-page site with links to your recommended products is enough to get started. You do not need a full content library on day one. You just need a destination URL that Pinterest will accept and that you fully control.

Not sure which affiliate niche or business model fits where you are right now?

Skip the guessing and get a personalized match at finder.platformproof.com. It takes about two minutes and points you toward the starting point that fits your skills and schedule.

Step-by-Step: Building a Pinterest Affiliate System That Works

Here is the sequence that Alston’s video maps out, translated into a concrete action plan you can follow from scratch.

Step 1: Choose your affiliate offer. Pick a product from ClickBank, Amazon Associates, Warrior Plus, or any other network you are already using. Know your hop link or affiliate link before you do anything with Pinterest.

Step 2: Set up a destination you control. If you have zero budget, open a free AWeber account and build a one-page opt-in form with a lead magnet related to the product. If you have $3 a month, get a Bluehost WordPress account and set up a simple blog post or landing page. If you already have a YouTube channel, create a video review of the product and make sure the affiliate link is in the description.

Step 3: Create your Pinterest pin. Use Canva to design a vertical image (the standard Pinterest format is 1000 x 1500 pixels). Make the pin visual relevant to the product’s benefit, not the product itself. A pin about a weight-loss supplement performs better with an image about healthy habits than with a photo of the pill bottle.

Step 4: Set the destination URL to your landing page, blog, or YouTube video. Not to your affiliate link. Type in the URL for the page you created in Step 2. Your own domain, an AWeber landing page URL, or a YouTube video link will all pass Pinterest’s filter.

Step 5: Write your pin description using keywords. Pinterest is a search engine. People type in what they are looking for. Write a description that includes the specific search terms your target buyer would use, and tell them exactly what they will find when they click.

Step 6: Publish and monitor. Check your analytics in Pinterest after a few days to see which pins are getting saves and clicks. The ones with clicks tell you your image and headline are working. The ones with saves tell you people found the content worth keeping. Lean into both signals.

Step 7: Update your affiliate links at the destination, not at Pinterest. If a product gets pulled or you find a better offer, go to your landing page or blog post and swap the link. Every Pinterest pin still works. Every person who saved your pin and comes back later still gets sent to a working page. This is the entire point of owning your destination.

Honest Drawbacks to This Approach

Alston does not oversell this system. There are real friction points worth knowing before you commit.

More steps between the pin and the commission. When someone clicks a pin and lands on your landing page, they still have to opt in, receive your emails, and eventually click your affiliate link in an email before you earn anything. That is more steps than a direct link, which means more chances for them to drop off. The trade-off is that once they are on your list, you can follow up as many times as your sequences allow. One subscriber can generate multiple commissions over time.

Your own domain can get flagged too. During the video, Alston ran into Pinterest blocking one of his own landing page URLs. He tried a few different URLs and some worked while others did not. Pinterest’s spam detection is not perfectly predictable. If your domain has been flagged previously, or if your landing page URL looks like a known spam pattern, you may still get blocked even with your own domain. The workaround is to try different URL structures on your site or use a clean subdomain.

AWeber’s free tier has a cap. Free accounts support up to 500 subscribers. That is enough to validate your niche and start generating revenue, but once you hit the limit you need to pay $16 per month. For most active affiliate marketers, that is a reasonable cost, but it is worth knowing the ceiling exists before you start.

Blogging requires consistent effort. A WordPress site on Bluehost is cheap, but cheap does not mean passive. Writing product reviews and keeping your content updated takes time. If you are not willing to write or pay someone to write for you, a blog may not be the right destination for your Pinterest traffic.

Find Your X

Knowing how to send Pinterest traffic is only one piece. You also need the right offer to send it to. If you are still figuring out which affiliate niche fits your current skills, time, and income goals, visit finder.platformproof.com. Answer a few quick questions and get a personalized recommendation you can act on today.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I post ClickBank affiliate links directly on Pinterest?

No. Pinterest’s spam detection blocks ClickBank hop links automatically. When you paste a ClickBank affiliate link into the pin destination URL field and hit publish, Pinterest shows an error saying the link was blocked because it may lead to spam. There is no workaround for posting raw ClickBank links on Pinterest.

Do Amazon affiliate links work on Pinterest?

Yes, Amazon affiliate links do pass through Pinterest’s filter in most cases. However, Alston still recommends against posting them directly. If your Amazon Associates account gets closed or the product is removed, every pin with that link becomes dead and you have no way to redirect the traffic.

What is the best alternative to posting direct affiliate links on Pinterest?

Send Pinterest traffic to a landing page that collects email addresses. This gives you the ability to follow up with visitors multiple times, update your affiliate offers without changing a single pin, and build a list that generates commissions over time rather than a one-time click.

Is AWeber actually free?

AWeber offers a free plan that supports up to 500 subscribers. You get access to email automation, landing page builder tools, and a drag-and-drop email editor at no cost. Once your list grows past 500 subscribers, the paid plan starts at $16 per month.

How much does it cost to start a blog for affiliate marketing?

At the time Alston recorded this video, Bluehost offered WordPress hosting starting at $2.95 to $3.95 per month. A domain name typically runs around $10 to $15 per year. Your total startup cost for a blog is roughly $45 to $60 for the first year, less than a single commission from many affiliate programs.

Can I use a YouTube link on Pinterest instead of a landing page?

Yes. Pinterest accepts YouTube video URLs without issue. If you have a YouTube channel with content related to your affiliate offer, you can send Pinterest traffic to your videos. The downside is that you do not capture the visitor’s email address, so follow-up is harder. But your affiliate links in the YouTube video description are easy to update any time.

Why did my own domain get blocked on Pinterest?

Pinterest can flag individual URLs even on legitimate domains if the page pattern looks like a known spam source, if the domain has been reported previously, or if the URL structure resembles redirect shorteners. Alston experienced this himself with some of his own landing page URLs during the recording. The practical fix is to try a different URL path on your domain or set up a clean subdomain.

How many Pinterest views do you need before affiliate traffic becomes meaningful?

There is no universal answer, but the underlying principle from the video is that volume matters less than destination quality. At 368,000 monthly views, Alston’s Pinterest account generates traffic worth capturing, but the value comes from where that traffic goes. Even a smaller account sending visitors to a well-designed landing page will outperform a large account dumping traffic into a dead affiliate link.

Sources

Alston Godbolt, “How To Promote Your Affiliate Link On Pinterest 2022,” YouTube, https://youtu.be/8OTRqA_CZG0
AWeber free plan details: aweber.com (free up to 500 subscribers, $16/month after)
Bluehost WordPress hosting: bluehost.com (plans starting at $2.95 to $3.95/month at time of recording)
Pinterest pin creation and link policy: help.pinterest.com
ClickBank affiliate network: clickbank.com