Pinterest Pointers: What to Know Before Getting Started

With 175 million active users and two billion on-site searches per month, Pinterest is a force to be reckoned with. It’s strengthening its search functionality and advancing its advertising capabilities. Pinterest presents significant opportunities for brands of all shapes and sizes to drive awareness and sales. In fact, 55 percent of users shop for new products on Pinterest, and 87 percent have reported buying something because of content they discovered on Pinterest.

For all these reasons and more, Pinterest is taking on a greater role in brands’ digital marketing strategies. Thinking about adding Pinterest to your digital marketing strategy? Here are five things to consider before getting started:

Is my category well represented on Pinterest?

First, you need to understand if your category has a presence on Pinterest and is well-represented on Pinterest. We recommend doing a search to see if keywords and interests related to your category are common on Pinterest. You may be surprised, beyond recipes and DIY there are also thousands of pins dedicated to beauty, fashion, cars, travel and savings tips to make those dreams come true.

Pinterest - Automotive BoardPinterest - Frugal Living Boards
Pinterest - Travel Pinterest - Hairstyles

What sparks the eureka moment?

Pinterest is creating more tools to help spark that “eureka moment.” By appearing in relevant categories, you can inspire people to keep your brand top-of-mind or can even encourage consumers to think about you in a whole new way. And the new innovation around Pinterest’s Visual Search means if you can see it, you can search it.
Getting Started on Pinterest
Based on Pinterest intent we can see that baking soda sparks “Eureka” moments outside the kitchen. For example, for some it’s beauty, for others it’s baking, and for others it’s cleaning.

Have successful product listing ads already? Want to get more bang for your buck?

Already running PLAs? Good news: Pinterest makes it easy to run programs with existing product feeds! These can be run alone or as part of a full funnel campaign from awareness to purchase.

I don’t have a large Pinterest following. Can I still run a paid campaign?

YES! Unlike other platforms, you can run a successful campaign on Pinterest with a very low initial investment in acquiring followers or in creating content to “fill the feed.” One of Catalyst’s clients was able to run a successful campaign on the platform, resulting in millions of impressions within its target audience, while maintaining a “profile” with fewer than 10 followers. Source: Catalyst internal data, 2017.

Am I already seeing site traffic from Pinterest?

Pinterest creates extended life time value for successful pins. Not only are they discoverable for those seeking out ideas, they link back to your website, and for seasonal offerings can drive traffic year-over-year. Further, the search engines reward you with organic listings when your pins are optimized for search. A win-win!

Interested in a full Pinterest Search and Social assessment? Reach out to Catalyst at info@catalystdigital.com

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