Pinterest has sort of flown under the radar as a valuable channel for social media marketing. With so much focus on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, the opportunities on Pinterest are often overlooked. This isn’t to say that effective Facebook advertising isn’t important – it’s just that there are unique possibilities on Pinterest that can help you reach your goals in other ways.
Part of what makes Pinterest advertising so unique is that the style of engagement is different on other platforms. Users come to Pinterest looking for content that can teach them new things, inspire them or introduce them to new products. This allows you to make a much deeper impression with Pinterest marketing.
Whether you are looking to raise brand awareness, drive traffic to your site or increase sales, the following tips can make your Pinterest advertising more effective.
Try Different Ads
A lot of advertisers get caught up in just using one type of ad on Pinterest. For most brands, it is the standard promoted pins. These ads can be effective and they should be a part of your strategy. With that said, you have a lot of options for reaching customers on the Pinterest app or website.
Beyond promoted pins, you should definitely check out the promoted carousels and video ads. Great video ads can be very engaging. They can also stand out since they start playing automatically when they are on the screen. Carousel ads can be good for campaigns that focus on more than one product. With this type of ad, you can use multiple pictures for users to flip through and each picture can have its own link to a landing page.
Install the Pinterest Tag
Installing the Pinterest Tag can offer a lot of value for your ad campaigns. To start, it will help you track data to see which pins and strategies offer the most value. You can then use this data to enhance your Pinterest marketing strategy.
The Pinterest Tag can also track user interactions to unlock more options for running ad campaigns on the platform. Once you are tracking different events on your website, you can then use the tag to build new audiences based on interactions with your site. This could be something as simple as people who have visited your site to people who have viewed specific pages or bought different products.
Target Customer Lists
Just like with other social media platforms, the success of your campaigns can hinge on the quality of your audience. Targeting audiences based on things like keywords or interests can be effective, but audiences based customer lists can offer a significant value. With this option, you can build audiences based on email lists and phone numbers.
As another powerful option, you can use the option to create Actalike audiences. With this option, you can take an existing audience and Pinterest will create a new audience based on the common interests and behaviors of the source audience. This can be the perfect option for expanding your reach with Pinterest marketing.
Get Ahead of Events
Planning ahead is one of the keys to success with Pinterest advertising. You need to start by taking the time to develop a content marketing strategy. Try to find your topics and develop posts in advance. You also need to consider the timing of posts on Pinterest.
On most platforms, the strategy is all about the moment. You are looking for engagement and interactions that day or within the next few days. With Pinterest, audiences have longer attention spans and they often look to events that are further into the future. If the campaign is tied to an event or time of year, try to get ahead of it by rolling the content out at least a few weeks in advance.
Pinterest marketing can offer a lot of value, but you can’t treat it like other social media platforms. Users engage with this platform in a different way and you need to develop your campaigns to account for this difference. Once you find that balance, Pinterest can be one of the most effective tools in your marketing toolbox.
