Performance Marketing Expert

Leveraging Pinterest in Your Search Strategy

As search continues to evolve, it no longer occurs solely within traditional search engines. Marketers are incorporating in-app search, e-commerce platforms, and social media into their search strategies to complement their existing efforts and reach customers at the most meaningful moments. And now, they have the ability to target consumers on a leading visual search engine: Pinterest.

Search Ads for Pinterest has been in the testing phase with a small group of advertisers; and last week, Pinterest officially announced it will launch search ads on its platform. Our team at Rise has been able to participate in some of Pinterest's testing, leveraging our existing search and social strategies to help clients drive incremental revenue.

Previously, brands could run Pinterest ads based on specific keywords; however, these ads would appear alongside relevant content on the site as native ads. Search Ads for Pinterest will show ads at the top of results (in the form of promoted pins) right after users type in queries, similar to the search functions of Google and Bing. These search ads will be purchased via a real-time digital auction on a cost-per-click basis, much like traditional search. However, unlike traditional search engines, Pinterest’s search ads will be image-based, rather than text-based.

Pinterest shared that its new search ad offerings will include keyword campaigns where advertisers manage the budgeting, targeting, and creative, as well as shopping campaigns, which will be created automatically based on product inventory. It will also roll out new targeting and keyword reporting options.

What does this mean for brands?
In 2016 there were 2 billion searches performed on Pinterest and 97% of those searches were non-branded. This provides a great opportunity for advertisers to reach consumers who might be interested in a particular type of item, but have not yet decided on a specific brand or product. In fact, according to Pinterest, 72% of pinners say that the platform has introduced them to a new brand or service.

By incorporating Search Ads for Pinterest into your search strategy, you’re able to leverage a powerful tool to reach individuals in the early- to mid-stages of decision making. Pinterest ads are positioned to drive awareness, influencing users to later engage with your brand through other digital channels such as paid search, which is usually far lower in the funnel.

At Rise, we are able to help clients immediately capitalize on this recent development by using existing non-branded keyword campaigns. Additionally, product feeds that are used within traditional paid search and social can be repurposed for Pinterest’s shopping campaigns. By both channels working closely together on a daily basis, brands are able to quickly get up and running, while being most efficient with time and spend.

What’s next?
Pinterest has always prided itself as the world’s largest catalog of ideas showcased in a visual fashion. However, it is relatively new to the ad space, having only been actively selling ads since 2014. As it’s grown, it has begun to understand the importance of monetizing its platform to keep up with developments on other image-based platforms, such as Snapchat and Instagram. Opportunities for brands to reach potential customers on the site will likely only continue to increase as Pinterest’s advertising capabilities grow.


For more information about how search and social can work together, or to learn more about enhancing your search strategy, reach out to Rise.

02/10/2017 at 11:22