UPDATE: To see the slides and recap of the “Pining for Pinterest” Social Media Week Presentation, visit our blog post on the recap.
If you haven’t heard of Pinterest yet, you will soon. The site, self-described as an online pinboard to “Organize and share things you love.”, is THE emerging platform of 2012. If Facebook Timeline is sharing the story of your life, Pinterest is the visual representation of your interests and what you aspire to do (or own in a lot of cases). It’s powerful for users because of three key points: it’s visual, it’s about the user (alas yet another vehicle to tap into the ego-centric online personas we create!) and it’s easy to use. For brands, there are also clear benefits, among the top being that it’s a traffic driving tool. Each item that is “pinned” from a brand’s website links back to that website. So if a pinned item gets circulated throughout Pinterest through the platform’s ability to have item’s “repinned” onto multiple boards, not only is an item from a brand’s website getting more awareness but it could also be getting more traffic.
The site is still by invite only, but more than just consumers are signing up: brands are too. Reports vary on the number of users but it’s safe to say that it’s getting over 13 million unique visitors a month according to DoubleClick ad planner by Google. The term “users” should be used carefully though. Similar to Twitter, people who “use” Pinterest aren’t as clear-cut because many people can consume the content on Pinterest without having to have an account – this is an important point to remember when sharing content on sites like this as followers aren’t always the best indicator of success! The number of people who have Pinterest accounts, also referred to as “Pinners” haven’t been released, but we do know there are around 7.8 million monthly active users through the Pinterest app on Facebook (based on what’s shown on Facebook app search results).
The Facebook app is one of the new Timeline Apps and also an indicator of Pinterest’s emergence as a mega-player on the social web this year. Facebook integrated Pinterest when they rolled out the Open Graph last week. The Pinterest app was one of the first 60 apps available to users. For the Facebook users that have added the Pinterest app to their Timeline, every action that they make on Pinterest that creates a story will automatically be shared on Facebook. For Pinners and people who view Pinterest pins, they can also “Like” items and Tweet them making content on Pinterest to share across social platforms.
As consumers’ engagement with Pinterest has grown, brands are beginning to swarm to the site. There is no ROI, or measurement system for Pinterest yet, but any social media marketer is going to take note of the potential to reach customers. Brands are heading to Pinterest as if it is a Gold Rush in the digital landscape.
Are you pining to learn more about Pinterest? Sociality Squared CEO, Helen Todd will be presenting “Pining Over Pinterest” at Social Media Week – New York.
The event will be held on Thursday, February 16 from 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM at Definition 6; Sociality Squared and Definition 6 are hosting. You can find the event details here. Due to the speaker and the subject’s popularity, the event is sold out. If you aren’t one of the lucky attendees, we look forward to seeing you there! We will be posting Helen’s presentation on the blog following Social Media Week.
Of course you can follow all of Sociality Squared’s updates and pins on our own Pinterest board too: http://pinterest.com/sociality2/
More information related to this article can be found here:
http://mashable.com/2012/01/09/the-top-brands-on-pinterest/
http://socialmediaweek.org/event/?event_id=1422
Post written by Tia Marie Kemp aka @TiaMarieKemp.