Pinterest’s Place in E-commerce


Pinterest is one of the most effective social media platforms for e-commerce businesses. It’s different than other conventional social platforms because it’s primarily made for product browsing and research, rather than building connections between people.


As the second highest source of social media traffic to Shopify stores, Pinterest is one of the most effective ways to wrangle visibility, traffic, and conversions for your e-commerce store. Pinterest has a number of benefits and designs that make it the optimal social platform if you’re looking to increase your brand awareness and conversions to certain demographics.  


What are the benefits of Pinterest for e-commerce businesses looking to boost their reach and sales through social media?


Various pins from Pinterest

Image via we make websites


1. A Wide Engaged Demographic

Pinterest has more than 200 million active users who use Pinterest on a regular basis to browse and save pins. Their demographic is slightly narrower than other social media platforms, which means it’s easier to craft content to target a specific audience.


According to Pinterest, women make up 70% of pinners. Two-thirds of all women (66%) ages 25 to 54 are signed up on Pinterest. Although it’s primarily women, 30% of users are men—so you don’t want to completely neglect Pinterest if you have a male target audience.   

50% of millennials use Pinterest monthly. In fact, Pinterest has become one of the hottest search engines for millennials to look for new products in a fun, lifestyle-driven way.


If you have a female millennial B2C audience, Pinterest is definitely an ideal option to find and sell to customers.


A lot of women on Pinterest are young moms. 60% of Pinterest households have children under the age of 5. This means that lifestyle products directed at children, moms, and families tend to see a lot of success on Pinterest.


Our favorite statistic about the Pinterest demographic is that 40% of pinners’ household incomes is more than 100k annually. A strong group of Pinterest users has disposable income that they’re eager and ready to spend on lifestyle products they discover on Pinterest.


2. Browse with Intent  

These pinners aren’t just on Pinterest passively looking around. They’re proactively searching for content, rather than reactively scrolling through their feed.


They are on the platform with the intent to find new products—and buy those products. In fact, 93% of pinners have used Pinterest to research products and make purchases.


Best yet, Pinterest users spend more money per purchase than on any other platform. The average amount spent per order is at a $50 average order value, and they spend approximately 29% more over their lifetime than those who don’t use the platform.


Pinners are eager to buy and spend more money. That sounds good for your e-commerce business, right?


3. Pinterest’s Purpose is Product Promotion  

The way Pinterest is set up is highly conducive to organizing and selling products. Their goal isn’t to connect people with people; it’s to connect people with products. The “social” aspect actually stems from a mutual love of similar lifestyle content, like two friends sharing a love for the same outfit collection.


In fact, Pinterest is both private and public. It’s unique in that users are motivated both to save items for themselves as well as share their favorite Pins with others. They can have secret or hidden boards they keep to themselves or share only with close friends, or they can have public boards that can be pinned and re-pinned by others.


Pinterest is like a digital vision board that makes it easy to purchase your visions.


Learn more about the power of Pinterest for ecommerce sellers here.


"As the second highest source of social media traffic to Shopify stores,  Pinterest is one of the most effective ways to sell online."  -Click to Tweet-


4. Ease of Purchase

Product Pins  

Product pins display a product or service, similar to a product page on your website. Although customers can’t buy directly on this pin, they can see product information like pricing and availability. They can also click on a link that will bring them to the website where they can make the purchase.  


Product Pins work really well because customers get to browse products from a variety of stores and brands. So they might search “blue dress,” and they’ll get a bunch of Product Pins showing all of the businesses that sell blue dresses. Although this puts you in direct competition with other businesses selling products like yours, it can give smaller businesses added exposure by letting customers see what kinds of products you’re selling.


The best part, though, is that the searcher won’t just see a crowded display of Product Pins for blue dresses as they might while Google Shopping. They’ll also see lifestyle content with “blue dresses” as a designated keyword. They could see an image of a woman walking in a blue dress along the beach, as well as images that detail how to match accessories with blue dresses.


The collection of “blue dress” pins actually does the work of selling for you. It helps show the browser how their blue dress could fit in with their lifestyle. This community of content does a lot to push conversion.


Buyable Pins

Buyable Pins take Product Pins to the next level. Customers can actually make a purchase directly through Pinterest. On Buyable Pins, they’ll see an “Add to Bag” button, where they’re brought to a shopping page to check out right then and there. Since customers trust Pinterest, they have no problem handing over personal and credit info to their favorite social media site.  


This is especially important for mobile users. In fact, 80% of Pinterest traffic is mobile. With easy-to-use and easier-to-convert Buyable Pins, customers can streamline the checkout process, buy from a Pin, and easily go back to browsing on Pinterest.


Human hands holding various smart devices


5. It’s Easy to Advertise.

Half of all active pinners have made a purchase after seeing a Promoted Pin, and 61% say they’ve discovered new brands thanks to Pinterest ads.


Pinterest offers Promoted Pins, which allows you to pay to promote certain pins. You bid to have your ads shown to your target audience while browsing on their feed or in search results. Promoted Pins look like regular pins but have a Promoted tag at the bottom, so they blend in beautifully with the aesthetic and ease of the Pinterest platform.  


You can actually optimize your advertising (and payment) based on your goals. For example:

  • If you want to boost website traffic, you’ll pay per clicks on the link through your Promoted Pin.
  • If you want to increase brand awareness, you’ll pay per 1,000 impressions (people who see your Pin).


Set your goals and determine your daily and total budgets. You can even create custom audiences based on demographics, location, or customers from your email list. Pinterest makes it easy for you to reach your marketing goals.  


Plus, Pinterest Analytics is also one of the strongest social media tracking tools. It’s very comprehensive and user-friendly, making it easy to understand how your ad campaigns are performing.


Get everything you need to know about Pinterest ads here.


Keyword Targeting

Our favorite part of Pinterest advertising is the ability to target ads based on keywords and interests. Pinterest places a lot of value on categories and boards. Customers can tailor their feeds based on their interests, so they can still browse within a specific keyword or category. They then create their own boards within these interests.

This natural categorization makes it easy to target your ideal customer accordingly. You can target people who follow “wedding” or “inspirational quotes,” for example. This increases the relevancy of your advertising. This relevance will lead to more engaged impressions and a higher rate of conversion.


The Bottom Line

Pinterest can be one of the most effective (and cost-efficient) ways to spread brand awareness and increase conversions for your e-commerce store. With an engaged purchasing demographic and flexible advertising solutions, Pinterest is quickly and quietly taking over the world of e-commerce.


Is it time to incorporate Pinterest into your e-commerce marketing campaign? Contact Seller’s Choice now for a free consultation to see which social platforms will usher in traffic and revenue for your business. We look forward to chatting with you!

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