7 Ways to Leverage Pinterest For E-Commerce
Your prospects and customers use social media for a variety of things.
They use Facebook to connect with friends and family in a casual online setting.
They use LinkedIN to connect with their professional networks in a professional online setting.
And they use Pinterest to shop.
According to Kleiner Perkins 2016 Internet trends report, 55% of active online shoppers have said that Pinterest is their favorite social media platform.
If the nature of your business is B2C, Pinterest is the easiest way to engage your audience online.
This makes sense, because the platform is designed for sharing and connecting on products and hobbies that are product centric.
And now, with their advertising option, Pinterest has made it easier to reach out, target, and engage your target market.
So, how can eCommerce companies take advantage of Pinterest?
Here are 7 Ways to Leverage Pinterest for increased E-Commerce conversions.
- Use the “Pin It” Button or Widget to Product Pages
The best thing you can do to drive brand awareness and traffic to your website with Pinterest is to add the “Pin It” button to your product pages.
This makes it easy for users to share what they like from your online store to their Pinterest page.
This is a great strategy since you’re getting a 3rd party endorsement, and encourages shoppers to share by showing them how many other people have also shared.
- Create Custom Boards
When you pin an image to Pinterest, you can assign it to a “board.”
It’s better to create theme specific boards for niched products or topics.
Say you’re running a fashion boutique, you might want to create a specific board for “1970’s Prom Dresses” and another called “Dive Bar Attire.”
If you assign themes to your board, you tend to attract more interest because you’ve framed this particular online setting in a way that’s easy for browsers to digest and find pins that interest them the most.
Pinterest Boards from Prima Donna
- Take Advantage of Pinterest’s Advertising Option
The above 2 items are marketing tactics that can place leads at the beginning of your funnel.
But if you want to take initiative and move them deeper, you’re going to have to take advantage of Pinterest’s advertising option.
This relatively new option for e-commerce and B2C brands give you the ability to target browsers who’ve bought products from your store or expressed some interest in the past and key into hashtags and keywords your target audience is using.
It’s how you can get your handmade topaz necklace noticed by an eager Christmas shopper looking for a unique gift, or get an aspiring chef to try your apple pie recipe.
- Use Visitor Retargeting to Reach People Who’ve Visited Your Site
One of the more advanced features in Pinterest Ads is “visitor retargeting”.
Retargeting visitors who’ve visited your site before can be powerful because it puts your products and brand in front of people who are already familiar with it.
According to information gathered by the Wishpond Content Team, retargeted users are 70% more likely to convert.
When you’re retargeting, you’re showing ads to people who’ve taken an action in the past, so ideally you’d want to create campaigns that complement that action to drive more actions.
If you’re running music equipment shop, you could build a list of people who’ve bought guitar equipment from you and create campaigns targeting these people.
You know these people are interested in guitars, so maybe show ads for effects pedals, guitar straps, etc. etc.
- Install a “Pinterest Tag” Onto Your Site
A conversion tag, otherwise known as a “Pinterest Tag” helps you build an audience to target based on actions they’ve taken on your site.
The tag is a piece of JavaScript code you put on your website to build audiences, reach more customers, and track conversions that might’ve started on Pinterest.
You can define conversion events by a specific action a browser takes on your site, like buying a product, or signing up for your email list.
Learn how to setup a Pinterest Tag with this guide.
- Use “Actalike Audience” to Extend Your Brand’s Reach
Pinterest offers an exciting new option that targets customers based off of actions that are similar to your audience’s previous actions.
This features is called “Actalike Audience” and is similar to Facebook Advertising’s “Lookalike Audience.”
Image source: business.pinterest.com
This feature is data intensive, so Pinterest requires at least 100 Pinterest users from your uploaded email database in order to create an Actalike audience.
Pinterest has gone on record to state that by using this targeting option, some companies have raised their CTRs by 63%.
To get a more detailed run down on Actalike audience targeting, check out this guide.
- Re-engage Prospects with Engagement Targeting
Engagement targeting is a form of retargeting that focuses on people who’ve already interacted with your pins.
You can use this to promote products that would relate to a pin that someone engaged with from one of your Pinterest boards.
For example, say you run a skin care line. If someone has interacted with a Pin related to all natural body butter, you might want to advertise one of your all natural skin care products to that person.
Engagement targeting gives you the ability to do that.
This type of targeting is someone has demonstrated an interest in topics related to your offering, which can signal in intention to buy in the future.
According to Pinterest, when someone interacts with a pin, they’re 2.2x more likely to make a purchase in the next 30 days, than someone who didn’t engage.
For this type of targeting, you need to make sure Pinterest has your website on record, because you’re using ads based on engagement related to pins that link to your site.
Conclusion
If you’re in ecommerce, the B2C space, or sell handmade commodity products, Pinterest is a tailor made marketing channel for your business.
Shopping online is already an addicting endeavor with fun built into it’s DNA.
Pinterest just took it to another level.
And with these advanced advertising features, you can capitalize on these opportunities and turn in a nice profit.
Do you work in ecommerce or the B2C space? If not, do you have a product niche you think would work perfectly with Pinterest’s audience?
If so, please let me know in the comments below!
