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Retailers looking to boost sales would do well to focus on Pinterest, say digital marketing experts, because consumers actively use the social platform to search for goods and ideas, rather than passively following a feed.
“Furniture retailers are making a significant push into mobile and social media as tech-savvy millennials reach the age of starting careers and moving into new homes or apartments that need furnishing,” according to research from software firm ShareIQ, which measures businesses’ online user engagement. “Pinterest unveiled several useful tools for shoppers such as visual search and in-app purchasing capabilities, in a likely attempt to attract more big-name brands to the site.”
Natalia Wulfe, an account director at Austin-based digital marketing agency Effective Spend, argues that Pinterest is a unique value proposition for retailers, which demands a different approach than marketing on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.
“While it has many of the sharing and community engagement properties of other social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram,” Wulfe says, “it’s also a powerful search engine like Google and Bing. When people are using Pinterest, they are often actively typing in searches to find products they intend to purchase.”
Zellie Friedman, social media manager for San Diego-based Power Digital Marketing, agrees that Pinterest’s focus on search creates more opportunities for retailers than other social media.
“With other social platforms, your success is dependent on consistent and timely posts,” Friedman says. “But with Pinterest, your posts can grow in success with time.”
Friedman suggests a two-pronged approach, combining great photos with searchable keywords.
“When it comes to home decor, you need a combination of beautiful photography with keyword-focused pin descriptions,” she says. “No matter how amazing your photography is, your pins won’t reach the feed unless they’re optimized with searchable descriptions. Include trending keywords within your product descriptions — whether it’s a style — think mid-century — or material, like velvet. This will help your pins reach the newsfeed, while your lifestyle photography can encourage repins to help your pins go viral.”
That said, Wulfe cautions against overdoing the descriptive text. “Pinterest is a visual experience,” she says, “so your Pin should tell your story visually, with minimal copy needed. A very effective way to drive retail sales on Pinterest is to run keyword advertising campaigns. Just like on Google, marketers have the ability to serve very highly targeted and highly relevant ads to Pinterest users based on the specific keywords they’re searching, such as when someone searches for ‘mint ottoman’ or ‘Adirondack chairs.’
…Pinterest’s focus on search creates more opportunities for retailers than other social media.
Wulfe highlights the particular effectiveness of Pinterest’s visual search feature and suggests using “lifestyle” photography that shows products in a natural setting. This also helps your products reach more potential customers through Pinterest’s visual search.
“For example, a user could see a loveseat that they like in a restaurant and take a picture of the loveseat,” Wulfe says. “Then, they can upload that image to Pinterest and Pinterest will return search results for that loveseat, loveseats of a similar design, or other furniture products that would complement that loveseat based on its color scheme and design aesthetic. Pinterest’s visual search also analyzes images that a user ‘pins’ and then recommends similar products or aesthetics. So, the goal here is to create pins that can be easily discoverable and matched to user’s visual searches and pins to achieve more impressions across Pinterest.”
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