Pinterest Launches New Ad Tools to Help Brands and Creators Tap into Product Discovery

Pinterest is launching two new ad products designed to help brands tap into its Stories-like Idea Pins, while it’s also launching a new ‘Paid Partnership’ tagging process, which will provide another way for creators to make money from their Pin efforts.

First off, on new ad tools – Pinterest is adding a new ‘Idea Ads’ offering which, like Idea Pins, are full-screen, multi-page presentations, which include custom links.

As explained by Pinterest:

“Audiences can view a brand’s inspiring content, visit their site and follow step-by-step DIYs or demos, all within the ad.”

As you can see in these examples, Idea Ads will appear in user feeds, using Pinterest’s interest targeting tools to maximize response.

It’s essentially an Idea Pin that you can amplify with paid promotion, which will get your content in front of more users in the app.

Idea ads with paid partnership, meanwhile, provides a way for brands to promote Idea Pin content created by users.

As you can see in these examples, the option will enable businesses to boost the reach of collaborative Pin projects, which will get your promotions in front of the creators’ audience, your audience and those you additionally pay to reach.

Idea Ads with paid partnership include a ‘Promoted by’ label below the creator name, as well as links to both the creator and partner brand’s profiles in the app.

It’s another way to establish more beneficial creative partnerships in the app, which helps brands create better content, and creators get paid for their platform expertise.

And it works. Pinterest says that brand collaborations with creators generate 38% higher brand awareness, on average, and 37% higher Pin awareness.

Which leads into the final new element – Pinterest’s also adding a new Paid Partnership Tool that will provide another pathway for creators to generate income from their Pin efforts – by simply tagging businesses in their Idea Pins.

As explained above, the process enables creators to tag a partner brand in their Idea Pin, which then alerts the brand of the collaboration opportunity. The creator and brand then establish details of the partnership, and brands can further promote the content if they choose.

As noted, it’s another way for creators to establish revenue pathways, while also, effectively, providing a showcase opportunity for creators, with free ad examples available for their approval in the app.

It could be a good opportunity to simplify brand deals, while also opening up new considerations for promotion, via collaborators you may never have sought out.

That could also help to showcase the potential value of Pins, which many brands may still be unsure about, particularly considering the app has lost users over the past year. Pinterest benefited from the early stages of the pandemic, and the global lockdowns that pushed more people towards eCommerce for product discovery, but as things re-opened, those users drifted back to physical shopping, which saw its usage numbers decline.

But the people that do use Pinterest are increasingly engaged in shopping activity, and with 433 million monthly actives, that’s still a huge potential audience to tap into with your promotions.

As such, these new promotional opportunities may be worth considering, as you examine the potential of the discovery focused app.