Branding and advertising online has taken various forms since its inception, with marketers always looking out for new profitable channels and mediums. Unfortunately, the format of sites and people’s inherent resistance towards overt marketing efforts have left relatively narrow advertising options compared to the real world.
Now, picture sharing website industry leader Pinterest has released their new Rich Pins feature which, while still very user centred, promises to enhance the way people can interact with products and brands by making it a result of general personal interest rather than marketability.
What is Pinterest?
The site is relatively new, launching in May 2010, but is already not only the biggest picture sharing website online but also the third largest social network in the world after Facebook and Twitter.
It distinguished itself from market leaders Tumblr and Flickr by introducing a very polished and user friendly interface that allows you to create category related ‘boards’ and suggests content based on assumed user interest, as well as keywords and following other accounts.
Boasting a middle to upper-middle class female membership demographic of around 20 million users, it’s become attractive to marketers because of how much increased user interest is created when product details are included in pins and the fact that 69% of its users have been led to a product purchase through the website.
The New Pins
Pinterest has allowed users to embed links into their pins for some time, for both marketing and informational purposes, but the new rich pins will show greater onsite detail for pins from certain accounts.
Although it will only be available to certain companies and blogs, it hopes to position Pinterest as more than just a site to share pictures and content. The new pins include:
* Product pins – focusing mainly on clothing and furniture. Details will include, pricing, availability and buying locations.
* Recipe pins – from some of the internet’s biggest food bloggers.
* Movie pins – reviews as well as cast & crew details.
Bigger Market Opportunities for Brands
Although the number of participating websites and brands at the moment is quite select, following Pinterest’s concerns over quality control, the feature will likely become less restrictive if Pinterest experiences success with its limited roll-out.
Regardless, Rich Pins will offer richer and more accessible exposure on the brands themselves so foreign companies distributing for these large brands will benefit from the increased public interest in certain products and companies.