Pinterest: How You Can Rock This Social Media Platform

7 Pinterest Marketing Trends Based On 2014 Research

Pin Trends By Day Of the Week-PinterestPinterest is the social media platform where customers actively let others know that “I want this product.

Before you say, “This doesn’t matter to me since I’m a B2B marketer,” appreciate that your customers, influencers or end-users  have personal lives filled with dreams and aspirations and some portion of them are active on Pinterest. So, even if you’re NOT a B2C marketer, Pinterest matters!!!

7 Pinterest marketing trends

At a minimum, you need to monitor Pinterest marketing trends to better understand your target audience from an aspirational perspective.

1. Pinterest audience

The most important fact to understand is that women rock Pinterest based on RJMetrics‘ analysis of a sample of 50,000 random pinners and their pins taken directly from Pinterest’s public pages. Pinterest is where social media shops because you can put a price on Pinterest (Check out this additional research and 15 Pinterest tactics.)

Women Rock Pinterest

  • 92% of Pins are made by women; 8% of pins are made by men. Women make 15 times more pins than men.
  • 80% of Pinterest users are female; 20% of users are male.
  • The average active female Pinterest user has made 158 pins.

And – Women and their interests are critical to your business, whether you’re a B2C or a B2B company, As MediaPost noted:

  • Women account for $7 trillion in US consumer and business spending.
  • Women make or influence 85% of all purchasing decisions.
  • Women purchase over 50% of traditional male products, including cars, home improvement products and consumer electronics.
  • 78%  of US women gather product information online before making a purchase.
  • Women account for 58% of all total online spending.

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

  • Use Pinterest to appeal to the women in your target audience. Include this information in your marketing persona.

2. Products and categories that get pinned

There’s a significant difference in the number of pins based on category.

  • 20% of pins are in the Food and Drink category.
  • 12% of pins are in the DIY & Crafts category.
  • 11% of pins are in the Home Decor category.

Top pinned categories - Chart

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

  • Appeal to the interests that perform best on Pinterest. Since Pinterest activity isn’t evenly distributed across categories, present those aspects of your product, brand and company that play to the more active interests.

3. Companies that get pinned on Pinterest

Eliminating user-generated content, the most repinned brands are closely aligned with Pinterest participants’ aspirations. Their content resonates with users’ interests.

Etsy far outperforms the pack in terms of repins. A deeper look reveals that 67% of Etsy pins come from the Pinterest bookmarklet and 8% of Etsy pins come from its on-site Pin It button. Therefore Etsy’s Pinterest strength is attributable to the alignment of its unique, handmade brand and the DIY and home decor focus on its product offering with users’ aspirations.

The next 3 companies, Urban Outfitters, Williams-Sonoma, and West Elm, exhibit a similar alignment of their brands and products with users’ desires.Pinterest-Most Repins by Domain - RJMetrics-1

Lowe’s has the #1 board on Pinterest, Build It, with 3.4 million followers. While not a top pinned site,  it’s followers are interested and engaged building Lowe’s brand. Lowes Build it on Pinterest

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

4. Pinterest trends by season

Pinning activity varies by season. Participants seek and share visual content in advance of events related to a particular activity. Note that the holiday peaks start as early as August.

Pinterest is an early indicator of interests and trends.

Pinterest Seasonal Pinning Variation-RJMetrics

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tips:

  • Plan content to showcase your business’s seasonal offerings on Pinterest. 
  • Be in front of the competition in terms of content creation and distribution timing.  

5. Pinterest trends by day

Choose your optimal pinning time to maximize your reach based on Pinterest’s analysis of the optimal subject matter shared each day. A closer look shows a correlation with your audience’s weekly cycles and needs.
Pin Trends By Day Of the Week-Pinterest

  • Monday: Fitness
  • Tuesday: Technology
  • Wednesday: Inspirational quotes
  • Thursday: Fashion
  • Friday: Humor (including GIFs)
  • Saturday: Travel
  • Sunday: Food and craft ideas

Take note that 3+ million humor Pins are saved each day making humor one of the fastest growing categories on Pinterest. Further, 400,000+ GIFs pinned per day on Pinterest since their launch in January 2014.

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

  • Correlate your pins with the hot topic of the day to take advantage of the larger audience at those times where appropriate. It’s much easier to get people to focus on your content when they’re already seeking that topic.

6. Pinterest trends by hour

Pinterest is used all during waking hours.

  • 32% of all pinning occurs between 10am and 4pm, the heart of the workday. This makes sense since this is when social media managers and content creators are at work.
  • 18% of all pinning occurs between 9pm and midnight, users’ “my personal time.”  (Note: This is consistent with other Pinterest research.)

Pinning Activity By Hour - RJMetrics-2014

Interestingly, this behavior is consistent across interests so that it has more to do with users’ schedules rather than their specific aspirations.
Pinterest  Hourly Pins - Top 5 Categories - RJMetrics

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

  • Pin content before your audience (aka during work hours) gets active during their  after dinner “me time.” BUT consider being available during your audience’s active time to engage with them in real time.

7. Pinterest retains users over time!

84% of female pinners are still pinning in their 4th year of using Pinterest while male activity has declined on relatively consistent basis.
Pins per year - RJMetrics-2014

Female pinners increase activity more each year they use Pinterest. The average woman posts 42 pins in year 1 and increases to 152 pins by year 4!
Pins per year - RJMetrics-2014

Actionable Pinterest Marketing Tip: 

  • Build your Pinterest following to reap rewards over the long term. 

 

Pinterest is an aspirational social media platform where women show what they want. Marketers can learn a lot about their audience from Pinterest marketing trends since 91% of women believe that marketers don’t understand them.

What has been most effective for your business on Pinterest and why?

Happy Marketing,
Heidi Cohen


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