Thinking about making Pinterest a part of your digital marketing strategy? Or already have a Pinterest page for your brand and need a few pointers? Tram Nguyen, head of product marketing for Pinterest, offered a few “pinteresting” tips every retailer should know in this interview with Women in Retail Leadership Circle (WIRLC).

WIRLC: Why should retailers incorporate Pinterest and Promoted Pins into their digital marketing strategy?
TN: Every day more than 70 million people come to Pinterest to plan their future and find inspiration. Most people on Pinterest are looking for brands to help them discover new products and services. In fact, more than two-thirds of the content people Pin is from businesses. Every single pin links to a web page where people can do more, whether it’s find out more information or fulfill a purchase. Pinterest enables retailers to be discovered by a new audience, drive purchase intent and, ultimately, generate sales.

WIRLC: What are some of the hallmarks of a good Pinterest strategy for retailers?
TN:

  1. Get scale. Most of the traffic retailers receive from Pinterest comes from pins that originate when their customers pin and bring their products onto Pinterest. Therefore, ensure your website has the official Pin It button to help make pinning even easier.
  2. Get rich pins so users who come across your pins have the necessary information to act. We also send out price drop notifications when your item goes on sale, helping encourage pinners to buy.
  3. Optimize for all devices. Eighty percent of Pinterest’s traffic comes from mobile devices, so images, landing pages and actions that are optimized for mobile (e.g., email sign ups) work well.
  4. Incorporate a diverse content strategy that uses both product and inspirational images to address the range of pinners’ intent.
  5. Promote pins to reach a targeted audience that’s planning for key purchase events or seasons.

WIRLC: Can you offer some examples of retailers using Pinterest in interesting ways?
TN: Many retailers have honed in on top-pinned products as a signal of future purchase intent. They use this data to help merchandise everything from their email marketing to their website to in-store programs. Stitch Fix asks members to share their Pinterest boards so it can get a sense of the person’s taste and make better product recommendations.

Some retailers address the evergreen nature of our pins by ensuring that even if a pin links to a product that’s no longer available, consumers can find something similar that they might like. Retailers can build custom landing pages using Pinterest’s API for traffic linking to out-of-stock pins.

Retailers might also seek inspiration from other industries, like hospitality. Four Seasons Hotels use Pinterest as a concierge service to curate an experience for people traveling to new cities and staying in its hotels. Four Seasons collaborates on a board with the guest, who indicates preferences, and then the concierge creates an experience for them using their local expertise. The program has helped Four Seasons create lasting connections with its guests, who in turn become word-of-mouth advocates for the brand.

WIRLC: What’s the Pin Factory and how can brands utilize it?
TN: Creative is one of the biggest determinants of a successful Promoted Pins campaign. We developed the Pin Factory as a way to make getting started with us as easy as possible. To get started with the Pin Factory, brands fill out a simple questionnaire and share existing assets and/or ask us to acquire the assets. We then develop quick, easy, simple pins that align to your campaign objectives, which can then be uploaded to the brand’s account.