Pinterest may not get as much hype from digital marketers as other social media platforms, but the statistics are undeniably compelling:
- 29 percent of U.S. adults have an account on the platform, including 1 in 2 millennials.
- 78 percent of Pinterest users say that seeing branded content is useful when they’re on the platform.
- 93 percent of Pinterest users say that they actively use the platform to plan their purchases.
Because Pinterest is a social network specifically focused on consumption, inspiration, and discovery, users are often more open to branded content – which makes it the perfect location for your next marketing campaign.
Pinterest’s advertisements are known as Promoted Pins, which are image-based posts that users can save to their boards like any other pin. 61 percent of Pinterest users say that they’ve found new brands and products via Promoted Pins, and half of them say that a Promoted Pin inspired them to make a purchase.
In 2017, Pinterest introduced Promoted App Pins, advertisements for mobile apps that enable users to directly install the app while browsing Pinterest. Promoted App Pins provide another channel for you to advertise your iOS or Android app, outside of the cutthroat app store environment, toward audiences whom you know will likely be interested.
For example, when the workout and meal plan app 8fit used Promoted App Pins, signup rates were up to 5 percent higher than other platforms, with up to 90 percent lower CPM (cost per thousand impressions).
Sounds like a great idea, right? Before you take off running, let’s discuss 8 things that you should know before launching a Promoted App Pin campaign.
1. Growing market
Pinterests’ Promoted App Pins cater to a growing hunger among digital markets for app install advertisements. Mobile analytics company AppsFlyer has projected that global spending on app install ads will grow by 65 percent from 2018 to 2020, reaching a total of $64 billion by next year.
2. Not available in all locations
As of January 2019, Pinterest has only made Promoted Pins available in a select number of countries: the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Australia, and New Zealand. In addition, your ads can only be seen by users in these countries.
This puts a significant limitation on Pinterest campaigns when compared with other platforms such as Instagram, which currently offers ads in more than 40 countries worldwide.
3. No redirects
When users click on the icon to install your mobile app, they must be taken directly to the app’s page on the iOS or Android app store. You can’t include redirects or insert your own code for tracking and analytics. The good news is that Pinterest has a robust analytics platform that will help you monitor the performance of your Promoted App Pin campaign.
4. Picking the right image
For platforms that are highly visual, such as Pinterest, choosing the best image or video is critically important. According to a study by visual web marketing firm Curalate, there are a variety of factors that can influence your campaign’s performance:
- Images without faces are 23 percent more likely to be repinned than images with a face.
- Images with warmer colors (such as red, orange, and brown) are twice as likely to be repinned as images with cooler colors (such as blue).
- Images in vertical or “portrait” format are more likely to be repinned than images that are extremely long or wide.
5. Robust campaign analytics
Pinterest has joined forces with several mobile measurement partners (MMPs) so that advertisers can track users’ behavior and installs during the campaign. As of January 2019, Pinterest supports direct integrations with five MMPs: Adjust, Apsalar, AppsFlyer, Kochava, and Tune.
6. Two optimization choices
Marketers using Promoted App Pins can choose between two tactics for optimizing their campaigns: “completed installs” or “traffic to download page.” In both cases, marketers are charged per click.
With the “completed installs” objective, the Pinterest algorithm automatically adjusts bids every day, based on your target CPI (cost per install). With the “traffic to download page” objective, the Pinterest algorithm prioritizes getting clicks and allows you to manually adjust bids.
7. Pins have longevity
Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter tend to cater to users’ short attention spans, with a constantly refreshing feed that encourages a “consume and continue” mentality. Pinterest, on the other hand, encourages a more long-term mentality, allowing users to easily return to the pins that they’ve saved to one of their boards.
As a result, your campaign may have more longevity than you expected, thanks to other users finding your pins days, weeks, or months later. For every 100 Promoted Pin impressions on Pinterest, brands get an additional 30 views due to users repinning their content – at no charge to your business.
8. Better users and better scalability
According to one study by mobile user acquisition company Bidalgo, Promoted App Pins engage “high-quality” users: people who are more likely to take in-app actions and make in-app purchases.
What’s more, Bidalgo found that Pinterest has “sizable inventory available on the platform compared to other social channels,” allowing marketers who want to scale their campaigns to rapidly ramp up their efforts.
