IS PINTEREST A GOOD SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING INVESTMENT?

But, is all the hype warranted? I scoured the web looking for statistics on Pinterest, and I came up with some pretty interesting stuff, which I have pinned right here.

Recently, Pinterest has seen its growth skyrocket. There is no shortage of stats showing that it is not just one of the fastest growing Social Networks, but one of the fastest growing sites on the internet. There is also analyses showing that the majority of users (at least in the US) are women, aged 25-34, that they spend more time on Pinterest then other sites, and that are very loyal. All interesting, especially for a site that is still in beta.

But, I wanted to zoom in on 2 interesting data points:

1 – A study by Shareaholic.com states that, for Q1 2012, Pinterest was responsible for 0.9% of referal traffic to sites, greater than Twitter’s 0.85% and 1/7 of Facebook’s 6.46%

2 - Publicly released information says that number of active users for each site is as follows:

• Facebook – 901 million*
• Twitter – 140 million
• Pinterest – 10 million

* No of registered users as of March 31, 2012.  Daily active users were 483 million at the end of January 2012. On page 44 of Facebook’s recent prospectus for sale of stock to the public (the first step in an initial public offering, or IPO), the company defines an ‘active user’ as not only people who visit facebook.com or its mobile version (which would be the standard definition of ‘active user’ in most Web marketing circles), but also as anyone who actively engages with the site through one of Facebook’s APIs (application protocol interfaces) through a third party site or tool.  I don't have to tell you how I much I disagree with Facebook's definition of active users.

In essence, Pinterest user count is only 7% that of Twitter, but sends more absolute referral traffic than Twitter. Also, with only 1% of Facebook’s user count, Pinterest sends 13% of the traffic that Facebook does.

So, why does Pinterest drive so much traffic per user? On other social networks, people might read the headline that is shared, and move to the next. On Pinterest, the “Pin” really acts as a visual bookmark. As a user, if you want the context behind the image, you often need to click on it. As well (and this is just conjecture), Facebook and Twitter content is shared in a linear fashion; and once shared it slowly expires. On Pinterest, content is discoverable for a longer time. For example, I have never looked backwards and read all of someone’s tweets.  On the other hand, when I find an interesting Pinterest page, I usually devour all the content they share.

On another note, in the UK, Pinterest is used mostly by men. I expect the shape of the network to change as they move out of private beta and into general availability. I do expect there will still be a female bias though it will probably be less extreme.

I expect to see a lot of interesting things happen with Pinterest over the next several months. Many brands already have a presence on the site, and many more will start. Do you have a plan for Pinterest?

COMMENTARY:   In a blog post dated February 1, 2012, I first reported on this incredible up and coming social network called Pinterest.  Its lightning quick popularity and 7.2 million users at the end of December 2011 was quite impressive.  Pinterest is a private, by invitation-only social network, but I was quickly accepted shortly thereafter.  What I didn't know at the time that nearly 90% of users are female between the ages of 25-34.   

In a blog post dated February 14, 2012, I reported that AppData had estimated that Pinterest had 10.4 million users, and 9 million monthly-connected Facebook users, and that 97% were female.   Even more impressive.

In a blog post dated February 12, 2012, comScore and Medi Metrix reported that Pinterest users spent an average of 80 minutes on the new social network during the month of February.  This ranked Pinterest third behind Facebook (423 minutes per month) and Tumblr.com (151 minutes per month).  

Click Image To Enlarge

Pinterest continues to experience steady growth and probably well over 12 million users, but I have a feeling that pinning things has a short shelf life and the number of users will eventually peak. When 90% of users are female, its obvious that as a marketing platform for advertisers, Pinterest may not be a great investment.  How do you tell the difference between an ad and a cute image?

Courtesy of an article dated April 29, 2012 appearing in Eloqua The Power To Succeed

 http://mashable.com/2012/02/28/pinterest-user-engagement/

Comments

[information arbitrage]

Hi Tommy. I can say, definitely yes. Pinterest is one of the fast growing social media site today.

[Email service provider]

I am happy to find your distinguished way of writing the post. Now you make it easy for me to understand and implement the concept. Thank you for this post. Keep it up.

[Glenn]

I think yes, it is also one of the best social media platform which help you invest money and expand your business.

[Email Marketing Service]

Thanks for sharing such great info. As a matter of fact i believe in the same concept that pintrest is not the right place to invest money. Although it has high ratings and stats showing increase in numbers of traffic but still this concept is not worth investing much money.