For all those holdouts who still think Pinterest is a place to store recipes or create dream boards, the social platform has changed the game yet again. Pinterest is the fastest-growing social network available at 53 million monthly users, with more clout when it comes to ecommerce than both Facebook and Twitter. And just when we all thought they’d won the game, they went and topped themselves again.
Just in Time for the Holidays
The Wall Street Journal reports Pinterest will now offer the Now-Trending tool to ecommerce sites. This tool will integrate with the ecommerce company’s website so that any visitors can see right away which products are getting the most love on Pinterest.
While their new service is offered to partner sites like Zappos.com and Walmart.com only for the time being, we do get a chance to see how the Now-Trending tool will work for any and all ecommerce sites in the future. Steve Patrizi, the head of partner marketing, explains that these partner sites will be able to show the most-pinned items from their ecommerce sites.
The trending-products widget runs on Pinterest's long-awaited API. In time, this will expand to include more data, which will allow more ecommerce companies to show the products that are generating a buzz all across the internet.
Pinterest will also soon make filtering possible for partner sites, which means Pinterest users will be able to sort items according to most-pinned, recently-pinned, and various other choices. The possibilities this filtering could open up for ecommerce sites are endless.
Though Pinterest makes the Now-Trending list available only to partners at the moment, the tool will eventually be available to all ecommerce sites. The social platform also plans to continue developing more tools to help ecommerce companies convert sales. The service is free as they receive greater exposure through their logo and brand appearing on large ecommerce sites. In return, you get greater insight into what consumers love about your company’s products.
What Does That Mean?
What this means for your ecommerce site is that you will soon be able to include the Now-Trending tool on your pages. Customers who visit your site will see which of your products have generated the most buzz among Pinterest users.
That kind of social proof just can’t be bought, and it’s just one more step toward Pinterest’s ultimate goal of becoming the go-to site for discovering content online. The benefits for ecommerce sites are obvious, with social proof standing as number one. Others are the ease with which the store’s products can be found, the assistance Pinterest offers in keeping those products within sight of buyers, and the potential reach your ecommerce site will gain as more users repin the products they see trending on your page.
If you haven’t already opened a business Pinterest account, now is the time to do so. Without the account, you can’t share your products (and other awesome content) with the world, and the world can’t pin and repin to spread the word.
How has Pinterest changed the way you sell online? Have any other social platforms affected your ecommerce business? We’d like to hear what’s working for you.
Originally published Nov 18, 2013 10:05:00 AM, updated January 18 2023