Pinterest and Its eCommerce Strategy

According to its latest quarterly release, Pinterest’s year-over-year revenue jumped by 5% to hit US$ 603 million in Q1 2023. Moreover, the platform also saw a 7% increase in Global Monthly Active Users (MAUs). CEO Bill Ready credits the growth to the platform's shoppability, improved content relevance, as well as its advertising business. Indeed, Pinterest is increasingly putting more emphasis on realizing the commercial potential of the platform, particularly when it comes to facilitating online retail.

To enable online shopping through its dashboard, Pinterest has been using the shoppable or buyable pins feature, which allows users to directly purchase an item by clicking on a pin that contains the product title, description, and pricing information. Merchants can also use functions such as the Pinterest API for Shopping, Video in Catalog, Shop Tab, as well as product tagging in order to engage users ("pinners") and convert them into buyers. In the spirit of being a social commerce platform, some of the pins also have labels ("best seller" for a popular product in a specific category, for instance) which enables customers to make informed decisions. In addition, the company is also testing features to incorporate the sale of refurbished or used items. In the latest earnings call, CEO Ready stated that the engagement on shoppable pins has increased by more than 30%, while attributed checkout for merchants who have uploaded their catalogs on Pinterest has also jumped by 30% year-over-year.

Recently, Pinterest announced a partnership with Amazon to serve as an advertising platform for the retail giant. With this feature, Pinterest's 463 million active users will be able to engage with ads and seamlessly transition to Amazon for checkout. With the intention of "making every pin shoppable," the days of Pinterest simply providing inspiration are long gone. Today, it is increasingly focused on driving users to purchase online.