Prepare for the Holidays with Pinterest: E-Commerce and Pinterest Advertising

By Jennie Sanjeevi

This July, Tug Toronto attended a Holiday Readiness Event, offering an exclusive look into how Pinterest empowers brands by optimising their advertising strategies through innovative products and creative approaches. 

While you may be thinking, we’re only midway through the year, the holiday season will be here before you know it! With that in mind, it’s never too early to start planning holiday campaigns. Getting a head start means brands can begin testing and experimenting with tactics to reach their high-intent audience, ensuring they have proven strategies in place for the upcoming holiday shopping period. Read on to learn how the Pinterest advertising tools are helping brands distinguish themselves in the run-up to the holiday season.

Rethinking the Funnel

In today’s advertising landscape, numerous social platforms allow advertisers to connect with their target audience in a personalised way. Understanding audience pain points and interests and engaging with them at the right time is crucial. However, many advertisers do not utilise all appropriate channels. Instead, they often concentrate their investments heavily on major platforms like Facebook and Instagram, overlooking other valuable options. Pinterest, for instance, offers robust full-funnel advertising capabilities that enable brands to think outside the box.

Pinning Down the Rise of Social Search

No longer just a place to stash moodboards and meal prep inspo, Pinterest has become a go-to platform for marketers to build an authentic, personalised experience with their target demographic. Boasting over 570 million users worldwide and an ‘80% success rate’ in their annual trend report for five consecutive years, according to Sprout Social, advertising on Pinterest is crucial for capitalising on seasonal demand and capturing audiences like Gen-Z, who are leading social search and integrated shopping experiences.

Navigating the Holiday Season: Challenges for Brands

The holiday season presents a critical period for brands, demanding a broad strategic approach rather than focusing on a limited number of platforms. In 2024, a significant amount of worldwide digital ad spend was concentrated on a handful of dominant platforms. During this upcoming holiday season, brands must prepare to address three key challenges: 

Evolving Audience Behaviour 

Consumer hesitation is increasing as trust in online product images, reviews, marketing campaigns and content diminishes. Organisations must prioritise building trust to mitigate the financial impact of this growing scepticism. 

The Relevance Crisis 

As brand messaging becomes increasingly perceived as forced or inauthentic, consumers are turning to crowdsourcing platforms for relevant content and information. This shift creates new opportunities for brands to connect with their audience through innovative and authentic messaging. 

Continually Rising Costs 

The combination of changing audience behaviour and the struggle for relevance is forcing brands to pay a premium for visibility. For instance, in Q4 2024, the average price per ad on Meta platforms saw a 14% year-over-year increase globally.

So What Makes Pinterest Stand Out? 

The platform boasts the ideal audience for the holiday season, encompassing all demographics and geographies, from Gen Z to Millennials, Gen X, and Boomers. Gen Z accounts for 40% of its global monthly active users. Furthermore, 56% of Pinterest users agree that the platform helps them decide what to purchase, making it an optimal place to connect with the right audience. 

“Holiday gift ideas” searches on Pinterest start popping up in August, meaning people are already looking for holiday inspiration. Pinners always check the platform for gift ideas, recipes, décor and fashion. Plus, nearly half of them (49%) create holiday wishlists, which gives brands a clear signal of what users are eyeing. In response to this seasonal hike, Pinterest is really stepping up its game, showing advertisers double the outbound clicks and a solid 51% jump in conversions from those clicks. 

Hacking Pinterest Ads 

From dynamic retargeting and time-bound promotions to festive video ads that boost storytelling and engagement, Pinterest offers a powerful toolkit for brands aiming to drive conversions and ROAS. Breakthrough videos, platform takeovers, and the Holiday Gift Badge help capture user attention at key shopping moments, while integrations like Shopify and Premier Spotlight maximise reach and impact. These result in more impactful campaigns that meet users where inspiration strikes.

With social search revolutionising the online shopping experience for good, and tighter purse strings where marketing budgets are concerned, the holiday season demands strategic ad spend. As a result, marketers are getting more creative by turning their attention to Pinterest ads. 

With its high-intent shoppers, appealing visual layout, and personalisation, Pinterest is key for e-commerce brands. It offers unique audiences and innovative ad formats. From shopping ads to video, Pinterest’s full-funnel approach provides marketing teams with a host of retargeting options to increase ROAS.

If you’ve got any questions about how to leverage Pinterest in your social strategy, don’t hesitate to chat with us.