The announcement shows a shift in how Pinterest engages with brands and opens up the potential for some exciting developments in how brands can leverage the platform. It also paves the way toward Pinterest introducing paid experiences to allow marketers to grow their follower counts, increase the prominence of their content (similar to the path of both Facebook and Twitter) and have access to deeper analytics.
Pinterest has officially opened its doors for brands, and here’s what they’re doing:
Business Pages
Brands and consumers used to both have standard profiles, but marketers can now create business pages from scratch or transition their standard profiles to brand pages.
Business pages allow brands to specify a business name (instead of having to use a first name and last name). From there brands can verify their accounts (helps people identify and find the brand page), add buttons and widgets to their other online properties and opt-in to receive access to future product updates. The changes aren’t significant, but they do show that Pinterest has plans for marketers in the future.
Best Practices
This is the first time Pinterest has opened up officially for brands, so it has created a library of case studies, a set of best practices and documentation on how brands can use the Pinterest brand in their own materials. For example, brands can use the full logo when referring to Pinterest the company or when promoting a campaign being run on Pinterest.