As with most social platforms, Pinterest is seeing great audience response to video content.
In fact, on Pinterest, video may be even more resonant than on other platforms – according to Pinterest’s data, 75% of Pinners are likely to watch a video about a topic that interests them on the site, compared to 55% of users on other sites.
Pinterest advertisers have also been benefiting from the power of video pins. After adding Promoted Video back in 2016, then autoplay video ads a year ago, Pinterest now says that users are 2.6x more likely to make a purchase after viewing brand video content on the site.
And given the platform’s focus on eCommerce and direct selling, that’s an opportunity that could be too good to ignore for many businesses.
Furthering this, Pinterest is this week launching a test of a new video ad format – max width video ads.
As explained by Pinterest:
“With Promoted Video at max. width, your video stands out to drive impact and brand awareness. The format is easy to spot; it spans wider than our standard format in feeds and in search on mobile, so people can sit back and watch your story.”
As you can see here, the new, bigger Pinterest video ads take up around two-thirds of the screen, and align with the rising vertical video format popularized by Snapchat and Instagram. The larger, more attention-grabbing ads will enable advertisers to stand out, and better promote their products to Pinterest’s ready to buy audience.
And that’s a key note – according to research, Pinterest, which is now closing in on 250 million active users, drives greater purchase intent than other social platforms, with some 90% of weekly Pinners using the app to make purchase decisions.
In addition to this, Pinterest says that an increasing number of people are also turning to the app for entertainment guidance:
“Entertainment is one of the fastest-growing categories on Pinterest, with more than 42 million people already using the platform to find new entertainment ideas.”
Pinterest also says it reaches 42% of people who’ve watched a movie in theaters within the last six months, and 56% of people who use streaming services including Netflix, Hulu, HBO Now and Showtime.
The new video ad format clearly aligns with advertisers in the entertainment vertical – but other brands too will be able to use the option to stand out.
The stats don’t lie, video content is a major draw for social media users, and the same is clearly true on Pinterest. The new max width format is not available to all advertisers as yet, but will be coming later this year, and may well be worth factoring in to your platform strategy.