Pinterest has been joining the game of paid Advertising right up in the same ranks as Google Adwords and Facebook. The full court press Pinterest is offering when it comes to advertising, which is very similar to Google Adwords, could offer companies with unknown services or tours some great exposure. Why is this? It is due to Pinterest Lens.

Pinterest Lens is Pinterest’s secret tool that has some of the strongest image recognition and object detection capacity out there. For instance, if you photograph a room full of objects, you can use Pinterest Lens to scan the room and highlight objects you wish to learn more about.

Here is how it is used – Let’s say, you are walking down the street on the way to work, and see a mannequin in a window wearing a beautiful outfit. You photograph it, and Pinterest will pull every object it has in its database that has a similar look. With this, a person can, at their own leisure, find a physical or online place to purchase the look.

With food, you can take an image of a recipe that you like, but maybe you want something a bit different. You use your phone to photograph the recipe image and Pinterest again will show images of similar food products and recipes that might stimulate ideas for new ways to cook that chicken.

So when it comes to travel, let’s say somebody stumbles upon an image in a magazine of a beautiful location with an extraordinary view. They then use their Pinterest account on their phone to photograph the image. Pinterest will pull up every location that looks like the location they say in the original image, which would lead the searcher to hopefully see your similar photo and your tour to said location. The searcher could then click on your image (PIN) and then go to your website where you talk more about the tour – enticing them to book.

The beauty of Pinterest advertising is that the focus is on the discovery phase of search. This is especially important when a user does not have a defined trip idea, place they wish to visit, or product they want to buy – in mind – and are open to suggestions. This makes the tool great for companies try to buy into some branding opportunities.

With paid ads, your image is laid in with the organic images within a Pinterest feed. This has benefit with so many people putting up ad blockers, and it doesn’t come across as salesy.

Targeting your Pinterest ads can be based on keywords, either broad, match or exact match (just like Google Adwords). Or you can opt for auto-targeting, which is much like Google’s Dynamic Search ads.

So is it worth bothering to use Pinterest and start advertising on it?

Here are a few thoughts to keep in mind.

• 97% of Pinterest searches are non-branded
• There are over 200 million Pinterest users
• More than 2 billion searches are made on Pinterest each month

Taking advantage of Pinterest’s paid advertising only requires the ownership of a Pinterest business account and at least one pin. So, what are you waiting for?

Let’s Get Advertising!

Free For You: To receive your free copy of Let’s Get Booking: Digital Marketing 101 for Adventure Travel and Tour Companies, visit this link and download your copy right now.

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