Pinterest Goes Commercial

There was never any doubt that the capitalisation of Pinterest would necessitate it becoming monetised through using more than advertising revenue and June 2015 saw the emergence of buttons enabling viewers to buy off the page.

Why?

Pinterest intends to build its catalogue of buyables, must-have items and lovely things through carefully chosen partners and, given its’ popularity with women with disposable income, great success is predicted.

A Man With A Plan At Pinterest

The programme is being led by Tim Kendall, who previously worked at Facebook implementing the platform’s advertising structure before moving to Tumblr to do pretty much the same thing.

Kendall, as General Manager of Monetization, says that he was inspired by The Sharper Image, an American catalogue and retail outlet which was at its peak before the emergence of the World Wide Web.

The Sharper Image originally sold off-mainstream consumer electronics and had sufficient market clout to enable special arrangements to be made with manufacturers, creating models of products that were exclusive to the retail giant.

Premier League and Aspirational Market Place?

How deep Kendall’s inspiration goes is unknown, but with Pinterest currently valued at $11bn there may be scope for ‘Exclusively from Pinterest’ to be added to some of the ‘Buy’ buttons.

The company is naturally protective of its image and reputation to the extent that merchants aspiring to sell through the platform have to meet fairly strict criteria before approval will be given.

We’ll certainly be watching developments closely so that we can advise our clients if we feel that Pinterest is going to be a viable channel for them.