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Anonymous hater “Retail Exec D” told Digiday this week that Pinterest is “just people playing around.” Is that what you believe? If you’re a marketer, is Pinterest on your to-do list or your block list?
Anecdotally, my acquaintances have sometimes joked about Pinterest as if it’s all cupcakes and weddings. They imply that a platform that’s home to such mundane conversation couldn’t be important to anyone important. But haters often find themselves on the wrong side of history.
Haters Gonna Hate, Pinners Gonna Pin
The vaguely sexist “no one cares about cupcakes” prejudice against Pinterest brings another social platform to mind. The chart below will roughly illustrate my thinking:
Twitter, now considered by some a $10 billion company, was dogged by perception problems as it grew. Five years ago, many pundits couldn’t look beyond their MySpace-shaped world to see the potential in lightweight and fast-traveling tweets, dismissing them as insignificant chatter about what people ate for breakfast.
2012 happened for Pinterest, too. On an Internet-wide scale, Pinterest now has almost as many users as Twitter. 15% of people on the internet use Pinterest, compared to 16% who use Twitter (Pew, 2012).
It’s tempting to dismiss Pinterest as trivial and leave these cupcake enthusiasts in peace. But we’d be missing something.
Could the U.S. Economy Be Built on Cupcake Enthusiasts?
A big chunk of those Pinterest users, the ones pinning cupcakes and weddings, are women in their 20s and 30s. These Cupcake Enthusiasts…could they actually be…Moms??
(Brand marketers everywhere instinctively freeze and perk up their ears)
Moms wield financial power — and not just when it comes to the grocery list. Moms are the reason automotive designers and marketers consider the “wife acceptance factor.” Moms account for more than half of household consumer electronics purchases (Consumer Electronics Association, 2010). Moms are more likely to shop online for clothes, toys, and music than the average Internet user (Nielsen, 2012).
But maybe you don’t believe me. Maybe jumping from “women” to “Moms” is too big of an assumption when it comes to the purchasing power of Pinterest users. Hmm, but then there’s this:
Pinterest Users Spend More Money Online Than Other Social Users
Those cupcake-and-wedding people like buying things. Shoppers referred by Pinterest are 10% more likely to make a purchase than visitors who arrive from other social networks, including Facebook and Twitter (Wayfair, 2012). Turns out they spend more too: Pinterest shoppers spend $170 per session on average, significantly more than Facebook at $95 (Reuters).
$170 per e-commerce purchase surely isn’t “just playing around.”
Excellent. Now What to Do?
Crack your knuckles. Many savvy brand managers for fashion, home, consumer packaged, goods, travel, and retail have already created owned brand presences on Pinterest. And there’s something all of them want from Pinterest users:
Brands want re-pins of their content.
Fortunately, according to RJ Metrics, 80% of Pinterest pins are re-pins. This means the user base is already sharing and engaging with content on a high level.
Make Pinning Brand Content a Cakewalk
140 Proof is going to be announcing some exciting new Pinterest capabilities next week – stay tuned for more.
P.S. to be fair to the Moms and all Pinterest users, Pinterest actually ISN’T all cupcakes and weddings. Pinerly reports that Weddings and Cupcakes (Food category) comprise no more than 15% of pins. Gotcha.
By John Manoogian III (@jm3), 140 Proof Co-Founder and CTO
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March 19, 2013 - 1 month ago
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Tumblr Inc doesn’t have a well-developed advertising offering yet, but that doesn’t mean that brands can’t reach Tumblr’s valuable audiences. Offerings like 140 Proof’s Native Ads for Social Sites offer brands the chance to run campaigns on popular blogging platforms like Tumblr.
Even though Tumblr’s fast-paced growth eclipsing other social platforms, many brand marketers are asking what Tumblr can offer them. Here are five reasons that brands should jump into a paid campaign on Tumblr with both feet:
1. An Audience of Tastemakers
Millennials make up one of the biggest demographic audiences on Tumblr. And they exert considerable buying power, not just on their own but also as influencers of those around them. A new study from the Consumer Electronics Association concludes that “Millennials have the highest purchase intent of all demographics” and they give purchase advice to friends and other family members.
Reaching them in their most-frequented spaces is a big opportunity for not just consumer electronics brands but other verticals like CPG, entertainment, and retail.
2. The Reblog Is King
Sharing is widespread on Tumblr, rivaling or surpassing other social platforms. Tumblr reblogs are fast coming into their own: Buzzfeed earned over 50,000 reblogs for just one of its Grammy night Tumblr posts. There’s even a Tumblr blog dedicated to highlighting highly-shared posts.
Likes on Tumblr are as seamless and fast as Likes on Facebook, and Shares (known as “Reblogs”) on Tumblr are even faster than a Facebook Share. A greater percentage of Tumblr users click Like on Tumblr posts than Twitter users click Favorite on Twitter posts.
3. Tumblr Job #1: Discovery
Discovery is key for brand marketers. And that’s a perfect fit for Tumblr. Tumblr’s young audience visits Tumblr to have fun and discover new things, much like they did when Facebook was a network of age-mates and not yet a family photo-sharing site. And because discovery and sharing are valued so highly (see #2), by many users above content creation, many people on Tumblr are looking for great things to share.
4. Flexible Creative Formats
Content from all other platforms — video, pictures, text — is compatible with Tumblr. Native social ad units for Tumblr are among the richest available, with generous visual space for well-designed creative as well as the traditional text and link. Brands who want to have an earned presence on Tumblr can easily tweak and repurpose their content from other networks, though beware — Tumblr users are more discerning (they see hundreds of great images and stories on Tumblr every day), so they’ll reward only the very best of your creative.
5. Brands Enjoy Greater Share of Voice
As we noted in Why Tumblr Is Important for Brands, other social networks like Facebook are crowded with brand promotions. Most brands’ paid social strategies focus on Facebook and Twitter, because of the broad, sizeable audiences that can be targeted plus relatively easy on-boarding processes for advertisers.
Although many brands have already claimed their Tumblr namespace and started creating content, most people haven’t encountered brand messaging on Tumblr yet. This is partly because brands aren’t yet aware that they can pay to reach Tumblr users beyond existing followers. With no official ad solution forthcoming, paid Tumblr campaigns are still the well-kept secret weapon of a few brand marketers. Paid campaigns on Tumblr from companies like 140 Proof, therefore, offer new reach into the Tumblr audience.
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February 12, 2013 - 3 months ago
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140 Proof is proud to sponsor this week’s cover of Ad Age’s print magazine as part of our effort to get out the message about Blended Interest Graph targeting technology for brand advertising.
The sponsorship kicks off 140 Proof’s campaign in 2013 to help marketers and media planners everywhere understand what the Blended Interest Graph can do for brands.
B.I.G. = Blended Interest Graph
The Blended Interest Graph unites audience data from social platforms like Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter, and the next generation of digital communities.
Our customers call it B.I.G.
Because it maps over 20 billion connections between people and the things they love, the Blended Interest Graph is the perfect targeting technology for brands. And it’s exclusively available from 140 Proof.
Learn more about the Blended Interest Graph by downloading our Special Report: Inside the Interest Graph
“Think B.I.G.”: About the Cover Image
For the cover, 140 Proof Creative Director Lau Ardelean (@lauardelean) built a virtual city using Cinema 4D and Illustrator to help show the scale of data included in the Blended Interest Graph. Much like the crowded borough of Manhattan, the Blended Interest Graph is bursting with interest data from social platforms, and 2 billion new data points are created daily. Ardelean collaborated with Creative Strategist Vanessa Naylon (@vnaylon) to explain how 140 Proof helps ambitious brands create winning social advertising campaigns. Moral support and backseat design-driving by John Manoogian III (@jm3).
Think B.I.G. Wallpapers for Desktop and iPhone
Think B.I.G. even when on a small screen. Download the cover image as a wallpaper:
[ B.I.G. City Desktop ] [ Just plain B.I.G. Desktop ] [ iPhone ]
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January 28, 2013 - 3 months ago
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How would you navigate a city of 20 billion?
Tokyo, the world’s largest metropolitan area, hosts almost 36 million people. Its rail system, also the largest in the world, transports 40 million passengers daily. But even Tokyo’s efficient, modern infrastructure wouldn’t be prepared to deal with a population of 20 billion.
That’s the engineering challenge that 140 Proof Labs developers faced when they set out to create the Blended Interest Graph. The B.I.G. unites audience data from social platforms like Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, and Twitter. This data includes Likes, follows, pins, check-ins, and other public social signals like hashtags and keywords.
It’s the biggest map of audience interest data in social, bigger than any one platform. It’s a massive virtual city built from the connections between people and the things they love. And with over two billion new public data points created every day, the Blended Interest Graph is not just big but constantly growing.
140 Proof architected the Blended Interest Graph to help brands navigate the sprawling world of social. Brand advertisers and media planners use 140 Proof’s B.I.G. targeting technology to power their social advertising campaigns. B.I.G. targeting helps ad campaigns reach target audiences at scale based on who people follow, what they like, and other social signals that indicate interests.
140 Proof builds custom audience segments that include fans and followers of influencers, related brands, check-ins, pins, trends, and more. For example, to promote their recent sponsorship of the U.S. Open, IBM reached people publicly checking in at the event with Foursquare with custom creative designed for event attendees. And family-friendly brands can reach family decision makers by targeting people who pin baby photos, clothing, and furniture on Pinterest.
What’s the point of building this virtual city of interests? Relevance is the key to why we do what we do. When messages between people (or between brands and people) are more relevant, life gets better. Decisions are more efficient, and people are happier. The trains run on time, and the city keeps on moving.
To talk to us about using Blended Interest Graph targeting technology for your brand campaign, contact us at hello@140proof.com.
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January 28, 2013 - 3 months ago
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Tumblr is currently the #13 website on the Internet, with over 8 billion page views per month. Last year, it gained notoriety as one of the biggest platforms in social.
But how should brands be looking at Tumblr? Is there a benefit to a paid presence there?
Tumblr Is the Home of Teens and Millennials
Tumblr’s audience is young and smart. According to Quantcast, Tumblr indexes very highly for people aged 18-24. Most of Tumblr’s visitors have been to college, too. And while most visitors currently make less than $50k, that’ll change. Any brand who wants to reach teens or Millennials should be considering how to reach them through Tumblr.
Youth-friendly brands have already started building their owned Tumblr presences. Brands from luxury and mass market verticals alike have jumped in. Kate Spade, Adidas, NBA, Spotify, Whole Foods, Audi, and Land Rover are already on Tumblr, to name a few.
Don’t other social platforms already have plenty of young people (and great ad options)?
Young people, who, by virtue of being college students, were the ONLY people on Facebook ten years ago, are too old to be teens or Millennials now. Then older folks, the moms and dads and aunts and grandpas, have joined Facebook too. No offense to moms and grandpas, but young people looking for spaces to make their own are emigrating to other platforms like Tumblr.
There are also some signs that Millennials and teens have been slower to join Twitter than other age groups. Just this past week, Garry Tan, the co-founder of Posterous, informally surveyed over one thousand people and found that teens are using Tumblr more than Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.
Be Heard Above the Noise
Facebook is crowded. Most major brands (and their competitors) have already created Facebook Pages and tested Facebook advertising. Facebook noted in its 2012 SEC filing that over four million businesses had created Facebook Pages. And while Tumblr has many respected and forward-thinking companies on its platform, the brand adoption rate hasn’t yet exploded. Brands are likely to be heard on Tumblr simply by virtue of the higher share of voice they’ll enjoy. (Before everyone else finds out about it, that is.)
Paid Options for Tumblr
While companies are working to figure out how their own Tumblrs (or “Tumblelogs”) might look, brands can now reach teens and Millennials through more traditional means like advertising. 140 Proof offers brands the opportunity to reach this up-and-coming audience through its Native Ads for Social Sites program.
140 Proof helps brands place advertising on Tumblr sites the same way they place more traditional display or other social advertising. This paid option allows brands to test Tumblr strategies before making an investment in owned Tumblr properties.
(We’ve always been big fans of Tumblr: it’s the backbone of the 140 Proof Blog!)
To learn more about advertising on Tumblr, contact us at hello@140proof.com.
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January 24, 2013 - 3 months ago
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Since 2003, social advertising has grown and lately flourished, with 2012 its biggest year yet. The United States ad market overall grew by 4% in 2012, partly due to campaigns for political candidates and Olympics sponsors. And social giant Facebook recently reported a 32% increase in revenue for the third quarter of 2012. But how will social advertising shake out next year?
Experts predict that social advertising market growth will continue to climb to between $6 billion and $10 billion. In May 2012, BIA/Kelsey predicted that social ad spending in the US will top $5.9 billion for 2013, with social display taking the biggest portion. And last year, the marketing analysts at eMarketer predicted that the paid social market, including social ads, social network games, and social network applications, will earn $9.99 billion dollars in 2013.
Other signs point to a successful social ads industry for 2013, too.
Nielsen reports that almost 172 million people in the US accessed social networks in 2012, with 20% of online time being spent on social networks (more than any other online activity). Women spend the most time in social, up to 18 hours per month. And 30% of mobile time is now being spent on social media networks.
Because 140 Proof offers social advertising across many social platforms and uses public social data to target ads, we’re bullish on continued growth for 2013. With over half of the US population using social networks, social advertising is increasingly the best way to reach relevant audiences at scale. And brand advertisers increasingly prefer the Blended Interest Graph to reach these audiences, because social data is public and always up-to-date.
In January, we’ll be profiling the biggest social advertising trends of 2013. Stay tuned for more insights as the social ad industry grows and evolves.
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December 4, 2012 - 5 months ago
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When we got our start, there wasn’t anything really resembling a “social ad” on popular social platforms, and the Facebook Like hadn’t even been invented yet. We created 140 Proof Platform and our Relevance Engine technology with Twitter as our springboard, and our partners came to us from the verdant ecosystem of Twitter apps. Some of the first publishers in our network were the most popular apps in the Twitter ecosystem, and this was a great proving ground for us.
But we knew that focusing on a single social network for data and audience wasn’t enough. Our future would grow beyond the ecosystem regime and beyond the “tweet ad” that some of our die-hard customers still love. And we have been transforming our focus all this time in a number of ways:
First, we’ve been growing 140 Proof Platform in what, as social has matured, has become a universally integrated social landscape, greater than the sum of the many social network parts. Beyond apps and tweet ads, we’ve grown our audience and network to encompass swaths of socially plugged-in digital users wherever they go. Big premium publishers, myriad flavors of smartphone games, tablet weather apps, and desktop utilities, messaging apps, browser extensions, and of course the good old website (where digital advertising got its start) are all part of the 140 Proof Media Network now.
140 Proof Platform targeting technology, audience, and data assets have evolved too. The interest graph-powered Relevance Engine that matches audiences with relevant ads was originally powered by public Twitter API data, and now it weaves public data from many social sources — including platforms like Foursquare, Tumblr, and Pinterest. The blended interest graph is larger and richer than single platforms: we draw the richest social signals from over 2 billion produced daily. It’s the full picture of global social relationships between people and their interests as defined by what they follow and like, and the content that they see. The blended interest graph allows us a more dimensional picture than any single platform can on its own. (If you’d like to learn more about the Interest Graph, read our special report.)
And third, we’ve created a rich portfolio of creative options for our customers. Our network supports rich media ads, video ads, and mobile banners, and we still do donuts in social with 140 characters of text. Your ads can go anywhere, on any device, and sometimes they auto expand into their own apps. A cruise line can present a full microsite within our audience’s favorite iPad apps, popping tantalizing galleries into view with a tap of a banner. A finance brand can bring its latest product video to people on Scribd.com browsing for articles on investing. Or, highly social CPG brands can run short, shareable messages across all screens and devices — natively just like they always have with us.
As we’ve always felt, social is everywhere, and it’s not owned by any one social network or platform. Social doesn’t even live only on apps or the “.com’s” of Silicon Valley. Social manifests itself as more than streams and feeds and even the ecosystem; it’s a layer blanketing all of our online, and increasingly offline, activity.
Sometimes people, hearing about how our scope has grown, ask us if we’ll change our name. We plan to stick with 140 Proof, to honor our deeply social roots and the social DNA in every aspect of 140 Proof Platform and the Relevance Engine. We’re excited about the course we’ve chosen into the frontier of social, and we’re delighted to have you along for the journey.
— The 140 Proof Team
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November 13, 2012 - 6 months ago
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By Michael Cascio
“Innovate relentlessly.” That’s the message that successful media brands have absorbed over the past 10 years as digital media has grown and flourished. Traditional outlets like newspapers and magazines have struggled to preserve readership, while new, digitally-native companies unencumbered by entrenched business models have rapidly emerged and grown to incredible scale…and they’re all chasing the same ad dollars.
The social networking era has only further complicated the situation. That sought-after, high-share-of-voice placement called the “homepage roadblock” isn’t worth what it once was, with media brands’ most passionate followers now cherry-picking content from social feeds. Fewer dedicated readers hit the New York Times home page and branch out; now, they spend the bulk of their time in social, clicking in to what is interesting and relevant to them, and they bypass everything else.
But there are also opportunities created by social. Brands have an insatiable appetite for social advertising, and the top publishers have amassed HUGE followings… the trick will be figuring out how to monetize those social eyeballs beyond having fans click through to a story.
To stay competitive with other publishers and apps for the best brand campaigns, top publishers need to add a new, social arrow to their quiver.
Unfortunately, premium publishers can’t just put a new, socially-enhanced ad on each page of their sites, because demand for placement on their pages already outstrips the supply. Premium publishers, by virtue of commanding a high-value audience, are inventory-constrained. They can split up stories into only so many pages, and they can put only so many ads on a page.
If premium publishers can’t add more ads to the page, what can they do?
One option would be to cannibalize existing ad space to make room for new, share-enabled ad units. This option would help publishers compete for innovative brand campaigns, but it would only marginally grow revenue.
Another option would be to monetize readers off-site. For example, those millions of social followers, the media brand’s most loyal readers — would there be a new way to advertise to them without using the publisher’s own site? New advances in targeting technology based in social data may hold the key.
Targeting based on the public interest graph can aggregate social followers of premium publishers into audiences. The twist is that publishers, not social platforms, could sell advertising to those audiences, the audience that publishers have spent so much time building. Amassing millions of readers offsite, through social targeting, could be an ideal scenario for premium publishing’s advertisers to stake their bold new social campaigns.
This article originally appeared in the MediaPost Future of Media blog on September 28, 2012.
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October 1, 2012 - 7 months ago
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