• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, October 18, 2017

Pinterest on Wednesday introduced a self-service suite of tools that advertisers can find in the Pinterest Ads Manager. The company also began testing a feature called autotargeting as a way to extend keyword campaigns into more searches. It helps automatically target ads to people who are searching for relevant ideas.

Autotargeting, powered by the Pinterest Taste Graph, is an opt-in feature that is available to all advertisers using Ads Manager. Advertisers can use it as a supplement to their keyword strategy.

The Pinterest Taste Graph -- the company's personalization technology, which provides insight into what people search for and why -- is built on a collection of human-curated links, more than 100 billion Pins, and trillions of interactions that people have weekly. Its focus is on better understanding searches on Pinterest or why someone saves a Pin.

"It’s informed by the style, textures and shapes that make something unique, the many ways people on Pinterest choose to categorize things, and so much more," a Pinterest spokesperson told Search Marketing Daily.

Pinterest released a suite of new solutions earlier this year to help marketers reach people searching on Pinterest for new ideas. Now they are self-serve, in one place, and integrated with an autotargeting tool

But it's not enough to launch a self-service platform. Companies need to educate marketers, so Pinterest updated its Help Center and business site with more content around the search features.

The plan is to release guides and webinars to help educate marketers during the next few months. In the meantime, advertisers can work with their Pinterest account management team. Pinterest Propel, a program created to support businesses and agencies new to advertising on Pinterest, also provides an option for businesses looking to get started. 

The platform performs in a different way than Google AdWords and Bing Ads, per the spokesperson, because on Pinterest, people are not just searching for information -- they are looking for ideas. More than 2 billion searches happen on Pinterest monthly, and 97% of those are unbranded, according to Pinterest data.

Interestingly, planning on Pinterest in many cases begins several months earlier than traditional search, which enables businesses to connect with customers when they are still undecided about what to buy. For example, the number of ideas people began saving for Christmas on Pinterest in April -- eight months prior to the holiday -- rose 95% year-over-year, according to the company's internal data.

Last year in the U.S., Pinterest experienced a 30% increase in searches for holiday-related ideas. More advertisers start their search campaigns early to catch this demand from consumers planning around seasonal events. 

Advertisers like Stainmaster are reaching new customers and at a lower cost per click, per Pinterest. The brand has seen 90% increases in traffic from new customers, driving incremental awareness at a 90% lower CPC than traditional search in the carpet care category.