• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, November 12, 2024

Pinterest is betting that America's interest in beard oil has peaked, introducing a holiday campaign with social media stars playfully lamenting the gift-giving stereotypes wrought by social media.

The new ads include videos from some of the social media’s funnier stars, including Lumberjack Bradley Thor (“No more mustache pomade”), Grandma Droniak (“Don’t give me another calendar -- I don’t know how long I have left”) and Zarna Garg* (“Why so many hand towels?”)

The ads highlight the platform’s new tools and provide easy ways for people to personalize wish lists. The campaign highlights Pinterest’s extensive gift guides -- more than 1,000 this year -- curated by influencers like Alicia Keyes, Paris Hilton and RuPaul. The effort also promotes such brands as Selena Gomez’ Rare Beauty and Rihanna’s Savage X Fenty, as well as Mejuri, Carhartt and REI. Ads incorporate content from a long list of publishers: Vogue, GQ, Eater and Wirecutter.

The ads are running on Pinterest channels, and other social media.

The campaign, created in-house, builds on Pinterest’s growing appeal as a shopping destination, as the social platform keeps looking for new ways to connect curious buyers (it claims more than half of users come to the platform because they want to shop) and the advertisers eager to reach them.

The formula is working. Last week, the San Francisco-based company posted third-quarter revenue up 18%, to $898 million from $763.2 million. Global monthly active users jumped 11% to 537 million, a record. Net income rose to $31 million from $6.7 million in the third quarter of last year.

“Our AI investments are driving results by powering better-personalized experiences and greater performance for advertisers, with our lower-funnel ad tools being the fastest-growing part of our business,” said Bill Ready, CEO of Pinterest, in the earnings announcement. “Advertisers are increasingly relying on Pinterest to engage our growing audience who see us as a great place to find inspiration, curate and shop.”

Following those results, Wedbush upgraded its neutral rating of the company, and now says Pinterest is likely to outperform peers. “We think the company is executing well against its user engagement and monetization strategies,” writes Scott Devitt, an analyst who follows social media and internet companies. “We see a number of drivers supporting monetization improvements over the intermediate term, including the scaling of third-party demand partnerships with Amazon and Google, the introduction of new ad surfaces and formats, continued adoption of lower-funnel ad tools, driving stronger conversion and visibility for advertisers, and ongoing work with resellers across under-monetized markets.”

*An earlier version misspelled Garg's name.