Instagram vs Pinterest – Which Ad Platform Is Right For You?

Instagram and Pinterest are great platforms to be able to reach and engage a younger audience that is hard to reach demographically. However, the problem is that many of these advertisers think that both these platforms have the same fundamental level of functioning. Before any brand starts using both these platforms, they need to know their differences. Below are a few differences that will help you assess the which platform would be better for your brand.

Functionality

Instagram is a social network that is normally used to by the users as a form of entertainment. Users normally scroll the content of pictures and videos of celebrities and posts made by their family and friends. They normally do this when they have time to spare.

They use Instagram as a form of connecting with people, brands, and influencers. This app is all about uploading and sharing visual content, for this reason, this platform targets consumers from a younger audience. It is a best used for creating brand awareness and storytelling.

Pinterest, on the other hand, is a search engine much like Google. It is a platform that is more or less used to discover things for viewing and content curation. People normally discover a particular subject or a type of product that is of their choice.

This platform is great for high-interest category classifications. The demographic is a higher level of female millennials. Now they are even introducing buyable pins.

These two platforms are great, since consumers increasingly prefer visual content that means opportunities for brands increases as well. When marketers look into the use of Instagram and Pinterest, they need to look into the urbanity of that these platforms provide.

Instagram ads has Facebook as a strong backing, and Pinterest ads are a great platform to try and apply the trial and error theory for brands to test.

Target Audience

It has been a while since Pinterest published their official numbers, however, it has been reported that there are roughly around 70 million Pinterest users around the world.

However, when it comes to having a larger global audience between the two, Instagram is clearly the winner. Instagram has way over 300 million users.

Advertising: Instagram Ads or Pinterest Ads?

Instagram ads are secured with Facebook; hence it has a greater and larger platform to target people. People can receive extra information, and only advertisers are the only ones that can use buttons that link back to their website. Since they have over 300 million users, Instagram allows a far wider global reach.

Pinterest ads only has advertising that is available to U.S. businesses, and they only have 45 million users in the U.S., which puts a limitation to use the platform. These pins can be promoted and paid by Cost per Engagement (clicks and repins).

Attention

Instagram ads allows the user to see one visual at a time, their feed or interface has been designed that way. That means that the brand gets the consumer’s attention 1/10^th of an advantageous second. This makes a stronger impression.

Pinterest ads, on the other hand, makes it more competitive. The user sees pins everywhere, from the top, bottom, and sides. If the user is surrounded by pins, there is a high chance the brand will lose 1/10^th of a second when the user is looking at them. There is a dramatic click decrease.

Demographics

Let’s take a few minutes to look at the demographics share by Pew Research:

53% of online adults between the ages of 18-29 use Instagram compared to 34% for Pinterest.

25% of online adults between the age of 30-49 use Instagram while 28% use Pinterest.

11% of online adults between the ages 50-64 use Instagram while 27% of them use Pinterest.

The Bottom-Line

The differences between Instagram ads and Pinterest ads are quite a few. In order to understand which one is right for your business, you will have to define your target audience, how far you want to reach them, and refine your marketing strategy, set your goals and be ready to use time and money on your resources and increase your networking.

It would also be wise to see how and what your competitors are executing on both these social platforms. If they are using both Instagram and Pinterest, it will give you a good sense of how to engage with your audience on your community platforms.

This will also give you a better sense of what type of information you can use to execute ideas on social media platforms.