Amazon becomes Pinterest’s first ever third-party ad partner

Social media platform Pinterest has opened up third-party ad demand for the first time last week, with Amazon.

The multi-year deal aims to bring more brands and products to the platform’s 463 million monthly users, combined with an on-Amazon buying experience for consumers, hoping to offer advertisers strong performance.

“This milestone partnership will add to the great brands already on the platform and provide more comprehensiveness, shoppability, and a best-in-class buying experience for users, along with greater performance for brands and advertisers,” said Bill Ready, CEO of Pinterest in a blog post. “This aligns with our goal of making every Pin shoppable, so that we can enable as many users as possible to bring their dreams to life.”

The news comes as Pinterest reported its earnings for Q1, detailing the $209m loss, partly due to restructuring, which more than doubles its losses for the whole of 2022, according to the company’s financial statements. Pinterest’s stock fell 18% in the day after it released the losses.

Briana Finelli, Head of Commerce US at Wavemaker commented: “For a while, paid social was the edge that omnichannel retailers had over Amazon. Pinterest performs extremely well for our clients with omnichannel retailers, and we expect performance with Amazon to be no different. This will also give an edge to advertisers without direct-to-consumer shopping capabilities to be able to convert users in social via Amazon.”

“The synergies are clear to see”

The partnership will be a multi-quarter implementation, not expecting to start until the end of this year.

“There have been rumours dating back to 2014 about the possibility of Amazon buying Pinterest,” commented Sam Holt, Managing Director at Performics. “The synergies are clear to see, however an acquisition in the current M&A [mergers and acquisitions] climate would likely be difficult and this seems a better solution anyway. 

“Pinterest gains a route to purchase that offers a far greater experience to consumers than anything they could build themselves and Amazon enters the social commerce space without the huge cost and integration struggles of an acquisition. This seems a win-win for both platforms – why buy the cow when the milk is free(ish)!”