Before you can even think about making sales, you’re going to have to drive traffic to your offer. This holds true no matter what you’re promoting or what kind of platform you’re trying to leverage to get some eyeballs on it.
While organic traffic that’s coming from search engines is one of the options to consider, Google has been making it harder and harder for webmasters each passing year due to a constant barrage of algorithm changes, some of which have single-handedly wiped out completely legitimate websites from the face of the search results.
With this in mind, small business owners and marketers have started exploring alternative traffic sources like social media, particularly Instagram and Pinterest. Unlike typical content-based blog posts, these have a major difference – they’re almost entirely visual in nature. Since the entire format of these platforms is structured to revolve around images, this requires certain adjustments to your content strategy.
So today, we’re going to take a look at Instagram vs Pinterest for business owners and marketers, how these seemingly similar platforms are based on completely different algorithms, as well as unveil the right strategy to follow if you want to see long-term results.
Instagram vs. Pinterest: a brief comparison
Without making this too long-winded, let’s look at the key characteristics of these two image-based platforms, highlighting both similarities and differences between them.
- Allows you to upload photos and videos
- Images uploaded must be recently taken
- Allows commenting on images
- Focused around engaging user interaction
- Posts are typically square-shaped
- 47.8 % female and 52.2% male users
- Engagement is measured in terms of likes, comments, and shares (the algorithm checks how many of these the content has received shortly after being posted)
- Content discovery is heavily based on hashtag usage
- Engagement tends to drop significantly after the first 24 hours
- Traffic has a comparatively lower buying intent
- Focused around discovering and re-pinning pins
- Images uploaded can be either old or new
- Allows you to upload photos and videos
- Posts can be either square-shaped or vertical rectangles
- The vast majority of users are women (76.7%)
- Engagement is measured in terms of pin clicks, saves, and website visits
- Hashtags are not as relevant (they’ve been phased out over time)
- Engagement persists even after weeks and months
- Traffic has a comparatively higher buying intent
Now that you have a solid idea about how Instagram compared to Pinterest, let’s take a deep dive into the more specific sections of each respective platform’s architecture and algorithmic tendencies.
Sharing content
In terms of Instagram vs Pinterest for selling, there are subtle differences as well. In both cases, your aim is to not only get your content noticed, but ideally also shared by your followers to increase its potential reach.
There is no built-in way for people to repost your content, outside of jumping through all the hoops of downloading it and posting it in their feed. This is not ideal since it can get you in hot waters both from a copyright perspective as well as from the perspective of risk of Instagram’s algorithms not liking duplicate content. The only way you can convince someone to do that is by directly messaging them.
Pinterest is a whole different beast when it comes to sharing content as it has a built-in repin feature. Not only that – repinning is actually encouraged and serves as a signal to the Pinterest algorithm that people like your content. So when it comes to Instagram vs Pinterest marketing, this is something to keep in mind.
Selling and eCommerce
How do the two platforms compare? Instagram vs Pinterest for selling and eCommerce is a question on many a marketer’s mind.
You can launch an ad campaign, go the organic route, or combine both. Instagram actually allows you to link directly to your eCommerce store, straight from the post. This puts your prospects one step closer to making the purchase, so it’s bound to have a positive impact on your CTR.
Similarly, Pinterest lets you use your product’s stock image and link directly to the eCommerce store where people can buy it. You can also take advantage of the Promoted pins feature that helps your pins reach a greater number of people.
User base and demographics
Paying attention to these metrics is crucial for you if you want to optimize your conversion rate and generally get the best return on your effort. Once again, these platforms have slight differences when it comes to user count and demographics.
Instagram has over a billion users logging in on a monthly basis. Most of its users are between 18 and 30 years old. Surprisingly, this is not a female-dominated platform, as the distribution is roughly equal between the two genders.
Pinterest’s user base is somewhat more humble in comparison, clocking in at 400 million active users. Roughly 75% of its users are female, which is something your content strategy needs to take into consideration.
Content discoverability through hashtags
When comparing Instagram vs Pinterest marketing and best practices, it’s always important to consider the role of hashtags that hold considerable weight on numerous social media platforms in general.
Instagram is very much hashtag-driven. This is because many of its users use hashtags to discover content they’d like to consume. Therefore, incorporating relevant hashtags needs to be at the forefront of your Instagram content strategy if your aim is to reach more people.
Initially, hashtags were a part of Pinterest’s platform as well. However, they’ve been gradually phased out over time. Technically, you can still use them, but they won’t be nearly as impactful as they used to be. Generally speaking, if your aim is to focus on Pinterest exclusively, there are other more important metrics to pay attention to, so don’t worry about hashtags on Pinterest in 2024 and beyond.
The purpose of the platform
When comparing Instagram vs Pinterest, you may come to the conclusion that the platforms are quite alike. While visually this may be the case, the purpose behind the existence of each of these platforms is somewhat different.
The platform was primarily built for various sorts of entertainment, which also includes posting selfies (but it’s not limited to it by any means). Users discover content either by following certain profiles, using the integrated search engine or through hashtags. It also has a more pronounced focus on posting videos compared to Pinterest, which can be vacation videos, unboxing videos, event videos and so much more.
As the name implies, it’s a combination of ‘pin’ + ‘interest’. In other words, its purpose revolves around letting other people find inspiration in what you post. People discover pins either by typing keywords into the platform’s integrated search bar or by checking out the profiles of people they are interested in and seeing what they’ve posted on their boards. Think furniture, haircuts, interior design, and various product visuals.
Specifics of the algorithm
As a savvy online marketer, you’ve surely come to realize that every traffic generation platform, whether it be traditional search engines or social media, has its own rules. Think of it like separate playgrounds where the path to success has its specific nuances and therefore may require a subtly different approach.
Instagram’s posts tend to be short-lived after going live. Generally speaking, they tend to be buried deep in the search results rather quickly, so it doesn’t hurt to think about each post having a rather tight expiration date (usually 24 hours or less). However, if lots of people react favorably to it and show signs of engagement by liking and so forth, the shelf life of the post can be extended slightly. Therefore, one of the differences when it comes to marketing on Instagram vs Pinterest is picking the timing of your posts wisely.
Most online marketers would agree that content posted on Pinterest has a longer shelf life compared to Instagram, although it doesn’t last forever. It’s not unusual to see traffic coming in from your pins for months and even years down the road of posting them. So if you’re looking for something that comes close to the definition of ‘set and forget’, Pinterest is the superior choice.
The type of content that performs well
As we’ve already established, the focus of each of these platforms is slightly different. Therefore, your content strategy needs to take this into account as well, along with the prevailing demographics of each platform.
Although it’s hard to describe what your content should be about with a single word or two, ‘personal experience’ falls very close. It’s a broad definition too; since many approaches work on Instagram, it’s up to you to find your unique angle and create the kind of content that resonates with your audience. This could be through case studies, behind-the-scenes photos, reels, guides, filters, stories, you name it. As long as you keep it to-the-point and simple, your audience should respond well.
Pinterest is much more about content segmentation. It all starts with you creating a board. For instance, let’s say you’re in the interior design niche. One board could be all about kitchen design, then another for living room design and so on. You get the gist. Now, the pins you post inside these boards could be even more niche-focused. In the kitchen design board, you could post mugs, cabinets, fridge magnets, etc. Keep in mind that Pinterest is much more product-focused, so placing links to your eCommerce store is not only tolerated, but even encouraged.
Analytics and measurement
Whether you’re planning to reach more people via Instagram or Pinterest, whether organically or through paid ads, the mantra is the same: you need a way to track your efforts. This allows you to measure what worked, what didn’t, and what still requires some polishing.
Those who have opted for a business account on Instagram can analyze and track various metrics that help you weed out the winning from the losing posts. These include replies, shares, likes, profile visits, impressions (including the exact source), etc.
Similarly to Instagram, Pinterest business account holders can view detailed analytics about the performance of their posts. If you have a personal account and haven’t upgraded to a business tier yet, you can do so for free. Back to the topic at hand – on Pinterest, slightly different metrics define the success of your pins. These would mostly be impressions, saves, and click-throughs to the website you’re promoting.
Repurposing content
Still undecided which of these platforms is worth focusing on? Once again, review their respective demographics and that should help you reach a conclusion. But if you still can’t decide, why not do both?
Adapting your Pinterest content to Instagram shouldn’t take too much extra work (and vice-versa), although there are subtle differences you need to keep in mind. But generally speaking, if your content ticks all of the boxes and has the potential to do well on both of these platforms, think about giving content repurposing a go.
In essence, the vast majority of time and energy you’ll spend will go into creating the content itself. After you have it ready for one platform, hitting that ‘publish’ button on another is a walk in the park, especially if you have AI-powered content-scheduling tools like Ocoya in your back-pocket.
But rest assured that Ocoya is far more than that! In addition to helping you schedule your posts weeks or even months in advance, it can also help you with content creation that taps into the power of the most cutting-edge modern-day AI capabilities. With such a powerful weapon for social media domination in your hands, you can confidently go after both of these platforms and then simply keep on watering the plant that begins showing signs of growth.
Conclusion
If there’s a conclusion to be drawn here, it’s got to be the fact that Pinterest is primarily a visual search engine whereas Instagram is predominantly a social sharing platform. And looking at Instagram vs Pinterest for business purposes, it’s good to keep in mind that people visit Pinterest with a buyer’s mentality more often than Instagram’s users.
Although the differences might be subtle, as the old saying goes, the devil is in the details! And, at the end of the day, there are no right or wrong answers when it comes to comparing Instagram vs Pinterest for business. It all depends on the niche and the nature of the products and services you’re selling!
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