Pinterest launches Buy Button - Why @Pinterest “Buyable Pins” will work thanks to Confessions of a Shopaholic

“There's no fee for Pinners, and there's no fee for merchants. We've done this for two reasons. First, we want Pinners to shop with confidence, knowing that the price they see on Pinterest is the same price they find on the merchant's website. We want to make it easy and affordable”

Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann at a Press Event on Tuesday June 2nd 2015 at Pinterest San Francisco, California headquarters to roll out “Buyable Pins” with Buy Buttons

Silicon Valley has caught Buy Button fever, especially after it had been rumoured back in December 2014 that Google had plans to launch a Buy Button as noted in my blog article entitled “Google Shopping Buy Button – How Project Wing 30-minute Delivery for Google Plus on Merchant Pages might compete against Amazon's Online Shopping”.

Pinterest, the Social Network for Scrapbook users, has decided to launch a Buy Button as reported in the article “Pinterest attempts to lure shoppers with 'Buy It' button”, published June 2, 2015 by Terry Collins, CNET News 

 Pinterest, a Mobile Social Media Website that's a cross between Instagram and Facebook, is said to be worth some US$11 billion. There are more than 50 billion pins on the Network placed by members, called “Pinners” on their personal Profile Page.

I haven't yet joined, as I'm not even a member or the smartphne toting crew due to my dislike of Smartphone as expressed in my blog article entitled “The Reason why I don't like Smartphones - Location Privacy and How to disable Location Services on Android and iOS”.

But this latest venture launching a Buy Button sounds a lot more promising, especially when compared to Social Networks such as Facebook and Twitter, who have been alledged to have plans to launch one such as noted in my blog article entitled “Twitter’s one-click Buy Button – How One-Click E-Commerce is Twitter’s Great Smurfberry Scam Confessions of a Shopaholic”. 

So how does this differ from Facebook and Twitter plans to launch a Buy Button?  Because Pinterest may have pinned down Shopaholics!

Pinterest launches Buy Button - Why Pinterest “Buyable Pins” will work thanks to Confessions of a Shopaholic

According to digital research firm Millward Brown:

1.      80% of Pinterest's 70 million monthly active users visit via their smartphone

2.      93% of active Pinners use Pinterest like a Shopping List

3.      87% have made purchases based on recommendations from interest

The new feature was launched by Pinterest CEO Ben Silbermann at a Press Event on Tueaday June 2^nd 2015 at Pinterest San Francisco, California headquarters. But many had antiocipated this move after it was discovered that Pinterest was removing links to Third-party Referral websites in February 2015 as reported in the article “Pinterest ditches marketers' links, may be planning 'buy' button”, published February 13 2015 by Don Reisinger, CNET News.

The idea is that Pinterest will have some "Buyable Pins" that will be added to the regular Red “Pin It” Button. These new Buyable Pins will feature a blue Buy Button that will allow “Pinners” as members of Pinterest are called to purchase some 2 million items from companies that Pinterest has partnered with to roll out this feature.

Those companies listed in the partnership are extensive and evolving, but includes a few notables:

1.      Macy's

2.      Madesmith

3.      Nieman Marcus

4.      Nordstrom

5.      SOBU

There is no charge to merchants to host pages and set up "Buyable Pins". Pinterest, in a bid to boost shopper confidence, has decided to make the Pinterest shopping experience no different from visiting the Merchant's website. 

Effectively, Pinterest functions more like an extension of the merchant's website, with access to Pinterest rapidly growing Monthly Active User and Membership based on the statistics from GWI (Global Web Index) as explained in my blog article entitled “@globalwebindex indicates @Snapchat is King - Why @Tumblr and @Pinterest on the rise as @Facebook has higher engagement levels”.

Instead, according to a Pinterest spokesperson Malorie Lucich, Pinterest plans to make money from Retailers by selling them access to their Promoted Pins platform as described in the article “Pinterest to promote pins in first ad initiative”, published September 19, 2013 by Jennifer Van Grove, CNET News. The Retailers can then insert the “Buyable Pins” into their Promoted Pins, a system that’s' very similar to promoted Tweets on Twitter.

Then when shoppers clicks on these “Buyable Pins”in their Promoted Pins platform, the option appears to purchase the item via a Buy Button that appears on their Promoted Pins page. This is very similar to the way how most Referral Websites function as explained in my MICO Wars Blog article entitled “How Jamaicans can make Money from Referral Websites”.

Google plans to launch a Buy Buton very soon as noted in the article “Google Confirms ‘Buy Button’ Is Coming”, published May 27, 2015, By Liz Gannes, Recode. Pinterest may have just pinned down how best to implement a Buy Button, being as Shopaholics already have confessed to using them for that very activity!