Pinterest Ads Playbook
How to set up, track, and run Pinterest ads. People use Pinterest to plan purchases, so ads work best when they look like useful Pins.
Account structure
- Use a Pinterest business account. Claim your website.
- Give each campaign one objective.
- Keep catalog (shopping) campaigns separate from other campaigns.
- Use a consistent naming pattern, for example
Objective-Audience-Creative-Season.
Tracking and measurement
- Install the Pinterest tag directly or through Google Tag Manager. Check it with the Pinterest Tag Helper.
- Add the Conversions API for server-side events. Send a matching event ID from both to deduplicate.
- Map standard events, such as page_visit, add_to_cart, checkout, signup, and lead.
- Set attribution windows on purpose and write them down.
- Add UTM parameters to every destination URL.
Campaign types
| Objective | Use it for |
|---|---|
| Brand awareness | Impressions to a defined audience. |
| Video views | Video reach. |
| Consideration | Clicks to your site. |
| Conversions | Actions tracked by the tag. |
| Catalog sales | Shopping ads from your product catalog. |
Performance+ campaigns automate targeting, bidding, and creative. Test them against a manual campaign.
Targeting
- Use keyword and interest targeting. Pinterest is search-driven, so keywords matter.
- Build audiences from site visitors, customer lists, and Pin engagers.
- Build actalike (lookalike) audiences from your best customers.
- Start broad and let Pinterest expand targeting, then compare with tighter settings.
Creative
- Use vertical images and video (2:3 for images, 9:16 or 2:3 for video).
- Show the product in use. Add a short text overlay that says what the Pin is.
- Formats include standard Pins, video, carousel, collections, and shopping ads.
- Keep text and logos away from edges that may be cropped.
- Refresh creative before seasonal peaks. People plan early on Pinterest.
Budget and bidding
- Use automatic bidding to start. Add a target cost or ROAS goal once results are stable.
- Launch seasonal campaigns weeks before the season, when planning starts.
Review cadence
- Daily: spend and disapproved ads.
- Weekly: results by keyword, audience, and creative; add negatives.
- Every two weeks: refresh creative.
- Monthly: catalog health and compare cost per result with other channels.
Pre-launch checklist
- Website claimed.
- Pinterest tag and Conversions API verified, with deduplication.
- Catalog uploaded with no critical errors (if selling products).
- Audiences and exclusions built.
- Creative in vertical formats with text overlays checked.
- UTM parameters on all URLs.
- Budgets set.