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Simple Pin Podcast: Simple ways to boost your business using Pinterest
How to Market to Gen Z on Pinterest
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Hey there and welcome to another episode of the Simple Pin podcast. I'm your host, Kate All. So last week I recapped Pinterest presents 2025 and there was a lot of conversation during that event about Gen Z growing on the platform and driving some of the actions they are taking. So if that's happening, maybe it's time that we step back and understand what this generation wants and how to market to them on Pinterest. If you are looking for a team to help you get in front of gen Z, the SimplePen team is eager and willing to help you. We want to take a look at your business, talk about your goals, and help you decide if Pinterest is your next marketing move. Whether you are an E commerce seller or you are a content creator, we can help you. So book a call with our team. You can just scroll down below in the description and book that call now. Totally free. We really just want to connect with you and see if we can help. Okay, so Pinterest might not be Gen X's digital scrapbook anymore. I am a Gen X. I do think of Pinterest as a little bit of a digital scrapbook, a place for me to house my ideas. But Gen Z is quickly taking over. In fact, my kids are all Gen Z, and my daughter, who's 20, uses Pinterest all the time. It's one of the best ways she curates not only some of her art inspiration, but but Pokemon inspiration, all these other things that she loves. And what I like about it for her is that it's not this place where you have toxic conversation or comments or DMS or any of that. You can really just curate all the different things that you love into your boards. And I get that this is so different. In fact, I'm going to record an episode coming up in the future. But if we look at all of social media, when you post something, what happens is it pops up in a feed. All of a sudden you see it there, right? Whereas on Pinterest it goes to a board, but not necessarily the feed. Which is interesting because we're used to showing something and then having everybody else see it. But that's not really the way it works on Pinterest. It's more like you are curating these boards and you're pulling in other people's ideas to curate those boards. So it's a little bit of a mind game as to how you market and then you add the layer of who Gen Z is and how they use it. It'd be really tough for marketers to wrap their brains around it. So I want to break down this whole idea of the Gen Z kind of takeover of Pinterest in a good way. How Gen Z uses Pinterest differently, and then what Gen Z is looking for on Pinterest and how our marketing strategies can work leading into that. So let's start with this kind of Gen Z takeover of Pinterest. So here's some stats. 42% of Pinterest global monthly user base is now Gen Z. I actually think it might even be higher. I believe they mentioned something like 50%, which is pretty crazy. It means that Pinterest is aging down, which is a pretty rare phenomenon. And social media, we definitely don't see that from Facebook or Instagram. Gen Z, like they've said, is their largest and fastest growing demographic. Over 200 million Gen Z users visit Pinterest monthly. And it's projected that 26.1 million Gen Z users are in the US alone by the end of 2025. Gen Z user growth is 9.7% you year over year growth compared to 1.1% for millennials. So let me say that again. 9.7% growth year over year for Gen Z, 1.1% for millennials. It's growing fast. So the platform is evolving from a millennial dominated space to a Gen Z hub, which means brands can no longer ignore Pinterest as a part of their Gen Z strategy, which we hear a lot of marketers talk about. How do we get in front of this new generation? How target them? Number one is to use Pinterest. So then how does Gen Z use Pinterest? Maybe differently than other generations. So they use it as a search engine at a much higher rate than say, other generations do. They have category specific search growth, which is food and drink, men's fashion, and women's fashion. They save two 0.5 times more pins than other generations. And they create 66% more boards than other demographics. Which goes back to what I was talking about, how instead of posting to an actual feed, they post to these boards and that's really how they curate these ideas and things that they want to pursue maybe in products that they're interested in by curating their boards. It is said that they spend an average of 15 minutes per session on mobile. Now, I think what's interesting about this too is that you need to understand when people engage on Pinterest, they don't do it like they would in Instagram, right? Like sometimes they'll connect with Instagram or TikTok and they'll be on there for hours. But they have high intent when they go to Pinterest. They're very curious about something. They're interested in the search and they want to see it. Right. That was another element from Pinterest presents is the I'll know it when I see it, but I can't describe it in words. Which is what makes Pinterest visual search so integral to this Gen Z demographic. Because they want to see it, they don't just want to have text links or they don't want to have to describe it. They want to go on this rabbit trail to know it when they see it. They're also seven times more likely to purchase a product that they have previously saved. Again, back to those boards. They're going to gather all these different ideas which is how every person usually uses Pinterest. But they are more likely to go back to their boards and make that purchase. In fact, 63% of weekly gen Z users say they're always shopping. Of course they are. My kids are always shopping. They are 1.3% or times more likely to shop online than non Pinterest users. And they say Pinterest is their go to social platform for shopping discovery. They are spending money even though this generation is a little bit interesting in the sense that they have a pretty significant generational wealth gap. They might potentially have a lot of school debt and they're struggling to find jobs, but they're still willing to put their money into a place where they know a product is a right fit for them. So let's talk about what Gen Z is looking for on Pinterest. Aesthetics and identity really top the list. They're constantly on the hunt for new looks and Personas to try on things like old money aesthetic, goth guy outfits or old brother core outfit. This came out in their Pinterest predicts that is a great tool that they release one time per year to be able to see the not yet trending. And this was a big thing that came out the last couple of years within Pinterest predicts is these aesthetic driven searches. The next thing is authenticity and values. 33% of Gen Z is willing to pay 5 to 10% more more for sustainable products. They have a strong preference towards vintage and secondhand shopping. Pinterest just released their like thrift shopping kind of element within Pinterest which is pretty cool. My kids love thrift shopping which is kind of funny because I did too back in the 90s so it feels like it's a little bit repeating itself. And they want real proof behind sustainability claims. They just don't want marketing speed speak. They will dig to find it. They want to make sure that your sustainability claim is actually true and real and authentic. The other element is visual discovery. Pinterest Lens, which is their visual search tool, has grown 27% among Gen Z. So this again goes back to the I know it when I will see it or maybe I want to try it on before I buy it. That was one of the really interesting things about like the lipstick and the makeup makeup. They want to be able to see what it will potentially look like and discover if this is really the right tool or product or whatever for them. So visual discovery is really, really important. If you have never used visual discovery on your phone on mobile, I highly encourage you to try it. In the bottom right corner I'll show a quick little video here. You can click on that and it will increase to cover the screen wherever you want. And you can visually search for something that's in a specific image. Now this is great especially for home decor or for fashion because maybe you want to drill down on a specific item and you want to look only for that specific thing. That is where visual search comes in super handy because you can get not only matches with that image, but you can get varieties that match that image. The last is inspiration over transaction. Pinterest is viewed as a positive low pressure space compared to TikTok and Instagram. Gen Z uses it for planning and curation, but not necessarily immediate purchases. This is why Pinterest is very clear to say 45 days or 90 days in advance. You as a marketer want to be planning your content because then that is where people can connect with you and your searches over that 90 day window so that you can get ahead of it by saying hey, you're going to search during this time. Here's my content or my products. Gen Z uses it for planning and curation and they want to curate mood boards first and shop later. 31% of Gen Z wish more brands would use Pinterest. If that is not telling you, you need to be on Pinterest, I don't know what is. Okay, so then what marketing strategies do work for Gen Z? Here's a few things I'm going to say. 1. Optimize for search. This is so, so important when it comes to keywords in your pin titles, your descriptions, your product feeds. You need to think of it like a search engine, not social media. I have a Pinterest for Dummies video That a lot of people get this aha moment where, where they say oh, it's like Google, it is like YouTube, it is not like Instagram or TikTok. So if you're going to be marketing on the platform, remember to be thinking of it like search. You also want to monitor Pinterest trends. This is really, really important because you want to get in front of that 45, 90 day window when people are searching. You want to encourage users to see save. This could be a call to action that is on your pin image that says save this for later, buy later. Because they are very much within that realm of thought that they don't want to buy right away. But they're like I want to see your 10 sustainable products from different companies. I want to investigate, I want to see if you're fully transparent about your sustainability. And then I might decide to buy this rain jacket made of recycled plastic because I now understand who the company is, their transparency and that they're actually sustainable. Make it shoppable. If you are an E commerce brand, you need to connect your catalog with Pinterest. That is free. It's an easy win win and all of a sudden all your products will go onto Pinterest. It'll have the right inventory, the right price and people can see that they can purchase from that pin really easily. Make it easy for them to buy your products. If you have Shopify, we have it too. We have integrated with Shopify and the verified merchant program. It is so easy. Like really, it's really easy. I highly recommend that you do it in order to make shopping easy. The third is to align with esthetics. So you want to create multiple boards that you have showcasing different angles, aesthetics. You maybe you have a fashion brand, a sustainable fashion brand and you want to showcase outfits or you want to showcase it for travel. Give them multiple options within your boards as to how do you use your products or consume your content. Pinterest drives 65% of trend predictions in 2025. So their Pinterest predicts that's looking ahead to not yet trending. May they got almost 65% of it right now. We haven't ended 2025, but there's still so many great things for people to explore in this back half of Q4 that I have no doubt a lot of those predictions will still come to fruition. The fourth is to think beyond Gen Z. Remember that only remember. Not only remember that over 50% of US moms are on Pinterest and many Pinners are shopping for Gen Z gifts. I am shopping for my kids and I might go to my daughter's Pinterest board to check out what she's interested in. 87% of parents say their Gen Z children influence household purchases. Yep, they do so create content that helps gift givers understand Gen Z preferences. If you have, if you create sustainable products and you have never created a sustainable, sustainable or eco friendly gift guide, it's your time to do it. Last is video and dynamic content. If you are creating a standard pin image which is just what you see, it's a standard pin image and you have not explored ads, video or I'm sorry, video. I will say video ads, which that's if you're going to pay for it. Not necessarily organic. This stat comes from this. But I think there's a lot to be taken away for the organic side of things. Video ads now account for 25% of total ad spend on Pinterest. Why? Because it works. Static designs, maybe that include animations or interactive elements can be another way to pull people in. So even if you're not paying for ads yet, video along with standard images are super smart to explore. Also. I'm pretty sure we all know this, but I'm going to go ahead and say say it anyway. Mobile first. 88% of traffic comes from mobile. So while we as marketers might use our big old desktop to do scheduling and planning for Pinterest because Pinterest makes it really easy for us to do it, our end user is not okay. So it's hard to predict like what your ROI will be when you put in these efforts to marketing towards Gen Z on Pinterest. But I want to give you some stats here. When it comes to ads, Pinterest delivers 32% higher ROAS return on ad spend than other digital platforms. There's been a 16% increase in ROI for brands targeting Gen Z in 2025 versus 2024 and CPM averages. Well, I'm not going to go into that. We, we'll scratch it. Small businesses report 31% average increase in referral traffic from Pinterest ads. That is pretty amazing. And then 21% of Gen Z purchasing decisions in lifestyle and decor have been influenced by Pinterest. So there's a lot of influence happening. So here's recap for you and things I want you to take away. Gen Z is reshaping Pinterest. This is no longer optional for youth focused brands. You have got to be on Pinterest. 2. Think search first. Optimize for search and Discovery, not just followers. I still get that question from brands who say, how do I grow my followers? That is not important. In fact, just the other day my kids were asking me about how many followers I had on different platforms and I said, I have 70,000 followers on Pinterest. And my daughter was like, you can follow people on Pinterest. She had no idea. So while that 70,000 number is sure real important sometimes to me, it is not important to my ROI or my bottom line. So think search first, followers, maybe 10th. Play the long game. Focus on saves and boards, not just this immediate conversion. Authenticity matters. Back up your claims with proof, especially around sustainability. It's really important to them. Aesthetics are so important. If you have not taken a look at your Pinterest images and if you are curating a look that Gen Z will see themselves in to be able to curate their identity through your products and through your images, this is your time to pay attention to that. Because you cannot use an old model of creating Pinterest images. Just two to three. It's a square, it's a, you know, vertical, has your copy, it has a great image. You got to think a little bit deeper. What does Gen Z want? What are they looking for? Make it super frictionless. Connect your catalog. If you are an E commerce seller from discovery to purchase, that should be easy. We are in a time frame where it is annoying to have to spend time to put your name and your email in. It's annoying to have a site that loads really slowly. I'm going to talk about that in a future episode when I go into how your content and your products can be discovered. Making sure things are seamless is so, so important. Don't forget the influencers, parents and older demographics shop for Gen Z so there's some buying power in multi generations there as well. So I hope this encourages you to start to frame up your images differently, to think about your marketing in a new way. And if this is the first time you are even hearing that you can target Gen Z in a really fantastic way on Pinterest. I'm so excited. I'm excited to go on this journey with you. I'm excited to support you because I think this is just another door open in a place that is growing. Every single single investor report we get from Pinterest says users are growing, people are using Pinterest more and Gen Z is using it more. So let me know where are you at with Gen Z and marketing to them. What has been successful for you? If you have tried it on Pinterest or what are you curious about? Go ahead and comment below. Remember, all links will be in the description below. You can find anything. You can also email us hello simplepinmedia.com we want to be here to support you in your Pinterest marketing journey. Thanks so much.