Costs are rising. A recession is looming. Consumer confidence is dropping rapidly. Your job is to find the most efficient channels where people are still spending - even spending more - all before 2023 planning. And in times of market contraction, it’s more important than ever to prove your channels are working.

At times like this marketers and advertisers rush to that last-click, bottom-of-the-funnel quick fix. But the latest research from Neustar and e-commerce firm Fospha suggests that’s a costly mistake. If you take this knee jerk approach you’ll be leaving precious money on the table. Instead, focus on your results look carefully into what actually generated demand and increased your total revenue. The people who take a little longer to convert also spend more money, so accounting for them in your measurement means squeezing more out of every pound you spend. And there’s nothing more recession-proof than that.

So how can Pinterest ensure your business is recession-proof? Sadly, it cant turn time forward a few years and bypass what we know are going to be tough times but it can be the marketing tool that will hold your hand and keep your audience well looked after and above all warm. There is no bigger mistake during times of recision than slowing down your marketing - in fact you have to double down.

1. Pinterest has one of the strongest ROAS 

iOS 14 has been particularly brutal for Meta’s ability to report performance for top of funnel media. It is important that we look at unbiased reports to get a clear and accurate picture of ROAS.

If we only use tools such as Google Analytics it only considers the bottom of the funnel where the conversion takes place but does not consider by how much bigger that conversion might have been. In the E-commerce firm Fospha's latest report uses anonymised data from their global clients and looks across clicks and view through equally.

When it comes to strong performance, challenger brands like Pinterest actually stand out, despite showing lower investment levels among brands in the survey.

When so many businesses do not hesitate to invest in advertising on Meta with an average 1.52 ROAS we know that Pinterest needs to be included in their marketing plan and the numbers back this up with a ROAS of 2.2

2. Customers spend more time on Pinterest 

The magic of moving up the funnel is that open minds open wallets—and increase average order value (AOV). When people arrive more open-minded, less decided, they ultimately buy and spend more. Look no further than the Fospha data to demonstrate this,

We see Paid Shopping broadly deliver great ROAS because of its generally low cost per acquisition, but the low CPAs are somewhat counteracted by a smaller average basket size. Here the average basket size is a massive 12% smaller than average for sales that incorporate Paid Shopping. Looking at an individual brand level, there are very few exceptions to this rule. – it’s consistent across almost every client in this dataset, so is very likely to be true for you too. This fits what you might expect for the channel. Google Shopping is a price comparison site, so likely to increase price sensitivity. People are also shopping for one specific product, not engaging with a brand, so when they click through are more likely to check out without visiting other pages or growing their basket. At the other end of the scale, Reddit and Pinterest have the strongest positive impact on AOV. This makes sense too – they are both thematically organised platforms, with ads well-integrated into their UX. Pinterest in particular is an aspirational platform that people are known to use for shopping inspiration, so it makes sense that customers spend a bit more when they’re acquired from there.

3. When people have more time, they buy more.

So why aren’t you seeing Pinterest convert immediately? Because they’re taking their time! And the beauty is that they have seen you, chosen your brand, you have inspired and they will be back.

Did you know that three quarters of conversions on Pinterest take more than one week to convert? When people take a week or more to make a purchase, they spend about 50% more overall in a month.

When people have more time, they buy more. But it’s also about the quality of that time. A more inspiring environment makes people more open to trying and buying. In a recent global research study with Sparkler, representing seven different countries, more than 60% of participants agreed,

“when I’m in an inspirational environment or mindset, I’m more likely to explore and discover things to try or buy.” 

Given that Pinterest is the #1 channel for inspiration according to Nielsen - over even magazines or TV - it makes sense that inspired shoppers on Pinterest spend more.

If you're measuring only clicks (1/0/0, or 1 day click, 0 days to engage, 0 days to view), you’re not valuing the view. That means you won’t capture those people that take longer to convert and ultimately spend more. For example, in the Neustar study, campaigns that only measured last touch or last click understated total conversions attributable to Pinterest by nearly 4x.

In summary, Pinterest provides the perfect environment to future-proof your business, you might not see the instant sale (but let's be honest who is when we are in recession?) but you know that all your efforts on Pinterest will pay off. Your audience is there, being inspired, spending their time and waiting to spend their money on what you have. 

2023 is certainly looking like the perfect year for your business to ensure their Pinterest marketing plan is in place and working towards future proofing your sales.