Social Media Analysis Reveals: What’s So Pinteresting?

According to a “Benchmark and Trend Report” from Experian Hitwise, Pinterest—the virtual pinboard—has rocketed to the number three spot among social networks in terms of web-traffic popularity. This new ranking puts it just behind social giants like Facebook and Twitter and has become a hot topic among marketers and social media fans. Mashable and other social news outlets have reported that the Pinterest user base is approximately 60:40 females to males, but it has still been somewhat of a mystery as to why the 2-year old social network has become so popular and which demographics most enjoy “pinning.” By using the Crimson Hexagon ForSight™ platform for social media monitoring and analysis, we’ll shed some light on this topic.

Click on image to enlarge.

Analyzing more than 11,300 mentions across Twitter, Facebook and Blogs, we found the majority of positive conversation (22%) focuses on the benefits of visual representation of brands and products. Pinterest users enjoyed crafting a “lifestyle” around their brands to engage consumers and help them understand how the brand views itself. Other Pinterest users (19%) loved expressing their interests visually, without the need for a long word-based explanation. The other positive conversation (16%) focused on Nonprofits and the rewards of utilizing a Pinterest profile to visualize the cause.

Neutral conversation only included 9% of mentions dedicated to general nods to Pinterest in the news or related posts. The majority of Neutral mentions, at 25%, were links from Pinterest with infographics, frequently used to show other social media trends. For example, one infographic categorized Facebook user growth. The last neutral category showed 9% of users simply jumped on the bandwagon, per say, as Pinterest has grown in popularity among social networks.

The topic wheel below provides another way to analyze the most popular topics related to Pinterest users:

The Topic Visualizer shows groups of related posts, based on the themes and topics of conversation. Click to enlarge.

The largest topic concentration is “tips” related to using Pinterest, though we notice the allure of a “visual social network” is represented within most topic categories. Delving into the refined categories, we can also see the “Pinterest Boards” highlighted. This may suggest users enjoy the level of personalization offered by the use of Pin Boards.

Understanding who uses Pinterest and why may also reveal if and when the all-visual social network may go the way of Instagram, which was recently acquired by Facebook for $1 Billion. It’s certainly clear that visuals and the networks leveraging them captivate us now more than ever.

Do you think the visual social network will lose its charm, or will social networkers find better uses for personal or brand-level interaction? Tweet at @crimsonhexagon and let us know what you think.

As always, we’ll continue analyzing the space for interesting trends. In the meantime, feel free to contact us at [email protected] with questions or to learn how your market, brand or product could benefit from leveraging the Crimson Hexagon ForSight™ platform for social media monitoring and analysis. Want to see the Crimson Hexagon platform in action? Request a Live Online Demo.

Miles Branman also contributed to this post.