Just when some financial institutions are starting to master the use of Facebook and Twitter to leverage their brands, here comes Pinterest to make the situation a little bit more interesting. If you’re not already familiar with the fastest growing social network site around, sit back and digest these facts and figures about the new entry.
Pinterest enables users to post photos to a virtual bulletin board. The photos are related to each person’s interests (see why the company chose that name?). Users can view other boards to seek inspiration and “like” and “share” photos similar to Facebook. Since the site launched in 2010, comScore estimated Pinterest had 11.7 million unique users as of January. That made it the fastest site in history to gain 10 million users. Now there’s talk the company is worth some $1 billion, putting it in the same neighborhood as the price Facebook paid recently for Instagram.
But how can Pinterest help financial institutions promote their services? Banco Sabadell in Spain and State Bank & Trust in Georgia might be providing the blueprint for banks to follow. From a Finextra article:
The Spanish bank has created seven boards to showcase photos from tennis tournaments it sponsors and YouTube video interviews with celebrities such as Barcelona FC coach Josep Guardiola. Sabadell’s decision to ignore actual banking is in contrast with State Bank & Trust, a small Georgia-based institution which has also moved early to use Pinterest but has taken a different approach to content, posting images from its brochures and adverts.
While these efforts are in the early stages and have seen little impact, there is potential to attract new customers and keep current ones engaged through Pinterest. And at a time when banks are trying to build relationships with younger consumers, any social networking efforts now could pay huge dividends down the road.
Banks such as Bank of America already have taken full advantage of Facebook’s new Timeline format. And card brands such as American Express continue to drive interaction through Twitter. Pinterest is just sitting there at midfield waiting for someone to take the ball and run with it.
Click here to read more from Finextra.
