It has been a long time coming. You have lost hours of your life collecting things on your Pinterest board. However, it was just collecting pictures. You still had to find a store to buy the product. The experience was not seamless in the least. That day is over. Finally Pinterest introduces Buyable Pins. People have been waiting for this feature for a very long time. You can now buy items directly from the Pinterest interface. If an item is buyable, you’ll see a blue Buy It button. This is going to be a very big money maker for Pinterest. They already has over 2 million products from retail partners like Macy’s, Nordstroms and Neiman Marcus. The products are not just clothes. You can also buy furniture and goods.
The options after you hit the buy button are pretty abundant as well. You can select what color you want, the number of items you want and sort by price. They have updated guided search and boards. You can now use search filters based on price and color. Payable Pins will let you pay with Apple Pay or pretty much any credit card. Pinterest doesn’t store any of your credit card information. The payment partners Stripe and Braintree handle the heavy lifting for them.
Pinterest will grow into a powerhouse the size of eBay or bigger thanks to smaller boutiques and individuals also using the new feature. Buyable Pins are easy to integrate. Look for eCommerce platforms like Shopify and Demandware to help small businesses with the process. As of now, Pinterest is not charging any fees for pinners or merchants. The price you see on Pinterest will be the same price you see on that merchant’s website. With everyone pushing mobile first, expect to see the Buyable Pins rollout on iPhone and iPad later this month. Android and the web come much later.