Pinterest’s new Promoted Carousel ads will display up to 5 swipable images in a single ad

A Promoted Carousel ad for Cheerios.

Pinterest rolled out a new ad format on Thursday, introducing Promoted Carousel ads that allow brands to include up to five images.

Why marketers should care

Very similar to Facebook’s carousel ads, advertisers can include a distinct title, information and landing page for each product image included in a Promoted Carousel ad.

The ads will display in a user’s feed like a regular Pin, but users will be able to swipe through the images directly in their feed or tap to display one of the five images and launch the landing page.

Pinterest gave a select number of brands early access to the new ad unit, including Cheerios, REI, Covergirl, DSW and Everlane. According to a Millward Brown brand lift study, Cheerios Promoted Carousel ad campaign resulted in an 11.4 point lift in ad awareness and 8.6 lift in message association.

REI’s social media manager Jaclyn Ruckle says the brand’s Promoted Carousel campaign delivered more engagement and higher click through rates.

“Promoted Carousel allows us to serve up multiple products and experiences in one place to engage the planning mindset of Pinterest’s audience,” says Ruckle, “Our Carousel campaign showed strong engagement and boosted our click-through-rate by 32 percent.”

Pinterest has made its new ad units available to all business accounts in each of its ad markets.

More results from the Millward Brown study

• Covergirl says it earned a 3.8 point lift in brand awareness and a 6.1 lift in ad awareness when using the carousel ads for its TruBlend foundation campaign.
• DSW claims Promoted Carousel ads for a back-to-school campaign improved ad performance by 20 percent.
• Everlane says it saw three-times the engagement with its Promoted Carousel ad campaign compared to the clothing brand’s usual Pinterest ad campaigns.

About The Author

Amy Gesenhues

Amy Gesenhues is Third Door Media’s General Assignment Reporter, covering the latest news and updates for Marketing Land and Search Engine Land. From 2009 to 2012, she was an award-winning syndicated columnist for a number of daily newspapers from New York to Texas. With more than ten years of marketing management experience, she has contributed to a variety of traditional and online publications, including MarketingProfs.com, SoftwareCEO.com, and Sales and Marketing Management Magazine. Read more of Amy’s articles.