The recent announcement that Japanese internet giant Rakuten will take a leading stake in the hottest social media property bar-none, is of great interest to SSF.

Sometimes dismissed as an “online scrapbook for women”, the fierce contest for financial suitor positions tells a much bigger story: that Pinterest is viewed as a potential disruptor much like Instagram proved to be (just ask Flickr), ready to claim it’s own stake in the see-sawing, evolving social media landscape.

With evidence that Pinterest is already starting to drive organic commerce for it’s users, the weight of Rakuten’s e-commerce experience should help raise Pinterest above mere social-sharer status to that of global social commerce engine.

Excitement in the social media industry but also for our clients.

How so?

Obviously, Rakuten’s presence at Pinterest should ensure that Japanese considerations are included early in ongoing development.

At SSF, we’d already taken the view that Pinterest represented an enormous opportunity for clients with regard to spreading a brand story wide, far and fast, while in the process driving heavily-fought-for traffic to those digital properties best prepared for it. We analysed how clients can take advantage of Pinterest and studied the growing pile of success stories. In fact – we’re in the process of building compelling Pinterest projects now.

Importantly, we recently partnered with social media heavy-hitters Digital Jungle, giving us the ability to measure, adjust for and maximize, the benefit platforms like Pinterest have for our clients.

SSF’s Interactive Director Darren Rogers adds, “In any good communication strategy, the key is to listen and understand what is being said before joining the conversation. So it’s no different with social media. Although there are a lot of tools on the market for measuring what is being said, our value to clients is how we analyze and use that information for better targeted, more relevant and more creative communication to achieve their objectives.”