Crafty Little Sales Pitch

Image 1: So much more to pinterest (n.d.)

Pinterest for me has always been a quick browse for some craft ideas.  Make a board, pin some great ideas, never find time to make them.  Now after a play around, I see it has so much more breadth and depth.  Over the next four weeks I will use different concepts to explore the world of Pinterest.  This week I discuss ‘power’; its varied forms, how it exists in Pinterest, who has it, and how it is used

Firstly, what is Pinterest?  Users browse a vast array of images and ‘pin’ them to ‘boards’ that they create.  Picture an online scrapbook.  Boards are publicly viewable unless made as secret boards.  What you pin, shows up publicly in ‘notifications’.  Others may then ‘re-pin’ your selections to their boards.  This has a cumulative effect, so an image can potentially be seen by multitudes (Aquino, 2013, p. 22).  Social connections are made through ‘following’ others, shared boards, commenting on images, and ‘liking’ pins.  Pinterest’s underlying purpose as a marketing and data collection tool however, belies the pitch to users of it being for personal collecting (Lui, 2015, pp. 134-137).  It is from this underlying purpose that I will now view ‘power’.

Power is easily recognised when we think of strength, however, awareness of the subtler forms is just as important (Allen, 2003, p. 2).  Allen (2003, pp. 2, 10) identifies ‘authority, coercion, manipulation, seduction, domination, and inducement’ as the “six modalities of power”.  In Pinterest’s targeted appeal to personal and business users, seduction, inducement, manipulation, and domination are clear. 

Seduction of users is via an overwhelmingly visual platform and the inclusion of varied interest areas.  The portrayal of user control is far from the reality.  Manipulation occurs when, with the aid of data collection, users are directed through and shown images related to their previous choices (Lui, 2015. p. 135; Van Dijck & Poell, 2013. p. 10).  In the initial Pinterest setup, designers ensured their preferred content domination by saturating the site prior to making it public (Lui, 2015. p. 136).  This domination is maintained by terms of service that control additions of images and the Pinterest brand guidelines of use.  Further, businesses are induced to pay for ‘promoted pins’, with the guarantee of image prominence.

Pinterest is a ‘super-connector’, a ‘hub’ that offers power to businesses (Kuttainen, 2017) in the forms of manipulation, seduction, and domination.  Data collection enables businesses to accordingly alter appeal and tactics thereby better targeting users.  Creation of their own boards with web page links, directs customers to their service or products (Aquino, 2013, p. 22).  The ‘promoted pins’ option, whilst a power of inducement aimed at business, gives business the power to dominate user searches.

Little power seems to exist for the everyday user, unless they understand how Pinterest works and choose to use its powers to their own marketing advantage (Van Dijck & Poell, 2013. p. 8).  Overall the main power to the user would be to avoid the tactics employed by Pinterest in the first place.  Users could add their own images or ones from outside of Pinterest, and place them onto secret boards.  By doing so, they bypass the marketed images, avoid public display, and prevent the cumulative effect of repinning. 

This is only a brief look at power, but many ‘modalities’ were found.  What else is there lurking behind the picturesque façade of this social media network?

References

Allen, J. (2003). Lost geographies of power. Melbourne, Australia: Blackwell Publishers.

Aquino, J. (2013). Harnessing the power of Pinterest: what marketers should know about the social bookmarking site.  Customer Relationship Management: CRM, 17(2), 22-23. Retrieved from https://search-proquest-com.elibrary. jcu.edu.au/docview/1287937632/fulltextPDF/FDB95403BB274BCFPQ/1?accountid=16285

Kuttainen, V. (2017).  BA1002: Our space: Networks, narratives, and the making of place, lecture 2: Power. [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu.au

Lui, D. (2015). Public curation and private collection: the production of knowledge on pinterest.com. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 32(2), 128-142. doi:10.1080/15295036.2015.1023329

Pinterest. (2017). Retrieved from https://au.pinterest.com/

Pinterest. (2017). Brand guidelines. Retrieved from https://business.pinterest.com/en/brand-guidelines

Pinterest. (2017). Terms of service. Retrieved from https://policy.pinterest.com/en/terms-of-service

So much more to Pinterest [Image]. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/e7/12/df/e712dfab3233 a60272614bfbb18b49df--funny-fitness-memes-funny-diet.jpg

Van Dijck, J. & Poell, T. (2013). Understanding social media logic. Media and Communication, 1(1), 2-14. doi:10.12924/mac2013.01010002