Set up audience targeting

Visitor retargeting identifies people who have already visited your site and lets you retarget them on Pinterest.

To create visitor audiences, you need to set up the Pinterest tag. Add the base code across every page on your site and add the event code to pages where you want to track the actions you care about.

You can create a target audience based on one or more specific event tags on your site or based on one or more pages that people have visited on your site. For events, you might retarget visitors who added a specific type of product to their cart but did not check out. For pages, you might retarget visitors who have landed on specific URLs, like your checkout or confirmation pages.

Create a new site visitor audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. Click Create audience
4. Select Visitors who went to your site, then click Next
5. Enter a Name and Description for your audience
6. Below Pinterest tags, select your Pinterest tag
7. Enter the duration of days you want to track visitors from and optionally select to Include past traffic
8. If you want to add a filter to your audience, click Add a filter
9. Click Create

Note: Once you've created your audience, the audience size will update within 24 hours on the Audiences page in Ads Manager. To delete a site visitor audience, click the trashcan icon on the Audiences page.

Target an existing site visitor audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Create ad
3. Click New ad group from the left-side navigation
4. Click Targeting from the left-side navigation
5. Below Audience, find and select your audience list 
6. Once complete, select your Budget & Schedule, Optimization & delivery and Ads
7. Review your information
8. Click Launch

You can upload existing customers' emails or mobile ad IDs (MAIDs) through a single-column CSV file. Leave out any additional information you have, like names, phone numbers or physical addresses. Keep in mind that your final audience list will likely be smaller than the total number of emails or mobile ad IDs you originally uploaded as we match your customer list to people on Pinterest.

Format your customer list

You can use several different formats to upload your customer list:

• Email files: Cleartext, SHA256, MD5 hash key. Must include an “@”.
• MAID files: Cleartext, SHA1, SHA256, MD5 hash keys. IDFAs (iOS) must be uppercase and AAIDs (Android) must be lowercase. MAIDs should follow the format 8-4-4-4-12.

Create a new customer list audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. Click Create audience
4. Select A list of customers that you upload, then click Next
5. Enter a Name and Description for your audience
6. Click Choose file to upload your .CSV file
7. Click Create

Note: Once you’ve created your audience based on your customer list, the audience size will update within 24-48 hours on the Audiences page in Ads Manager. To delete a customer list audience, click the trashcan icon on the Audiences page.

If your CSV upload fails, it’s likely that one of the above requirements have not been met. Headers, titles and empty rows or tabs that create breaks should not be included.

Once your list has at least 100 matches, the status will turn green on the Audiences page in Ads Manager and you'll be able to use that audience for your ad. If your list has fewer than 100 matches, the status will be red on the Audiences page and you will not be able to use that audience. Try to add more emails or MAIDs to the existing list to increase the chance of getting additional matches. To do this, follow the edit steps below.

Edit customer lists

When you upload your customer list to Pinterest, it's immediately hashed and can’t be re-downloaded or accessed again. You can choose to add or remove people from an existing customer list or to replace an existing customer list. Customer lists don’t update automatically unless they’re connected to a CRM with our Pinterest API partners. To delete a customer list audience, click the trashcan icon on the Audiences page.

Add or remove people to an existing customer list

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. From the list, find the audience you want to edit, then click Edit on the right side under Actions
4. Select Add people or Remove people, then Choose file to upload a new CSV file with the emails or MAIDs you want to add or remove
5. Click Save

Once your customer list audience is successfully uploaded, you can target campaigns to people using your list.

Replace an existing customer list

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. From the list, find the audience you want to edit, then click Edit on the right side under Actions
4. Select Replace audience, then Choose file to upload a new CSV file with new emails or MAIDs from your computer
5. Click Save

Once your customer list audience is successfully uploaded, you can target campaigns to people using your list.

Target an existing customer list audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Create ad
3. Click New Ad group from the left-side navigation
4. Click Targeting from the left-side navigation
5. Under Audience, find and select your audience list
6. Select Include or Exclude
   • Select Include to reach the people who are part of your chosen audience
   • Select Exclude to reach people on Pinterest who aren’t a part of the audience you’ve uploaded
7. Once complete, select your Budget & Schedule, Optimization & delivery and Ads
8. Review your information
9. Click Launch

Once you've claimed your website, you can target visitors who've previously engaged with Pins from your website. This includes saves, closeups, comments, link clicks and video views.

Add different filters to your engagement audience to target or exclude people from your audience:

• Destination URL: Filter people who have visited a specific page on your website
• Action types: Filter people who take specific actions, such as saving or commenting on your Pin
• PIN IDs: Filter your audience with the organic, original Pin ID of the Pin you want to use
• % Video Viewed: Filter people who have watched a specific percentage of a video Pin
• Pin Category: Filter people who’ve engaged with a specific Pin category

If you choose not to add filters, your audience will include people that engaged with any Pin that leads to your claimed website. This can include promoted Pins, organic Pins and Pins not created by your account.

Create a new engagement audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. Click Create audience
4. Select An engagement audience that engaged with Pins from your confirmed domain, then click Next
5. Enter a Name and Description for your audience
6. Enter the duration of days you want to track visitors from and optionally select to Include past traffic
7. If you want to add a filter to your audience, click Add a filter
8. Click Create

Note: Once you’ve created your audience, the audience size will update within 24 hours on the Audiences page in Ads Manager. To delete an engagement audience, click the trashcan icon on the Audiences page.

Target an existing engagement audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Create ad
3. Click New ad group from the left-side navigation
4. Click Targeting from the left-side navigation
5. Below Audience, find and select your audience list
6. Go back to Ads Manager to use the audience you created
7. Once complete, select your Budget & Schedule, Optimization & delivery and Ads
8. Review your information
9. Click Launch

Actalike targeting helps you reach people similar to one of your existing audiences. You can use actalike audiences to find new customers, new people who are likely to engage with your Pins, or new people who are likely to visit your website based on your source audience. You can also create a new, more specified audience based on one of your existing audiences. The source audience will not be a part of the new actalike audience.

Create a new actalike audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Audiences
3. Click Create audience
4. Select An actalike audience that behaves similarly to one you already have, then click Next
5. Enter a Name and Description for your audience
6. Select the country you want to target
7. Select the percentage of people you want to target from your existing audience
8. Click Create

Note: Once you’ve created your audience, the audience size will update within 24 hours on the Audiences page in Ads Manager. If your source audience is also new, the audience size will update within 72 hours. To delete an actalike audience, click the trashcan icon on the Audiences page.

Target an existing actalike audience

1. Log into your Pinterest business account
2. Click Ads at the top of the screen, then click Create ad
3. Click New ad group from the left-side navigation
4. Click Targeting from the left-side navigation
5. Below Audience, find and select your audience list
6. Go back to Ads Manager to use the audience you created
7. Once complete, select your Budget & Schedule, Optimization & delivery and Ads
8. Review your information
9. Click Launch