Pinterest is introducing new ad formats along with an updated ad manager tool. Currently in beta, the debuting Top of Search ad configuration aims to leverage visual search by inviting advertisers to perch atop search returns and results for Related Pins queries. The company is also making local inventory ads generally available so local merchants can highlight products available in nearby stores. Also unveiled at the Pinterest Presents summit last week was Pinterest Media Network Connect, which allows advertisers to securely link campaigns to media networks on the platform.

The Top of Search offering “helps to address the fact that 96 percent of Pinterest’s top searches are currently unbranded even though 45 percent of user clicks occur within the top 10 search results slots,” reports Marketing Dive.

Top of Search ads will appear directly within those top 10 search results and in Related Pins, placing brand messaging where they can be viewed at the onset of the Pinterest users’ shopping journeys, the company explains in a newsroom post.

“These are moments when users are most open to discovering and deciding on new products,” the company adds, proffering early test results that show “an average click-through rate 29 percent higher for Top of Search ads compared to standard campaigns, and a 32 percent higher likelihood of attracting new clickers.”

Wayfair, an early tester, “saw a 237 percent increase in click-through rate over a two-week period compared to their usual campaigns,” according to Pinterest.

“With Pinterest now up to 578 million users, who come to the platform with shopping intent, it could be worth considering the opportunities of Pins in your digital marketing approach,” writes Social Media Today, which says that while Pinterest has offered search ads since 2017, the prime top-of-page positioning is the innovation here.

The local inventory ads can display retailers’ real-time prices for in-stock items within a geotargeted store radius.

News of these additional offerings “arrive ahead of the key holiday shopping period and amid signs that social-first advertising is making big gains,” points out Marketing Dive, emphasizing Pinterest’s claim that “Gen Z now makes up half of its user base.”

Meanwhile, the new Pinterest Media Network Connect, implemented as a self-service tool within Pinterest Ads Manager, “lets media networks share first-party audience data, product catalogs and/or conversion data with advertising partners,” writes MediaPost.