Pinterest has found its best product market fit in years: transforming into a global performance platform and shopping destination.

With the introduction of Pinterest Performance+, Pinterest is doubling down on AI and automation for smarter, more scalable campaign execution. Working with a partner like Smartly amplifies the platform's potential. 

As a top Martech partner for Pinterest—and the first to launch support for Pinterest Performance+ campaigns outside the Pinterest platform—Smartly helps marketers automate, personalize, and optimize faster than ever. Below, we share five practical ways to maximize your results with Smartly and Pinterest Performance+, including pro tips to make every campaign count.

1. Understand What Pinterest Performance+ Really Offers

Pinterest Performance+ is a suite of AI and automation features designed to streamline everything from targeting and bidding to creative delivery and budget optimization. It's purpose-built for Conversion, Catalog Sales, and Consideration objectives.

Here’s what makes it powerful:

• 50% less required inputs, reducing friction in campaign setup.
• Uses Pinterest’s 1st party data to automate performance decisions in real-time.
• Optimizes delivery based on best-performing creative and user behavior.

Pro Tip: While Pinterest Performance+ handles a lot, creative and strategic input still matter. Providing high-quality, diverse assets for testing gives the algorithm more combinations to work with and better results to return.

2. Automate at Scale with Smartly’s Pinterest Integration

Smartly allows you to create and manage Pinterest Performance+ campaigns efficiently. The platform offers advanced automation features, streamlined workflows, and robust management tools that help you optimize your campaign performance.

With Smartly, you can:

• Manage multiple campaigns from a centralized workspace.
• Use workflow automation to streamline large-scale campaign execution.
• Enable collaborative review processes across creative and performance teams.
• Track, edit, and duplicate campaigns quickly across markets or objectives.

Actionable Tip: Set up a template-based workflow for recurring campaign types (e.g., product drops, seasonal sales). Once built, you can duplicate, customize, and launch new campaigns in minutes instead of hours.

3. Scale Pinterest Creative with Automation & AI

Pinterest Performance+ works best with strong, versatile creative—and that’s where Smartly’s Creative Studio shines. Its GenAI-powered features allow teams to scale high-performing visuals without sacrificing brand identity or burning out design resources.

With Smartly’s creative tools, you can:

• Auto-remove image backgrounds and place assets into branded templates.
• Dynamically swap product images, pricing, or messaging based on audience segments.
• Ensure on-brand consistency across all assets, from static to video.

Pro Tip: Use Smartly’s creative performance reports to identify which design elements (e.g., copy, CTA button color, background style) are driving results. Then iterate those into new versions using automation—no designer needed.

4. Test Strategically and Scale Winners

Pinterest Performance+ doesn’t mean “set it and forget it”. In fact, it works best when paired with thoughtful testing, and Smartly makes that easier than ever.

Consider Emma Sleep, a global sleep brand with ambitious growth goals. By running Pinterest Performance+ campaigns alongside their business-as-usual (BAU) campaigns using Smartly, they achieved impressive results:

• ROAS of 10.4%, far exceeding benchmarks
• 28% of total Pinterest revenue in November was generated through Pinterest Performance+
• 25% increase in ROAS and revenue in the German market compared to BAU

This side-by-side testing approach gave Emma Sleep confidence to scale.

Actionable Tip: Set up mirrored Pinterest Performance+ and non-Pinterest Performance+ campaigns in Smartly for at least two markets. Compare performance on ROAS, cost-per-action, and reach. Use learnings to scale the better performer.

Advanced Strategy: Incorporate catalog-level testing for ecommerce brands. Run identical product sets through Pinterest Performance+ and BAU workflows and use Smartly to evaluate cross-product and cross-market performance at scale.

5. Stay Ahead with What’s Coming Next

Pinterest Performance+ is just the beginning. Smartly and Pinterest have a feature-rich roadmap for 2025 and beyond, including deeper creative integration and expanded campaign types.

You can already:

• Launch Pinterest Performance+ campaigns for multiple objectives (Catalog Sales, Conversions, Consideration).
• Layer in budget optimization, dynamic targeting, and GenAI-powered creative enhancements.

And with new tools continuously in development, Smartly users will always be one step ahead.

Pro Tip: Work with your Smartly customer success manager to enable beta features early, like the background generation tool or creative experiments at scale. Early adoption often comes with performance advantages and dedicated support.

Unlock Pinterest’s Full Performance Potential

Pinterest Performance+ is a leap forward in AI-powered campaign management, and Smartly’s automation, creative tools, and strategic infrastructure amplify its impact as a revenue-driving machine.

You’ll save time, reduce manual effort, scale better creative, and, most importantly, outperform your benchmarks.

Ready to unlock Pinterest’s performance potential? Request a Smartly demo.