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As a merchant, you might want to upload your products to Pinterest as product Pins. Product Pins are specially formatted to let people who are browsing on Pinterest know that they're shoppable. They contain a product title and description, as well as pricing and availability info.

Add your retail catalog’s data source to Pinterest to upload many of your products, as product Pins, at once. Then, you can promote them across Pinterest as shopping ads. You have the option of providing the URL link for your hosted data source, or uploading your data source manually.

Before you get started

Before you add your retail catalog, you’ll need to:

  • Get a Pinterest business account
  • Claim your website
  • Install the Pinterest tag
  • Have a website that meets our merchant guidelines (with easy-to-find contact details, shipping policy, and refund policy)
  • If you do not meet the requirements above, learn more about retail catalog alternatives.

    How retail catalogs work

    Retail catalogs work depending on how you choose to add your data source, from which we can access your retail catalog.

    If you’re providing the URL link for your hosted data source, we’ll access your data source daily so we can dynamically create product Pins for each product in your retail catalog. Make sure your updated data source is available every day so your product details are up to date. You can even schedule your data ingestion in advance.

    If you’re uploading your data source manually, we’ll access your data source when it’s being uploaded, and every time you upload an updated one so we can create product Pins, or update the metadata for existing Pins, for each product in your retail catalog.

    We’ll alert you to any errors. It's important to review and fix them as quickly as possible to make sure your product info is accurate and up to date. An error can mean your whole feed does not update, some items on your feed do not update, or you need to make some formatting changes.

    We can process up to 20 million products per retail catalog. If you have more than 20 million products, contact us.

    Prepare your data source

     

    This is only relevant if you’re hosting your data source. If you’re uploading your data source manually, you can skip this section.

    You’ll need to host your own data source on an FTP/SFTP/WebDAV server or with an HTTP/HTTPS direct-download link. This needs to be accessible by a user-agent, and cannot require IP or SSH key whitelisting. If you're using a direct download link, there cannot be any extra navigation required for us to access the file.

    We support the following formats:

    Tab separated (TSV) (Download TSV example)
    Comma separated (CSV) (Download CSV example)
    XML (RSS 2.0, ATOM 1.0) (Download XML example)

    Note: We accept compressed files (.zip, .giz, .gz, .bz2 and others), but we currently do not support encrypted, password-protected compressed files, Google Drive files, or Dropbox files.

    Your retail catalog needs to include the following fields, formatted exactly as you see them. If they’re missing, or formatted incorrectly, your entire retail catalog will fail ingestion.

    • id
    • title
    • description
    • link
    • image_link
    • price
    • availability
    • item_group_id (only required when products have multiple variants)
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    id

    Unique ID that represents the product.

    Maximum of 127 characters. DS0294-L
    title Name of the product (same name as the product from the landing page, including variant details, such as color and size). Maximum of 500 characters. Women’s denim shirt, large
    description Description of the product. Maximum of 10,000 characters in plain text (not HTML). Casual fit denim shirt made with the finest quality Japanese denim
    link Landing page for the product (needs to lead directly to the same product and showcase the same data)

    String URL.

    Maximum of 511 characters and the URL must start with http:// (we do not recommend hardwalls).

    https://www.example.com/cat/womens-clothing/denim-shirt-0294
    image_link

    Link to the main product image (at least 75x75 pixels, accessible by our user-agent and no template or placeholder images).

    If you change the image later, you’ll need to use a different link or the image will not update.

    String URL.

    Maximum of 2,000 characters, starting with http:// or https:// (encode or remove commas).

    Recommended: Enclosing the string with quotes.

    https://scene.example.com/image/image.jpg
    price

    Price of the product (should reflect the true cost of the product and include currency in ISO-4217 if it's not US dollars, otherwise we’ll default to US dollars).

    <numeric>

    <ISO 4217>

    Currency can come before or after the numeric price value, with or without space and follow the standard ISO-4217 code. Do not use 0 values or currency symbols.

    24.99 USD
    24.99USD
    24,99 USD
    24,99USD
    24.99
    24,99
    GBP24.99
    GBP 24.99
    GBP24,99
    GBP 24,99
    availability Availability of the product.

    Should be one of the following values:

    in stock
    out of stock
    preorder

    in stock
    item_group_id (only required when products have multiple variants) Parent ID of the product. Maximum of 127 characters. DS0294

    You can add optional fields to your retail catalog to help us better map your products to people. The more information you provide, the more relevant your Pins will be to the people who see them. Have a look below to find out more about the optional fields.

    Optional general attributes

    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    product_type Categorization of your product based on your custom product taxonomy.

    Maximum of five subcategories, with a maximum of 1,000 characters must be separated by > wrapped by spaces (We do not recognize other delimiters such as the comma or pipe).

    Clothing > Women’s > Shirts > Denim
    additional_image_link

    Links to up to 10 additional images of your product (at least 75x75 pixels, accessible by our user-agent and no template or placeholder images).

    We'll create a new pin for every additional image link. If you change the image later, you’ll need to use a different link or the image will not update.

    Maximum of 2,000 characters each, starting with http:// or https:// (encode or remove commas).

    Recommended: Enclosing the string with quotes.

    "https://scene.example.com/image/image_v2.jpg, https://scene.example.com/image/image_v3.jpg"
    mobile_link Mobile-optimized version of your landing page. Needs to start with http:// or https:// https://m.example.com/cat/womens-clothing/denim-shirt-0294
    sale_price

    Discounted price of the product (should be lower than the price and include currency in ISO-4217 if it's not US dollars, otherwise we’ll default to US dollars)

    If provided, the sale price will be considered the current price of the item.

    <numeric>

    <ISO 4217>

    Currency can come before or after the numeric price value, with or without space and follow the standard ISO-4217 code. Do not use 0 values or currency symbols.

    14.99 USD
    14.99USD
    14,99 USD
    14,99USD
    14.99
    14,99
    GBP 14.99
    GBP14.99
    GBP 14,99
    GBP14,99
    average_review_rating Average amount of reviews for the product.

    <numeric>

    Between 1-5

    5
    number_of_ratings Number of ratings for the product. <numeric> 2
    number_of_reviews Number of reviews for the product. <numeric> 4
    description_html

    HTML description for the product.

    Recommended: Use this if your description is longer than 200 characters.

    If this field is provided, we’ll use it instead of the required description field.

    HTML formatting <body>
    <h1>My Product</h1>
    <p>Buy Now</p>
    </body>
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    item_group_id Parent ID of the product.  Maximum of 127 characters DS0294

    brand

    Brand of the product Maximum of 100 characters Josie’s Denim
    GTIN Unique universal product identifier Numeric following GTIN guidelines 3234567890126
    mpn Manufacturer part number of the product  

    Maximum of 70 alphanumeric characters

    "mpn":
    "PI12345NTEREST"
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example

    color

    Primary color of the product. Maximum of 30 characters. blue
    gender Gender associated with the product. Should be one of the following values:

    male
    female
    unisex
    male
    age_group Age associated with the product.

    Should be one of the following values:

    newborn
    infant
    toddler
    kids
    adult

    newborn
    material Material used to make the product. Maximum of 30 characters. cotton
    pattern Pattern used for the product. Maximum of 30 characters. plaid
    size Size of the product. Maximum of 30 characters. M
    size_type Additional description for the size of the product.

    Should be one of the following values:

    regular
    petite
    plus
    big_and_tall
    maternity

    regular
    size_system The country’s sizing system in which you’re submitting your product. Country code.

    US

    alt_text Description of what appears in the main images of the product. One or more alt text values, separated by commas. The number of alt text values should match the number of images in your image_link field. Commas should be encoded as &#44, or removed if they’re part of the alt text. Commas should be used to separate multiple alt texts. A light blue crochet baby hat with tassels
    variant_names Options for this variant of the product (People on Pinterest will see these options next to your Pin and can select the one they want). Texts separated by commas listed in the order you want them displayed. Color,Size
    variant_values Value options for this variant of the product (People on Pinterest will see these options next to your Pin and can select the one they want).

    Texts separated by commas listed in the order you want them displayed.

    Should be consistent with the order of the variant_names field.

    Red,Small
    adult Whether the product is adult or not. Adult products will not be shown on Pinterest.

    Should be one of the following values:

    true
    false

    false
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    tax Tax details for the product

    Consists of one group of up to four elements: country, region, rate (all required) and tax_ship (optional). Colons, even for blank values, are required.

    country:region:rate(required):tax_ship

    US:1025433:6.00:y
    shipping Shipping details for the product

    Consists of one group of up to four elements: country, region, service (all optional) and price (required). Colons, even for blank values, are required.

    country:region:service:price(required)

    US::Express:13.12

    shipping_weight

    Weight of the product. 

    <numeric> <metric>

    Make sure there’s a space between the numeric string and the metric.

    5 lbs
    shipping_width Width of the package needed to ship the product.

    <numeric> <metric>

    Make sure there’s a space between the numeric string and the metric.

    16 in
    shipping_height Height of the package needed to ship the product. 

    <numeric> <metric>

    Make sure there’s a space between the numeric string and the metric.

    12 in
    free_shipping_label

    Whether you provide free shipping for the product or not.

    If you do, enter 0 in the free_shipping_limit field. If you only offer free shipping after someone spends a specific amount, enter that amount in the free_shipping_limit field. 

    Should be one of the following values:

    true
    false

    true
    free_shipping_limit Minimum order purchase necessary to obtain free shipping of the product.

    <numeric>

    <ISO 4217>

    35USD
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    custom_label_0 Custom grouping of products (up to five) Maximum of 200 characters

    Summer promotion

    custom_label_1 Custom grouping of products (up to five) Maximum of 200 characters Best sellers
    custom_label_2 Custom grouping of products (up to five) Maximum of 200 characters New products
    custom_label_3 Custom grouping of products (up to five) Maximum of 200 characters On sale
    custom_label_4 Custom grouping of products (up to five) Maximum of 200 characters Half price
    Column name Description Syntax/supported values Example
    ad_link Link that can be used to track traffic coming from Pinterest shopping ads.

    String URL.

    Should send full URL including tracking, not just tracking parameters.

    We currently do not support impression tracking.

    Must begin with http:// or https://

    https://www.example.com/cat/denim-shirt/item012?utm_source=Pinterest
    condition Condition of the product.

    Should be one of the following values:

    new
    used
    refurbished

    new
    google_product_category Categorization of the product based on the standardized Google Product Taxonomy.

    See the English full taxonomy. Visit Google’s Help Center to access taxonomies for additional languages.

    Both text values and numeric codes are accepted.

    Apparel & Accessories > Clothing > Shirts & Tops
    21
    Formatting tips
  • If you're using a CSV, we recommend wrapping your values in double quotes to avoid any possible parsing issues
  • Floating delimiters (like commas and tabs) can result in the item or file not processing properly
  • Check that you have the same number of delimiters in each row and column
  • Follow standardized American English for the required and set values in your feed
  • The retail catalog data source you’re adding must be encoded in UTF-8 format (with the exception of GOOGLE_TSV_EXCEL files, which must be encoded in ISO_8859_1 format)
  • Retail catalog alternatives

    Make sure you follow our merchant guidelines. We may remove products or accounts that violate these guidelines.

  • Use the Pinterest API to create and manage your catalog. This advanced option is most suited to developers as it requires specialist knowledge.
  • Partner with an e-commerce site. It will format your products for publishing on Pinterest.
  • Create individual ads from your profile. This is a good option if you have a smaller group of products you'd like to advertise on Pinterest.
  • Create product rich Pins. Rich Pins automatically sync with your site and feature the most up-to-date pricing, availability and product information. 
  • What's next?

    Learn how to add your retail catalog data source to Pinterest.

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