FYI: Pinterest Pulls the Plug on Affiliate Links
Top pinners around the world are definitely crying right now.
According to Venture Beat, Pinterest began removing all affiliate links, trackers and redirects from their site late Thursday night. To the lay person, this probably doesn’t sound like a big deal but, to the experienced pinner, many retail websites and popular affiliate networks, namely Hello Society and Reward Style, this is doomsday.
In short, highly influential pinners used to have the ability to make money (notice: past tense) just by by posting pins of products, their followers could purchase said pinned product through the link, and the pinner would then receive commission for the products sold off of their Pinterest boards. Sounds like a sweet deal.
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But, this new ban, which we suspect stems from the company’s need to monetize the site, makes it much more difficult for top pinners to cash in on their curating talents.
While this new policy is disheartening for the niche group of pinners who profit from affiliated links, we think that it might actually improve the pinning experience by returning to the authentic model that lead the site to be valued at an estimated $5 billion dollars. Not to mention, clean the site up and keep it running quickly.
Affiliate links or not, we definitely aren’t resigning our Pinterest accounts anytime soon. However, our heart do go out to the pinners who just lost their extra income.
