There's a magical place with millions of toys all under one roof — the iconic Toys“R”Us — and lucky for Pinterest shoppers, the retailer brought some extra magic to their feeds, too.

The moment? The holidays. Key goals and objectives? To grow brand awareness and drive action intent for Toys“R”Us' latest goods and "top toys," both online and in-store. Who did they want to reach and delight? Parents and seasonal shoppers. How? Through an attention-grabbing Pinterest campaign with a full-funnel approach. Checking the list once, checking it twice: marketing mission accepted.

People come to Pinterest with an intent and purpose, and the majority of people who use the platform say they come here to shop.¹ This presented Toys“R”Us with a unique opportunity: they could reach high-intent shoppers at scale.

To do this, they leveraged the eye-catching Pinterest "Gifts for Kids" holiday badge and integrated it into their video and standard assets. Toys"R"Us created assets for every stage of the funnel, with an overarching goal of driving online purchases and boosting in-store visits and sales. Their ads highlighted the season's "best gifts" and "top toys," which was the winning holiday recipe to grab consumers attention and share of wallet.

Timing-wise, Toys“R”Us kicked off the campaign in October, sharing their "top toys'' in peoples' feeds. This gave them a head start, showing up and standing out amongst the holiday marketing noise and becoming top-of-mind for shoppers during the peak shopping season.

And their ads did a magical job — they gave users a glimpse of Toys“R”Us' latest and greatest offerings, and took shoppers from inspiration to action. 

Magical results

After the ads were posted on Pinterest, there was an uptick in people saving the ads to children’s gifts related boards, such as "the best gifts" and "easy Christmas gifts." Furthermore, Toys“R”Us quickly rose through the ranks within the toy category — becoming the #1 destination for holiday toys for kids.¹ 

The highest converters were mature gifters, like grandparents, shortly followed by parents with a +4.6pt lift, AKA the people busy finding gifts for the kids in their lives.¹ In addition to the strong brand lift metrics, Toys“R”Us also saw some exciting in-store activity: a 17% lift in in-store visits.²

Pinterest proved to be a full-funnel powerhouse for Toys“R”Us. The platform enabled the retailer to help drive awareness and inspire shoppers to visit their local Toys“R”Us stores, which resulted in a phenomenal boost in sales.

Tips for your next campaign

Try these Pinterest best practices to help get more out of your ads. 

1. Use Pinterest's creative best practices. Take your ad performance from good to great — make your ads pop with eye-catching creative, strong text overlays, and consistent calls to action. See more top tips here. And want to give your ads an extra pop? Give them a Pinterest badge of approval.

2. Invest in moments. People use Pinterest to plan for multiple occasions, from the holidays to everyday life. Reach your audience while immersed in planning mode and primed to take action. Head to Pinterest's holiday hub for valuable insights on how to take your seasonal marketing further.

3. Explore Pinterest's possibilities to score full-funnel success. Inspire your audience with Pinterest's wide variety of advertising products, which help you generate organic awareness, consideration, and purchase opportunities. Plus, check out Pinterest Academy for free courses to level up your Pinterest ads game.