Growing audience catapults Pinterest to No 3 social media site

Though there never was any doubt about Pinterest's huge following  among the social networking community, a new report from  Experian says Pinterest has now confirmed that it is now the third most popular social network in the US, based on number of visits. The social networking site, allows users to create and manage theme-based image collections including events, interests, hobbies etc.

It ranks just behind Facebook and Twitter on popularity.

According to Experian's 2012 Digital Marketer: Benchmark and Trend Report, social networking has reached new highs, with social media being used regularly by 91 per cent of  adults and 15 per cent of all US internet visits dedicated to social media sites in December 2011. However, the landscape of social media had changed greatly in the past year, with Pinterest, by way of example, virtually coming out of nowhere to now having president Obama ''pinning'' on the network.

Many were taken by surprise by the announcement last December Pinterest had emerged among the top 10 social networks.

According to the new Experian report, Pinterest's traffic surged 50 per cent between February and January of this year, a growth stunning in itself. Thanks to the surge, the site has been able to overtake services like Tumblr, LinkedIn, and Google+ for what according to Experian, is the third highest number of visits in February. Experian's report did not go into more detail.

There was further confirmation from analytics firm comScore, which said recently that Pinterest attracted 17.8 million unique visitors in February from the US alone and on the engagement front, the website is winning as well, with users spending an average of 89 minutes per month on it. However, the social network is way behind Facebook, with users spending an average of 405 minutes per month on its site.