In recent months, Pinterest has been leading the pack of social media growth. Growing US traffic over 429% from September 2011 to December 2011, this social network is the place to be– especially for brands.

If you’re not aware of Pinterest, check out this article which breaks down what this phenom of a social network is about, how to use it, and why you can become addicted. With nearly 3.5 million unique visitors per month, Pinterest is able to connect advertisers and brands with their consumers in a whole new way.

At first, this may seem confusing since this social media network is like a glorified tack board of random pictures. But with a deeper dive, it’s more of a temple for inspiration. Bringing together pictures of home decoration, fashion, and do-it-yourself crafts, this is the perfect platform for brands to introduce inspiration to their consumers.

The nature of the site lends itself to branding. Since users are able to pin their favorite images from sites, people within the network are able to click pinned images and follow through to the image’s URL; thus, driving increased traffic to sites that potential audiences would never have seen. This is where social media mavens are key. With their help, your piece of inspiration can go from unnoticed to 1000x repinned within an hour. For example, if I were to follow the “trending now” pins, I may find a bracelet that I think is awesome. After clicking through the image I’ve ended up on Etsy, a website for local small-time artists to post their creations for sale. Having never seen the Etsy site before, I am now a convert and will go back frequently to see what other cute things I can buy!

Companies such as Nordstrom, HGTV, and West Elm have gained quite the following using Pinterest and we can only expect to see this trend grow. Along with brand-follower growth, we can expect that Pinterest will continue to gain ground on Facebook as the leading Search Engine Referral for traffic.

According to Mashable, Pinterest can really be used in 5 distinct ways (seen on the right). The top two should be of real interest for brands and their respective advertising. Number 2 – Use like a focus group is the cheapest most effective way for a brand to find out if what they’ve introduced is pinning well with their audience or if something which could come to fruition in the future has gotten repinned. These two signs will illustrate if they’ve made the right decisions and aligned their decision making properly with their social crew.

Now onto Number 1. Promoting a lifestyle is all that consumers are doing when using Pinterest. Pinning their favorite crafts, inspiration for their dream home, ideas for their future wedding, Pinterest is the best way to really dive into what a brands consumers connect with– in a psychographic way. By taking a look at a brand’s heavy followers, Pinterest brands can illustrate what other things their target market is into and figure out ways to incorporate the other aspects of their life into the brand. Psychographics really show the full attitude, interests, and trends within a market and should be taken very seriously when it comes to branding.

You may be wondering, why do I care? Well, if you’re a consumer this is a great way to find new trendy things of interest for your life. You could even be voicing your persona to brands for their decision making. And if you’re a brand or advertiser, this is the new way for you to do advertising and really validate the decisions you’ve made or will make as a brand, company, or even individual products.

Consumers are what drive the marketplace and Pinterest is the social network way of broadcasting the inspiration of consumers– for free. Social media mavens, get pinning and show me (and your favorite brands) what you’re all about.