Lightweight models and cost effective scalability (Pinterest)

For this week I have been tasked as a member of team B to discuss the Web 2.0 pattern known as Lightweight models and cost effective scalability. The pattern itself is all about leveraging the benefits and opportunities presented by Web 2.0 basically to do more with less. It suggests that the business model for an application or web service should scale along side the technologies used to implement them. 

I believe I have found an exceptional example of this web 2.0 pattern in full effect. The photo sharing website known as Pinterest. Before I discuss why i believe Pinterest is a great example of Lightweight models and cost effective scalability, I will first explain what Pinterest actually is. In a nutshell Pinterest is a personalized media platform, it allows users to upload, save and sort images and videos referred to as pins. Pinterest acts as a personalized media platform. Users can browse the content of others on the main page. Users can then save individual pins to one of their own boards using the "Pin It" button, with Pinboards typically organized by a central topic or theme. Users can personalize their experience with Pinterest by pinning items, creating boards, and interacting with other members. By doing so, the users "pin feed" displays unique, personalized results.

Pinterest has experience some of the highest increases in growth in rate of usage in the entire online business environment. During 2012 Pinterest's user base grew from 9 million to 40 million and now to this day has over 70 million users. The company's employee count grew steadily as well from 20 staff members to 100. Pinterest currently consists of around 150 employees which is small in comparison to its user base, however Pinterest leads the way in the most number of users per employee compared to other social networking platforms including Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  A true example of “doing more with less.” The company is now focusing on revenue as a priority, by considering advertising systems and taking a cut from traffic turned sales goods. 

In terms of building a business on top of components from others, Pinterest approaches this concept a little differently.  Its “Pin It” button is a browser, “plug-in,” in the form of a bookmark link. The link ensures that it is a seamless experience for users to “pin” content from any website, so that they do not need to open new pages or even leave the page they are on. As a result, users are not restricted to pin from only Pinterest, but rather the entire web. Furthermore, Pinterest incorporates a "share" button which links to the users Facebook or Twitter accounts, which allows the application to expand to other social networking sites. 

Pinterest main office is in San Francisco, California. However, recently the company has begun hiring  from other countries in an effort towards localisation of its services and in turn strive for globalization. The company has begun such efforts in the UK and initially plans on learning from these experiences and then expanding its teams to both France and Japan. However, Pinterest’s career page suggests that these plans are already underway with positions advertised for “Country Managers” in not only the UK, by Japan and France. These positions advertised state the responsibilities starting up operations in the company, increasing Pinterests local brand image, creating and maintaining relationships with other companies and recruiting, training and managing staff whilst constantly communication with the US team to find out local trends and opportunities. It is plain to see that Pinterest is utilizing outsourcing to exploit the expertise of localized teams.

Pinterest is in fact a free service meaning that the barrier for adoption is fairly low. As mentioned above, its ability to work alongside the entire web surfing experience seamlessly further makes adoption easier for users. Pinterests implements SaaS strategies, providing constant updates and welcoming user feedback. 

Pinterests astonishing growth in usage was obviously due to its viral adoption. Its "share" features which utilizes sites such as Facebook and Twitter means that viral and low cost marketing is possible. The way that Pinterest was designed made it seem like the developers were expecting rapid growth as it handled the change very effectively. The site’s design meant that users had control over the content and the site’s simplistic design could cater to varying loads of data. 

The Co-founder of Pinterest has definitely evaluated and identified all risks that they have undertaken since the very beginning of the project in his Keynote. In conclusion, I hope I have proved to you that Pinterest is indeed an excellent example of the web 2.0 pattern Lightweight models and cost effective scalability, the future for this website/application looks bright as the company continues to push forward in innovation and user connectivity. 

References: 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinterest

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2398653,00.asp

http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/pinterest-stats/3/

http://www.cnet.com/au/products/pinterest/