← We Fixed It, You're Welcome
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- [00:01]
A
Welcome to we fixed it. You're welcome. The show where we take over companies, you come along for the ride and we try to put them back better than we found them. Welcome back. On today's episode, we're going to reach into a corner of the Internet that some people still use like crazy and some of us may have forgotten about a little. That's right, Pinterest, the classic website and social platform that turn the entire web into our personal inspo board. Pinterest, it's still alive and kicking and making some bold moves. Right now they're cutting people, cutting costs and betting big on E commerce to drive the company forward. Good old monetization. The play is, forget TikTok shops, come over to Pinterest. We're going to decide whether an all e commerce, all the time approach is the right move or whether we can come up with our own fix to do that. We've got Chino, Melissa, me, me. And we've invited someone else on to inspire us throughout this conversation. Please say hello to Leon Lin. Leon is the co founder and CEO of First Collab, a company that helps brands and creators collaborate on influencer marketing campaigns using machine learning and predictive analytics. And before that he spent over nine years at Pinterest where he was the head of discovery product and had a lot of influence over the user engagement features and capabilities. Welcome Leon, you tell us a little bit about yourself.
- [01:24]
B
Yeah, yeah, thanks for having me on. Yeah, yeah. Pinterest is very near and dear to my heart. I started at the company in early 2013 and yeah, spent almost a decade there. I spent most of my time, you know, I like to think about it as building up a lot of the algorithms that power Pinterest, helping build the very first version of recommendations there and then eventually search and related pins and eventually like my role was to basically over see all the different ways where users could discover content across the platform and yeah, and you know, kind of the decade that I was there, managed the product through a lot of different trade offs, helped the product grow, but also like kind of grow through interesting initiatives like growing the product internationally, trying to monetize the product, helping bring creators onto the product. So a lot of like really interesting challenges that we faced as we scaled through the years. So yeah, have a lot of thoughts about the product. Loved working on it during like my, my time there. So yeah, something, something I love discussing.
- [02:33]
A
Nice. Thanks Leon. It's great to have you here. You know things that we don't know and we're excited to bring you into this conversation before we do Chino, this, this Pinterest stuff's happening in real time. So tell us what's exactly going on in the moment and what are we here to talk about?
- [02:48]
C
Yeah, I think. Thank you, Leon, for joining us and excited, because I love Pinterest. I've been a Pinterest user since, you know, I don't want to say the dates, let's not date ourselves, but if we roll back the time, you know, if you remember the very early days of Pinterest, there was no shouting, no doom scrolling, just soft lighting, aspirational kitchens. It wasn't loud or thirsty and didn't yell at you to buy. Now every five seconds it sat in the quiet corner of the Internet with Inspo and it was really what I call the Internet's mood board this week, this little calm crack in the business. So Pinterest just announced widespread layoffs impacting around 15% of its workforce, along with reducing the space of their physical office spaces, which they are slated to happen all by the end of September of this year, 2026. So at the same time, the company is also doubling down on AI powered products that I'm sure, Leon, you had a hand at starting that foundation on. And also appointing its first ever Chief Business officer, Lee Brown, and making it very clear that their big bet is to do one thing and that is trying to win over Gen Z. So today we're really asking the question behind the headlines. You know, when is a platform that's built on slow inspiration and when they start to optimize for speed, skill and shopability, what gets lost in translation there? And so this episode on Pinterest is really about pushing into E commerce, content monetization and AI driven discovery. We'll be asking the question how much monetization is too much? And looking at the push and pull of purposeful commerce versus customer exploitation and whether you can evolve a platform without alienating your original loyal users that help build it in the first place. So let's really get into it.
- [05:07]
A
Nice.
- [05:08]
B
Yeah. Looking forward to it.
- [05:09]
A
Yeah, this is a good rundown. And it's funny because you think about the difference between purposeful shopping and intent, intentful shopping versus browsing. And Pinterest seems like from its inception, like it was designed for browsing. It's a place where you look around, you think about what you're going to buy. You might see where you might buy it elsewhere, but are you there to buy? At the beginning you weren't, and now all of a sudden you are.
- [05:34]
B
Yeah, One of the, like, greatest challenges that Pinterest has is that it wants to be a product that really is there throughout the full funnel of people's kind of, like, inspiration journey. Right? And that starts at the very top where you're just exploring or just having ideas or some intent around things you want to do. Right? Like, maybe you don't even know that you want to do something. Like, maybe, for example, you want to, you know, decorate your home. And you don't really even or have that intent, but you see some home decor images or videos that really inspire you to, like, think about that. And it needs to be able to capture user attention and, you know, engage and motivate users at the very top of the funnel, help them through that entire journey, whether it's kind of like, you know, the consideration stage or, like, the stage where you're actually thinking about, like, you know, how do I actually, like, bring this to life? All the way down to, like, the very end where you're actually, like, deciding, like, what to purchase and what to do to, like, really bring it to life. For example, I see, like, a bookshelf behind you, Melissa. Like, let's say you're, like, buying bookshelves on Amazon. What you do is, like, if you were to search bookshelves on Amazon, you'd see, you know, hundreds of bookshelves of different products. But it's like, products in isolation on white backgrounds. And that stuff is not interesting to browse at all. Right? Like, you don't want to open an app and just spend all your time, like, looking through that content. What Amazon has done is made, like, a really great, like, lower funnel experience where you can buy products and shop very easily, but it's not very good at, you know, serving the top of the funnel users, where it's like, I just come here to relax and get inspired. And now how do you kind of, like, seamlessly transition users to complete their journey and get them to, like, the bottom of the funnel, which is an entirely different product experience.
- [07:29]
C
Right.
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D
And I. I love what you have brought to the table here. I hope you don't feel like we're here to sabotage you or anything like that.
- [07:36]
B
I. I feel like it's three against.
- [07:37]
D
One kind of thing as you're representing Pinterest. But I love that Pinterest was born on creativity, really, and ideas. And to me, that's kind of the tension. Is that now, is it really a shopping site? Are you really pushing me to buy a plant or buy this, this vision board of things that I've seen, you know, wedding inspiration or whatever it might be. And so I think that's something that we, as, as a culture has. It has gone from one end of the spectrum to the other end of the spectrum. I do agree that I would love for Pinterest to be able to direct me to the exact bookshelf that I want. But at the same time, that might not be the reason I went onto.
- [08:31]
C
Pinterest to begin with.
- [08:32]
D
I wanted to look at relaxing, calming office spaces.
- [08:37]
B
Yeah.
- [08:38]
D
And get some ideas. I didn't necessarily want it to direct me to room and board. So I think that's kind of the tension that they're going through. And now when you look at all of the different social media, you know, you're just getting so much thrown at you at all times, and then realizing the little hashtag that you realize that the influencer is actually sponsored by whatever they're sharing. And that's frustrating because it doesn't feel authentic. And I think the great thing about Pinterest was it was just you and me. It was individuals out there creating these amazing boards and with ideas that you might not have even thought of, like having a wedding next to a river and all the things, whatever. So I just, you know, I don't want them to lose that because I think that's what's captured their loyalists. But I do understand the need. It's a business that needs to grow. It needs to figure out, how do you go to market with this? How do you take it to the next level? You're competing with TikTok Shop, you're competing with Amazon, you're competing with all of these places now. But at the same time, I feel like. And Pinterest isn't the only place. And we've been talking about this with a lot of different companies, but you get inundated with the. Buy, buy, buy. Yeah, no, the convenience of buying. And to me, that's not why I go to Pinterest. I mean, yes, ultimately I might end up there, but I also don't like that feeling of being somewhat used. I don't know if that's the right feeling. Chino. I don't know, there might be a better word for that than used, but I feel used. I feel kind of like that's.
- [10:30]
C
That's not why I'm here.
- [10:31]
D
I'm here to look at, you know, Leon's version of what, you know, a man cave should look like.
- [10:39]
C
Yeah, it's. It's. You brought up a lot of interesting points, Melissa and I, you know, as an OG Pinterest user, I remember, you know, you would go on, and it was very individual. But what was really interesting is I remember, you know, and I was not a girl that, like, did my wedding. I was not one of those. But you know how to redecorate my room that's tiny. And, you know, you. You want to find some cool spaces to inspire you as you're kind of going throughout your life. And when my friends and I would do that and we'd compare notes, interestingly enough, a lot of some of the same content was pushed to each other. So although I felt it was individual because a lot of the boards, for me, like, most of them are private. You don't really have access to other people's boards. But what was interesting to me back then was noticing there were a few pieces and content that we got pushed or things that we. We just happened to see again. Could that be because we're a group of friends, and so because of that, we all have similar tastes? There's a. There's a piece to that. Is it another part of kind of the early days of kind of information and data gathering? It could be for that too. When you have the hashtags and the ad buy in, and I think what the challenge is here, it is where you go for your ideas, and I love that. But I'm finding that a lot of the affiliate links and the ads continue to come at the forefront. So I'm seeing the same content over and over again where I'm like, this doesn't feel authentic. This is not something that I haven't seen that also hasn't been duplicated on reels on Instagram or TikTok. And so, as an OG who craves trying to find something different, I'm struggling a little bit to look for something that's kind of outside of what the algorithm is telling me I want, versus I'm actually having to really force it to push something. And I might get two or three blocks in before it pushes me back into the algorithm. So it's that kind of push and pull that. Leon, I would love to get your perspective, because I love Pinterest. It's one of my favorite. I work with creatives, just moved into a new place, and so I have been on Pinterest like crazy, but I just don't know how to solve for this problem. So I'd love your take on. On this.
- [13:00]
E
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- [15:01]
B
Of all, thanks for being such big fans of Pinterest for so long. I think like what you're seeing right now and a lot of the, I would say like experiences where it feels like it's very like commercial. Yeah, it's because it's coming at the tension of trying to kind of like make all parties happy and in this case like advertisers and creators.
- [15:27]
A
Thanks Leon. I think we're hitting on what I'm seeing is three friction points. One is when there aren't ads or there isn't monetization or commercialization and then all of a sudden there is you Know, that's, that's a tension point to say, wait a minute, I thought I understood the rules of engagement here. Now you're leveraging me and you're making some expectations on me that wasn't there yesterday. You know, that could create a point of audience consumer attention. A second would be, I'm here to browse. You know, like again, I'm here for inspiration. If I go to Zillow and I look at beachfront property somewhere and then all of a sudden I've got an agent poking up every five seconds saying, can I help you? Can I see? Do you want to see a showing? Well, now I'm here to just, you know, taking some pictures and maybe someday I'll come back to, I'll come back to Zillow. Yeah. But, but, but for the moment, I'm good. Or, you know, that's the shopkeeper tapping on the shoulder saying, saying, can I help you and get out. And then the, the third would be the crossover from one channel to another where when you talk about, you understand signals and buyer intent and it's funnel. If I've been browsing Google for something or I'm on Amazon or I've thought about something in my head and then all of a sudden I see it like, you know, like you're seeing over indexed in my, in my Pinterest board and my feeds and what's being suggested for me, then it crosses a line where I feel exploited. So those are the three points of tension that I'm picking up on. And I think we're getting maybe caught in those dynamics in the current situation, especially if it's the push toward not just content, like how do we monetize our content partners and content creators and what they're selling ingrained into the feeds. How do we do click through revenue and ad shares and all those things. And now how do you buy natively on the platform, Put in your credit card check out? That's a lot to throw at an audience at once.
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C
Yeah.
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A
Expect it all to work.
- [17:28]
C
And just someone who's trying to figure out how. What towel racks to put on, because that is what I'm for picture at. Because we. I have no idea what to do. But what's interesting is I think that there's an opportunity in terms of a solve for both for me. And I'm speaking so, so, so selfishly here, Leon. I'm going to be honest. And if Pinterest, if you're listening to this, please, I don't mind the slow burn. We miss something that's different. I get the ads, I get the business. And mind you, they just reduced their team size by 15%. So there's a bottom line there that we need to be very, very serious about. So I think it's also a very unique platform because people are planning and after planning, it's usually having to purchase those things. And so I wonder if it's, hey, let's make Pinterest very premium. If you want an ad spend here, that dollar is going to be so much more than it would be on TikTok because it's not happening four or five times. Right, sorry. To the brands who want to promote and put the ad spend there. I think that's a really great solution. Make it a little bit exclusive. I don't need everybody to send me everything. And that way, you know who's really serious. That could also just mean Amazon and the people with the big dollar putting their money where their mouth is. That is a fact. And I think, you know, there's a pool for that. Get Amazon to put the big bucks down and for the smaller suppliers for the local shops, maybe giving them a smaller ad spend so that as a user who wants to see something different, something outside of Amazon, really great opportunity because I also would love, you know, after four or five scrolls and I'm like, you know, I've created a little board of, okay, here's all of my towel rack holders. Is it 6? Rug? Is it 4? Is it too wide? Me and my husband are having a little bit of a disagreement. I need it shorter, he wants it wider. I'm on Pinterest. This is a live thing happening. But if Pinterest can then once we kind of curate our little internal board that's happening and share a mix of both, where I'm getting fed a few ads when I'm scrolling through that specific board on, you know, here's what Amazon's doing, but here's also a really cool local, maybe Canadian shop that I want to do that actually is a really custom homes that have different price points that, you know, I can see and being able to go to there and then, you know, having an affiliate link or whether it's a content creator who's an interior designer or something. But I think Pinterest is a very unique media that we consume. It's for the window shoppers who are likely going to be shopping and buying that. So I do think there's a space for it. But I think we should put the premium on the big brands. I don't want to see that Amazon, get them to pay it, Jeff can afford it, but let's also give opportunity for creativity there. And so I think that is my solve on how to do it so that it's low and slow. But curated as Instagram used to be your curated mood board.
- [20:46]
D
I'd love to add on to what you've said, Chino, because I'm always looking at how do you actually execute and operationalize a fix. And I think what you've brought up is a great example of where the customer is. And so, Leon, I'm always looking at it from a customer experience perspective. And definitely the segmentation of customers and what they're looking for is very across the board, so to speak. And I love that idea of getting it curated to the point where you actually do want to see what the opportunities are to purchase. So what about having tiered discovery boards? So Inspo only, Like there's the Inspo only page. You're not going to see any ads in this. This is just giving you ideas. And whether it's color, whether it's bathroom, whether it's towel racks, whatever it might be, versus the shop mode. And so you are able to toggle. And this would be interesting too, because this allows the creativity to remain authentic. Because it's really. You're looking at someone who creates a Pinterest board they're not affiliated with. You know, the towel rack. Right. But then when you hit shop mode, you. You're getting options of towel racks that are similar to what was on that Pinterest page. Right. And so letting the loyalists and the people that are seeking creative juices dodge those ads while you're also getting the algorithm and AI predictions of how you can actually boost sales and growth and retention by doing this universally across. Across the boards. But it's in the background and it's at the customer's request, so it feels more authentic and less like you're being pushed something that you didn't ask for and being pushed something that the Pinterest owner is being paid for. Yeah. Right. So there might need to be a little. I don't know, Leon, you might know the ins and outs of this more than I do around creative incentive overhaul, like the commissions overhaul or how they get paid. But these inspo to purchase journeys, not just I'm sponsored by Amazon Bookshelves, right. Rewards that you have pinned something really amazing. And the Toronto towel shop is excited because they're getting some. They're getting something back from Chino and you are able to get, you know, A couple bucks from that. Right. And it. But it's not like you're working with a specific company necessarily, so that's just an idea.
- [23:45]
B
Yeah. Like, I think you guys bring up, like, a lot of really great points, which I absolutely, really trust that the team at Pinterest is really working on. But, you know, some, some areas in which, like, I really think could help make the, you know, ad or commerce experience feel more natural. I think the first thing is just like, catching users more at the right time or when they're at the right stage. Right. I'll use the example of like, trying to purchase a towel rack. Like, I think we show a lot of ads and shoppable content and experiences where users are more in like a lean back browsing mode. Right. So this is like, you open up the homepage, you see a lot of ads when you' start off. Right. And we know that there are certain experiences like, yeah, Melissa, you mentioned, like, maybe being able to toggle onto to a shop. Shop mode. But also there are times in which we know that users have, like, higher intent or they kind of like, are more in the mood to actually, like, bring. Bring things to life. Right. Like when I'm browsing my boards, for example, I'm browsing my recipe boards because that's the time I'm actually looking to make a recipe. I might be browsing my home decor board because now I'm looking through the options of towel racks I saved, and that might be like, a better time to tell users, like, okay, this is like, when you can bring that to life. Right? Or even like, when you start to search, like, very specific towel racks, maybe that is bit more of like, an intent. So I think, like, there's one aspect of it of like, okay, put push, like users to shoppable experiences, like, when there is, like, more intent and, and when it's like they're deeper into that. That journey. I think there's a second part of it too where it's like, you know, you mentioned, like, maybe, maybe less like, big brands. And I more think about it as almost like, you know, how can we elevate the type of content that's coming from. From brands too, where it doesn't feel like as intrusive as an experience. Like, you know, like, the way to think about it is like, if you were to get, like, recommended, like a really awesome, like, towel rack that was like, perfectly designed, fit your aesthetic, and was placed exactly in a scene that matched your home, you would probably be like, you. You might find it like, really relevant. Right. Regardless of like, where you are in, in your journey. And so when you think about like, what do you need to like, get that? I think part of it is like, you just need like a larger diversity of brands and advertisers. Right. Like Pinterest is still relatively early on in their like, monetization and ad strategy relative to like a Facebook or Google. So we just haven't, we haven't onboarded as many like advertisers or brands yet. So we don't have as many towel racks to show you or as available. So it's harder for us sometimes to make things relevant. So as we like kind of get a larger diversity of businesses, hopefully we can show you something that more fits your tastes. And then, yeah, I think it's also like our responsibility to do a better job of figuring out like, what is relevant to you, what matches your tastes. And then I think there's a final aspect too where we can probably ask more from our brands to help create and upload ads or content that's more similar to like, what users want to like, browse. Like not a towel rack on a white background, but a towel rack in a, in a, you know, a relevant setting for you.
- [27:27]
D
I was going to ask about that because I feel like that cross sell ability so that if you went to the towel rack, Kohler or whoever it might be, you go to their site and they actually had that actual tile rack for sale and they had three different thumbnails images of Pinterest boards with that rack in the board and you could click on it and then go into Pinterest. That would be awesome because then they're also. You're also cross selling because, oh, I didn't realize that this matches the faucet and it also matches the little, you know, table tray. So I would love that kind of, you know, cross pollination of brand and Pinterest. I think that would actually be something too, to give people inspiration as they're, as they're shopping in like these big box places.
- [28:31]
A
So it's like a backwards discovery and it creates an environment. Yeah, I like that a lot. Well, Leon, let's stick with the, I don't know about the towel rack analogy, but let's stick, let's stick with the dinner analogy. So I'm, I'm looking up a recipe on Pinterest because I'm preparing to make dinner. I'm collecting these different recipes. I'm, I'm getting inspired. I'm in the mo. I'm going to. Okay, I Figured it out. But in the meantime I've got, and I'm not anti commercialization, right? This, this is a for profit company. They're there to leverage their user data and make money and all that. I'm not anti. But then I start seeing ads for content creators that are selling their own line of, you know, kitchen ingredient spices, kitchen ingredients, food preparation. Then I'm seeing doordash integrated into my feed somewhere. Then I'm seeing my local restaurant or a chain nearby, you know, integrated into my feed and all I wanted was a recipe. Um, and I'm getting this push and pull dynamic in my experience like how much what, what of those or maybe things I haven't even mentioned or favorite game versus of and part and parcel of the experience and how much of those are intrusive where it's like why am I even here anymore?
- [29:48]
B
Yeah, the way I think about it is that like, you know, I think it's really the responsibility of the platform to figure out what is the best content to give you for like your specific intent and then kind of like basically require that the content like meets that, like ex, like meets that bar that you want. So the way I think about it, right, is that like, you know, you mentioned like obviously like I run like a creator influencer marketing platform now, so I'm like a little biased around my creator content, right? But I always think that like, you know, even if you see a lot of like creator sponsor content, it's actually the responsibility of the platform to make sure that they're only showing that to you if it is at least as good as the other content that you could be seeing, right? So if you're looking for like a dinner recipe like you should be shown that creator content only if the creator was able to integrate a sponsorship and a well enough that like that content feels as good as a non sponsored piece of content. Right. And so that's to me like one of the beauties of influencer marketing is that like the content itself is engaging and it feels like less like an ad. But that's kind of like, you know, I would say like you mentioned like okay, you know, if I'm looking up dinner recipes, maybe I'll get like an ad for doordash, maybe I'll get like, you know, content from creators, etc. I think at the end of the day it's basically just like it's the responsibility of the platform to say like okay, what piece of content can we show Aaron that's most likely going to inspire him to create like an awesome dinner and just figure out like regardless of how that content came to be, regardless of if it came from an advertiser, if it came from a creator, if it's sponsor or not, like what is the content that's going to like give Aaron the best shot at making like a really great dinner at the end of the day. And the reason why like, you know, I think oftentimes it is kind of like sponsor creator content is that like yeah, like sponsorships allow creators now to spend, you know, their, their full time, make it their full time jobs to like make really great content. So I like to think like a lot of times too like yeah, the sponsor content can be just as good and just as relevant as, as content that's purely organic.
- [32:22]
C
I agree, kind of pushing over to you Aaron, but I think Leon, you brought up a really good point too of like diversifying your ad space. And I think Pinterest has solved kind of their nugget from your, what your point of view was. I think they need to do a better job selling to these smaller shops to say, you know what, you actually do want to get on Pinterest because people like me who are OG users are tired of seeing the Amazons and the really big companies like I, I crave finding you and I wouldn't be able to find you kind of without it because that's kind of where I'm looking for my board. So you know, jump on the Pinterest ad trade and you know, we'll give you a bit of a deal so you can get started as a smaller brand. Like I think there's something there. And so Aaron, from like the brand perspective, how do you think Pinterest can help really incentivize those smaller shops to help them diversify their content and everything else that we've been talking about?
- [33:23]
A
Well that's got a good question, Chino. I think you know, handholding and creator kits and training and educational materials. And this is not just how you do an ad creation in another platform, a standard ad. This is how you play within the Pinterest community and showcasing success story users. You see like, you know, MasterCard commercials where the small shop did it and MasterCard was there all the way. You kind of need those stories about emerging brands or web first brands and how they, they're using, they couldn't go a day without Pinterest.
- [33:57]
D
Well, I like the idea of also using AI and using the algorithm and the data that you have. So when you have information about a Pinterest participant such as Chino, for example, you can then focus, maybe spotlight four or five local businesses in the area and showcase what they have to offer and maybe how they've been inspirational and been able to fill in an inspiration board for Pinterest of other users, for example, Chino. So you could see that, like, hey, if you're looking for knickknacks and kitchen and kitchen tools, you need to go to Melissa's kitchen store here downtown in old Old Town. Right? And that would be wonder, a wonderful way for Pinterest to also help to diversify to your point, Gino and Leon, all of the people coming in from sponsors, ads, et cetera, et cetera, but actually make it feel curated. And actually, you know, that would be a great thing to be a Pinterest player of the month, right? And you get to be spotlighted as your, your small plant store, whatever it might be. That would be fabulous. And I, I wouldn't mind seeing that come up as soon as I logged into Pinterest versus big box type of ads, command doordash or whatever, whatever it might be. I mean, it would be lovely. Aaron, for example, for one of, you know, you've been searching for dinner recipes for one of the Pinterest highlights to be. This is one of those cooking classes where you get to go and sit and have a chef come in and you get to cook and da, da, da, da. Would you be interested in this? Would you like to see what it looked like? Right?
- [35:52]
C
That kind of thing.
- [35:53]
D
I, I like those kinds of things that feel very personalized. I mean, I think in today' world, we all know that the consumer wants things personalized. They want it responsive, they want it immediately. And so to me, you know, having something like that would be really a wonderful way to really kind of showcase both sides because, you know, like, it is about money. So at the end of the day.
- [36:21]
B
Yeah, I think, you know, to Ariel's point, I think this is just like something I thought about as you guys were speaking. But like, I think Pinterest does have like, a very unique opportunity with smaller businesses because it is the platform where people care the most about the content and less about the person behind the content. Right. I, you know, like, basically, like no one ever pays attention to, like, if there is even an avatar behind the content, they just judge the content for themselves versus, like, you know, other platforms, like, you know, like an Instagram or like an X, for example. Like, it's very important to know, like, why this piece of content appeared and who it appeared from. Pinterest like that affiliation is much less like important. And so I think it very much can work the same way for brands and advertisers as well, right? Like you want to, you want to buy like the best kitchen utensil. Like you're just going to look, evaluate it purely on the merits of the content and you can ignore the brand a lot of times because at the end of the day you're already trained to, to ignore that. On Pinterest you just care about like is this content great? Does it meet my aesthetic? Does it meet my use case? And I think that gives a lot of opportunity to smaller businesses that don't yet have the brand recognition but you know, have the product that, that really meets users needs.
- [37:52]
A
Does that work though, Leon? Because I like what you're saying and make it more diplomatic and let the best content win. But we were saying before big brands can outspend small brands and small neighborhood shops on content, small brands and creators can outspend free content. So does it create this even playing field or is it just really whoever is feeding the, feeding the machine and, and contributing the most has the best content?
- [38:18]
B
Well, the thing is like, you know, and this is again like it comes down to the platform's responsibility, right? So whenever a platform shows ads, it takes into consideration like a few things. It takes into consideration like how much is the brand paying for the ad or how much of the brand bid for that ad slot. Right. But it also takes into consideration things like how relevant is this for a user? Like there's a user happiness component. Like I want to make sure that like the user finds this ad useful and ultimately like how likely is it that the user ends up making a purchase or make, makes a conversion on the ad, right? So you know, in a world, yes, so like brands have like a lot of budget to spend but at the same time, right? There's, there's, it's a platform's responsibility to kind of like balance that alongside well what content is like most relevant to the user and ultimately what content is the user wanting to buy. And the way I kind of think about it as well too, right, Is that like if a brand makes like a really great product and finds their audience in many ways, right? Like they should have a nearly like unlimited budget for the platform because at the end of the day like it's ROI positive for them, like the marketing dollars they invest on the platform, they're getting more than that back from the platform as well. And so I think if you're able to find and Target your audience well, and the platform is doing a good job of finding that audience and getting them to make that conversion. You know, I think like, even like smaller brands have the company to or have the ability to eventually grow into very large budgets on a platform.
- [40:08]
C
I would totally agree with that, Leon. And I would say too, going back to that. So that is a solution on getting smaller shops to think, okay, what's the use case? Why do we need Pinterest? You've just outlined that beautifully. And I think for the bigger brands that have those big dollars, get them to pay more, cut it back, make it more selective, as I shared earlier, because they can afford it, right? They do know that even though it might cost them a little bit more, Pinterest is still where people plan and usually you're going to purchase. And so to your point, Leon, the positive ROI on that is undeniable. And so I think Amazon or another big brand will still put that money in. But from a user perspective, if you make that more selective, bump up the price to the big stores, give the little guys a little opportunity to keep that diversity in there, you're kind of balancing it out. You're making me happy as an OG user. You're allowing me to shop because I will, because I need to find that dish thing or, you know, the towel rack. But I think you're able to kind of balance both by doing that. So it's a really good solve and point there, Leon.
- [41:27]
A
All right, well, building off of that, we're going to go into fix mode. We've got some fixes on the table. Let me pull them together. So when ads and ad integration and commerce integration is contextual, it better be useful, it better be interesting to the individual and valuable to that individual. I presume if you start, stop. If you start tuning out ads and you're not responding to the purchase behavior they're signaling for you, then your feed changes and it adapts over time and it starts to re calibrate around you and your interests. And you don't just keep getting served those discovery ads that you don't want. It's got to be adaptive and the algorithms have to prove that on an individual basis and then also fight the urge to put the biggest spenders front and center all the time. So maybe there is that tiered kind of advertising levels where the biggest pay the most, which creates kind of a nice subsidy for smaller shops and neighborhood shops where they can come and play too. And if, look, if they've got the best content and it's A small creator or a small shop, they get, they get front of, front of the line and then you gotta. For people who are there to browse and get inspired, which is what Pinterest was there for in the first place. And for creators that are not looking to monetize necessarily and they just want to have recognition or have self expression, don't kick a knot either. Like they have to be able to play in this ecosystem. Brands can get behind Pinterest by kind of decentralizing it and using their own product lines for sort of dispel. We call it a backwards discovery where you can see things not just on the Amazon way, where it's clean product shot on a neutral background, but integrated into living rooms or environments or things like that and create this nice little brand collage or product collage which can take you into Pinterest. And so it would be a nice way of, you know, we'll call it backwards or reverse discovery. I got a couple other things, but I'll throw those in at the end. If we walk up to Pinterest and say, hey, we, it's our turn. This is all the stuff we're going to give you. Melissa, did we fix it?
- [43:45]
D
I think we did. I think one of the things is again my customer centric vision of this and strategy would be really looking at, like I said, either the tiered discovery boards with the inspo only or shop only or even badges like they do on TikTok and things like that where you see shop local badge, right? On something you see sponsored badge meaning big box, whatever it might be. Or you can even have control as a user to mute any commerce algorithm so you don't have to see any shopping, it's just seeing the actual content on the board. I will love that. I also think that it's important for, to create the, the most authentic creative control experience for influencers and the Pinterest posters. So for me that inspo to purchase journey should be, should be monetized, but in a way that isn't. I'm sponsored by the bookshelf, right? So I created a board that has the bookshelf in it. It should be more. I created this, this amazing board and you can click through and go to the commerce site and see where you can purchase some of these things. And if someone does, they get something back from them. And so it feels more authentic than just, oh, I actually have, you know, a phone or something like this that I'm trying to sell. Right. So it doesn't feel like you're Being sold something all the time. You're being sold an idea versus an inspiration and a feeling and a vibe versus actually something that you can go and decide on your own if you want to purchase. So that's how I view that.
- [45:38]
A
I'm with you. All right, I buy it. Thanks, Melissa. Gino data. We fix Pinterest.
- [45:43]
C
I think we fix it. I love the idea, Melissa, of that inspo to purchase aspect there. I do think leaning on what Gen Z is looking for from the data we've talked about in many episodes of shopping local sustainability, you know, giving the little shops more opportunity to have an ad spend is really important and, you know, maybe getting the bigger guys to subsidize it. But again, having Leon on as well from that content and influencer creator, sharing pieces of content that actually feel inspo worthy versus just that hard push would be really helpful and to kind of pull the needle through the thread or however that saying goes. I actually found, you know, a towel rack last night from looking at someone's content where they were walking through kind of their new Renault in Toronto. So happened to be. And I screenshotted that and I think really edge use case. But it really does bring the point home that Leon shared of having really great influencer content that feels aligned to Pinterest original values.
- [47:01]
B
That's awesome.
- [47:03]
A
Congratulations on the towel rack too. Thanks, Gina. Leon, how are you feeling about all this?
- [47:10]
B
Yeah, I think I'm feeling great. I think we discussed a lot of things that I think. Yeah, Pinterest is definitely thinking about and it's, it's critical for them to, to invest in and make sure that we really kind of pay attention to this in order to fix Pinterest long term. You know, the way I would kind of like summarize a lot of the fixes we propose right. Is just like Pinterest needs to stay authentic to like, what its core value is. I think Pinterest is still the best platform for folks to plan their futures and make their futures a real. And you know, at the end of the day, like, I think it's, it's on the Pinterest team to, to make sure that every user, every time they visit Pinterest is feeling somehow nearer to the future they want to create. Which means like, making sure that, you know, whether we're serving, servicing more ads or more shoppable content and more creator content, we hold that bar for all of that content and we ask ourselves like, okay, does this content actually help bring users closer to the future that they envision? Right. Now Pinterest is kind of like at a place where, you know, a lot of this content is new. They're experimenting. So sometimes it doesn't feel like it's helping users necessarily getting there. And I think, yeah, it's really just the responsibility of the platform to figure out like, how can we make sure that all of these new pieces of content are still helping users like ultimately like get to why they're coming to the platform. And I think we mentioned things like better relevance, more advertisers, smaller businesses, you know, understanding user intent better. Those are all things that are going to be critical for Pinterest to invest in to make sure that at the end of the day they're still authentic to their, to their underlying like user experience.
- [49:07]
A
That's great stuff. I'm going to go back to Melissa, you said something about, and I'm just going to throw this in too into the mix. I'm not saying I'm sold on these, but you mentioned the inspo mode versus shop mode, which sounds nice. I don't know. You know, there's still going to be ad integration in the inspo mode. We'd figure that out. But I like the toggle ideas. We'll put that into the mix. There's also, they could go the mode of the direction of like a Costco club member membership, you know, you know you're talking about elevating or, or doing more of a premium aspect. So you could be tapping into the mentality of those who are here to shop. You will create this curated community driven shop experience and you get benefits and you get a club membership and show your card at the door and type of thing, you know, you're one of us. So that could be another revenue driver or you could go that route with a club membership and you kind of buy your way out of it. So if you shop enough every month and you hit your tier, then your membership's free, you know, but there's a minimum base commitment for those that are there for the shopping experience potentially. You know, we've all agreed Pinterest is, is the E commerce switch is flipped. Like we're doing this, we're on the Pinterest side, we're getting it, we're going to get aggressive about selling you stuff and if you do what we ask of you and you're, you're using, it's purposeful, you're getting good discovery here. We're showing you things you like and you're responding, then you can essentially cover your membership. So just another way of creating passive revenue as they're looking at active revenue too. That's going to do it for this episode. I feel good about our fixes, but like I said earlier, it's a breaking story, so let's put a pin in it for now. We might come back to this one. Before we go, I'd like to give thanks one more time to Leon Lin. Leon, how can our listeners keep up with you? How can they learn more about First Collab and all the stuff you're doing?
- [51:09]
B
Yeah, well, thank you so much for having me on. Yeah. Kind of just to give some background about First Collab. So the whole reason I got started with First Collab is first, when working on creators at Pinterest, I saw the enormous value that creators were able to help advertisers kind of like, promote their content. But I also saw that, like, you know, when I first joined Pinterest, the entire discovery experience was following based. You follow people and you got their content. By the time I had left Pinterest, less than 2% of the content you saw came from people you followed. So everything now was driven by algorithms, recommendations, et cetera. But, you know, the way I saw, like, influencer marketing evolving was that it was still very much stuck in the stage of, like, let's go pick the largest influencers with the most, the largest audience in my vertical and sponsor them. And as you know, these social media platforms have shifted. That strategy isn't necessarily, like the best way to get ROI anymore. So really, like, what we do at First Collab is really helpful. Help brands work with influencers at scale and work with the influencers that actually drive the right results or the best results based upon a much more like, metrics oriented approach. So I would say it's basically influencer marketing for kind of the new age of how influencer marketing should work. And we work with a lot of brands like Notion and Gamma and Framer and have proven out a lot of success stories there and now run some of the largest social media campaigns. So, yeah, check us out. First collab. We're on LinkedIn firstcollab.com as well. And so, yeah, if you're running marketing interested in influencer marketing, like, feel free to set up a chat with me and happy to chat with you about how to get your influencer marketing program into a good place.
- [53:07]
A
Very cool. Thank you so much, Leon. Thank you, Chino. Thank you, Melissa. If you, our listeners, have a Pinterest board you want us to see, including towel racks, we'll take them. If you think we might like it, send it in@wefixeditpod.com if you're turning into a fixaholic and you love what we're doing, help us grow our community. Tell others about our show. Give us a review. Keep listening for new episodes of We Fixed It. You're welcome and we will see you next time. We hope you enjoyed this episode of We Fixed It. You're welcome. We go into every episode somewhat cold, and nothing we say should be construed as legal advice, financial advice, or anything that would get us in trouble. All trademarks, IP and brand elements remain property of their respective owners.