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BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
We organized a marketing event with bloggers who seemed like the kind of people that would enjoy Pinterest, and they introduced the service to their audiences.
Video
YC
Ben Silbermann at Startup School SV 2016
@ Y Combinator
11/09/16
Related Takeaways
BS
Ben Silbermann
10/25/13
@ Y Combinator
We started to have meetups to connect with people who shared common interests, which is fundamentally what Pinterest is about.
BS
Ben Silbermann
10/25/13
@ Y Combinator
The few people that used Pinterest actually really loved it, so instead of immediately changing the product, I thought maybe I could just find more people like me.
BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
In the beginning, we did desperate things to attract users, like changing Apple Store computers to display Pinterest, hoping to create buzz.
BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
When raising money, we had to articulate how big we thought Pinterest could be, which helped us attract ambitious and creative people to the team.
RC
Ron Conway
10/27/13
@ Y Combinator
I didn't discover Pinterest; my team recognized its potential, and I was impressed by Ben Silbermann's calm and thoughtful approach as a founder.
BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
As Pinterest grew, we built a research team to understand users better, especially those from different countries or infrastructures.
BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
When we released Pinterest, it didn't grow quickly at first, but we kept going because we thought it was a really cool product that we enjoyed using.
BS
Ben Silbermann
11/09/16
@ Y Combinator
While waiting for the app approval, I collaborated with a friend to create a tool for collecting things online, which eventually evolved into Pinterest. In the early days of Pinterest, we thought it would be cool to create a tool for ourselves to collect things, which we believed could also help others see the world differently.
BS
Ben Silbermann
10/25/13
@ Y Combinator
A lot of people in Silicon Valley didn't get Pinterest; they looked at it and said it was visual and not organized in real time, but the fact that it made sense to someone was what really mattered to me.