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Bill Ready’s Pinterest Turnaround Plan Is Expensive

By  |  Feb. 6, 2023 4:36 PM PST
Photo: Photo: Shutterstock

Pinterest on Monday gave us an updated view into its new CEO Bill Ready’s strategy to revitalize the company. It’s an expensive plan, leading to such a spike in spending that profit fell a whopping 90%. And Pinterest, similar to Meta Platforms, is forecasting revenue that’s barely growing, thanks to a downturn in digital ad demand. But Ready can point to one big win: Pinterest’s once-sinking user base is now expanding, and even has picked up momentum with coveted Gen Z users. 

Ready is ironing out this strategy without wasting a lot of time extolling Pinterest’s creator efforts—a contrast with former CEO Ben Silbermann. Pinterest, under his leadership, mentioned creators more than 20 times in its third quarter letter to shareholders last year. Ready, in contrast, barely mentioned creators on Tuesday, except when talking about his plans to bring in more videos from publishers, including Condé Nast, which announced a partnership with Pinterest last week to distribute more than 160 videos on its app. Such partnerships have contributed to an increase in the company’s spending, though the biggest drag came from a 67% jump in sales and marketing tied to its own brand campaigns. 

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