Plying Pins Of Interest

<p>Soon, Pinterest users will have the option to buy pins they like on the&nbsp; platform. The innovation on Pinterest, brought on public demand, is expected to increase the rate of impulse buy through digital media among mobile shoppers.<br><br>Pinterest is a social media site that allows users to create collections of photos, articles, recipes, videos and other images that are called “pins”.<br>While browsing through Pinterest, if a user comes across an item with a blue pin button, he can buy the product directly through the social media platform. Further, Pinterest has also developed a secure payment gateway for completing transactions; it allows users to pay through Apple Pay or credit cards.<br><br>With buyable pins, Pinterest will now enter the arena of e-commerce where it will have to compete with powerhouses such as Amazon globally and Flipkart and Snapdeal in India. That said, the new feature is expected to get Pinterest a larger user base that will see the application as an online shopping destination.<br><br>Buyable pins are a treat for sellers too as Pinterest will also feature promoted pins on its application to garner greater revenues for itself and more visibility for the sellers’ products. In the US, Apple users will be able to enjoy the option of ‘buyable pins’ on Pinterest sooner than their Android peers who will see the button being rolled out a couple of weeks later.<br><br><strong><img alt="" src="http://bw-image.s3.amazonaws.com/VR-16-july.jpg" style="width: 300px; height: 329px; margin: 3px; float: right;">Facebook Goes Lite</strong><br>Social networking giant Facebook has rolled out its lighter version — Lite — for users accessing its services with slow data connectivity and poor bandwidth. The application, which is less than 1 MB in size, comprises Facebook’s prime features such as news feed, photos, and notifications, among others. “Facebook Lite was built to give people a reliable Facebook experience when bandwidth is at a minimum,” says Vijay Shankar, product manager of Facebook Lite, in a blog post. The application is available on all Android phones.<br><br><strong>All That Hype &nbsp;</strong><br>In a recently released study of more than 3 million social media user interactions, Forrester found that for every 1 million followers of a brand on Facebook, only about 700 active engagements occurred (i.e., liking pictures, commenting on threads, etc.). Twitter’s active engagement rate was about 300 for every 1 million followers. After all the math was done, the average follower to brand engagement rate for top social media platforms was about 0.1 per cent.<br><br><strong>Huge Hangout</strong><br>Latest findings reveal that 33 per cent of all professional people are on LinkedIn, making it a gold mine for professional acquisition, recruiting and industry networking.<br><br><strong>Leaders</strong><br>Kiran Mazumdar Shaw<br>@kiranshaw Chairman &amp; MD, Biocon<br>“Every investor I speak to in the US is now getting impatient n wants Modi Govt to ‘Walk the talk’ of regulatory hurdles n business ease.”<br><br>Jeff Weiner<br>@jeffweiner CEO, LinkedIn<br>“Compassion is not conditional. To the contrary, it’s arguably of greatest value when most difficult to summon.”<br><br>(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 13-07-2015)</p>