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Instagram Founder Kevin Systrom: Most Successful Things Are Pivots

By Kevin Systrom · Startup Growth · 1 min read

Instagram was not Systrom's first idea. It was his third pivot. He says most billion-dollar companies started as something else.

Key Points

Instagram started as Burbn — a location check-in app that nobody used correctly
Users ignored the main feature and just shared photos
Systrom killed everything except photos. Instagram was born in 8 weeks.

Most successful things are pivots. The first idea almost never works.

Burbn

Systrom built Burbn. Check-ins, plans, points, photos.

Users signed up but used it wrong. They ignored check-ins and posted photos.

The data was clear: people wanted to share photos, not locations.

If you look at a lot of the largest public successes, many of them had some sort of pivot along the way.

The Pivot

Systrom made the hardest decision a founder can make: kill the original product.

He stripped out everything except photos. Rebuilt from scratch in 8 weeks.

Instagram launched. It did one thing. It worked.

Most successful things are pivots.

The Pattern

YouTube started as a dating site. Twitter started as a podcast platform. Slack was a failed game.

The first idea almost never works. The pivot is where the magic happens.

The founders who win are the ones willing to kill their original vision.