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Comment by mrharrison | Hacker News Reader

I like how their success story keeps changing. I think it was a TED interview or something like that I heard a couple years ago of their success story. Which was Paul Graham, convinced them to go meet their customers face to face to learn their customers and form a personal relationship with them. Now it seems to be bright pretty pictures.

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This comment seems a little... prosecutorial.

Why should there be only one reason? It has been obvious for years that design is a huge factor in Airbnb's success, and that it's a lot more than "bright pretty pictures". That shit is hard and they nailed it. I'm sure they did some other things too.

I feel like you're contradicting yourself here. Yes, there are probably more than one reasons for their success. That is why focusing on one (design in this case) is silly.

Slightly meta here - but I think everyone here (including myself) is just being pedantic about the article. If you want to know what makes successful businesses reading 1 or 2 articles about one on globally distributed publications is not going to give you the whole picture.

Founders at Work is a good example of painting a better picture -> http://www.amazon.com/Founders-Work-Stories-Startups-Early/d...

I love that book, and I fully agree with your comment.

Its true, its not one thing that makes a good product. I think this article lines up with their recent release of their new branding, and this article is trying to turn that social snafoo into a positive. Which is a good move, and is what they should do. I agree nice pictures make a big difference. I was going to put a link to vrbo, but they went and copied airbnb's site. VRBO had average pictures and average functionality for years and the site and is much bigger than airbnb. I think it really all comes down to distribution in the end. Pretty pictures will get people to stay, but aren't end all be all.

The title of the article is a bit grandiose; however I suspect their success is likely the net effect of many great small decisions like this.

Probably "helped transform" would be better.

The graph of the data with the high quality, bright photos showed a "WOW!"-like increase. I think they have a copy of the graph in Lean Analytics now. It is a dramatic change. Not like "Oh we saw an increase in traffic" but more like hockey-stick difference.

I think everyone knows better pictures are better, but I don't think anyone realized how much of a large difference it could make--especially in their area.

—Oh here is a copy I found real quick. As far as I know, they hired a few photographers, saw a statistical difference, and then decided to hire 20 http://i.imgur.com/VpYTF9L.png

The graph you linked shows them already on the uptick before going to do the photos but the article doesn't mention that.

In the classical 12-part monomyth, the visit with PG could be considered the "Supernatural Aid" part. [0]

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monomyth#Supernatural_Aid

I like how their success story keeps changing

Probably because it's difficult/impossible to identify the real causes of any company's success and we want to attribute it to something we can digest. This podcast episode on Survivorship bias is very relevant: http://youarenotsosmart.com/2013/05/23/survivorship-bias/

I've come across articles about the story of AirBnB's success a few times, and it's been pretty much the same one as linked here. Anyway I don't think there has to just be "one thing" that can be a turning point for a startup, they usually go through multiple ups and downs and any number of stories you could point to that was "the reason" for their success or ultimate failure.

Let me ask you this, which one of these services looks more appetizing?

- http://san-francisco.eat24hours.com/

- https://www.trycaviar.com/san-francisco

Bright pretty pictures give a pretty damn obvious advantage.

The problem here is that you view these as two different things, not that the story keeps changing. Great design begins by spending time with your customers and truly understand their wants / needs. It's not about pretty pictures.

It's a BS marketing spin that keeps changing alright.

Neither design played a huge role, nor "meeting their customers face to face". The world is filled with failed startups with great design.

The simple explanation is: they simply offered a product people needed for it's value + some luck.

But I guess the product having a use value (as opposed to nice design or soapy stories about "connecting" with their customers) does not cut it as an offering anymore.

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