Pinterest Now Third-Biggest Social Network

Pinterest is now the third most popular social network in the country, according to a recent report by data miners Experian.

Experian’s “2012 Digital Marketer: Benchmark and Trend Report” states that 91 percent of adults use social media regularly in December 2011. And one of the biggest climbers in a short amount of time has been Pinterest, a digital pinboard, which had its traffic rise 50 percent from January to February of this year, VentureBeat reported. It also said it had 21.5 million visits in the week ending January 28.

Google's Larry Page may also have a problem giving Pinterest the third-biggest social network title, especially since Google+ most recently held the honor. Page said in an earnings call Thursday that Google+ traffic rose 10 million from January to 100 million active users by the end of March.

“Well over 100 million users are active on Google+,” Page said. “Activity on the Google+ Stream itself is increasing too. We’re excited about the tremendous speed with which some people have amassed over one million followers, as well as the depth of the discussions taking place among happy, passionate users — all evidence that we’re generating genuine engagement.”

While some may scoff at Page's statement or question the meaning of "active" on Google+, can we really trust a week's worth of data on Pinterest? Sure if we extrapolate its most popular week 4.2 times, we get 90.3 million users on Pinterest, but that's not reality. That's Pinterest on the best week in the best month of its existence.

In the video below, NBC Bay Area talked with the co-author of "The Power of Pinterest" about the rise in popularity of the social networking site. Christi Tullis explains how small businesses can get most out of their pins.