For an app that has over 460-million unique users and over 608-million registered users, it was only a matter of time before Viber decided to go beyond instant messaging, voice and calls. Viber has rolled out Public Chat, which is essentially a social media platform for users to engaged with celebrities, personalities and brands.
India is Viber’s largest market with over 33-million users and they have gone big in India by roping in biggies like Sachin Tendulkar, Anushka Sharma and Ranveer Singh, among others. Tendulkar, for instance, has already a handful of posts and over 11,000 followers. “You can’t help but be excited when the counter of followers starts to tick. There are some chats that we opened in the UK last week with over 3,00,000 followers and similar numbers in Philippines. We are sure to see similar numbers in India too,” says Mark Hardy, chief marketing officer, Viber. He said that Viber’s social media platform is different from Twitter and Facebook which had no followers when they started. For the record, Whatsapp has over 70-million users in India and 600 million globally.
“We are switching on social with a user base of 460-million users worldwide. They are already there. The way I see it is that we have almost got a responsibility to our users to deliver from Day 1,” Hardy said.
