The fight for the next billion!
The social media landscape has changed over the years. Facebook changed its algorithms in January last year and took a massive hit on monthly active users and number of people creating content on their website, and its revenues went down by 70% in that particular quarter and this showed us how fickle digital businesses can be. Facebook has been very smart in acquiring Instagram and Whatsapp, can we say Mark Zuckerberg saw it coming?
All this has made the Indian social apps the hottest sector to invest in for VC firms and other tech investors. Vernacular apps are taking over because they have overcome the language barrier with great technology and simplicity.
Maybe or maybe not, but the next billion people are here to be taken up by other social media platforms as the current platforms do not just cater to the population which has been left out. There are language barriers, education barriers and technology barriers which are to overcome. All this has made the Indian social apps the hottest sector to invest in for VC firms and other tech investors. Vernacular apps are taking over because they have overcome the language barrier with great technology and simplicity. These apps are generally engaging and allow you to share content on a click and content is currently the king.
We have seen YouTube stars, LinkedIn influencers, Instagram & TikTok celebrities come up in the past decade. These people connected and made content for certain populations as they could connect to them, but social media still has only reached one-seventh of the world population. Big companies like The Alibaba Group, Google and Tencent Holdings are making rich investments in order to get the next billion people in India. Vernacular apps like Sharechat, Manch, Clip app, Vokal, Roposo have all raised capital to scale their businesses. The question who is going to win? Or are they all going to take a part of the market share?
Vernacular content is hard to create because historically, mainstream media has been inspired by widely spoken languages. As an organization, we have been able to tackle this issue via our database and connections. We at One Impression are helping apps like TikTok, Sharechat and VMate create vernacular content and reach out the untapped user-base in various parts of India and worldwide. Who else is ready to reach out to the new internet users out there? Get in touch!
Please let me know your take on this change in dynamics in the comment section, below. You can reach out to me at [email protected]