There are so many ways to connect these days. The era of the smart phone has redefined mobile etiquettes. Its absolutely fine to connect with people any time of the day, any hour because now its possible to just Facebook or what’s app them.
But who is the most connected; the most passionate of all apps which makes it simply difficult for you to exist without. Like most sci-fi and very popular dooms day subjects, lets assume we had only one option in the world what would it be? That’s the topic of exploration today.
Interestingly, with the advent of Brand management and differentiation every large brand is aware that they need to ‘differentiate or die’ and you will notice that unlike the olden days, the brands that have been launched in the social space the last decade or or so have all begun in that manner – very clear and focused , single minded at best of what they are about. Then a decade later they seem to have a fusion, slowly eating up spaces, one key example is the sharing to messaging space, the LinkedIn like!…from being a professional connector to also creating content…or the Facebook messenger. Twitter by far as stuck to its proposition and to that extend I guess its been a hit for those who believe in ‘Broadcasting’ more than just tweeting. Seriously its not just any ‘Tweet’ anymore and now more than ever!
So why are social media brands wanting to do more and create more value? Ok one could be that they want all the billions of people on one platform. And then there is the other conglomerate approach where there is buyouts of the best chat service, the best picture sharing service and being the force. But above all, what is the role of these social instruments in ones life and who is indispensable.
Talking about the role, I am a Facebook favorite; there could not have been another idea on earth that could have connected all of us young old, the distantly related, the cross border friend, and the school and college gangs together. But I realize that today we use Facebook to find people and then connect with them on other properties. While we may never abandon a Facebook, with chat services like What’s app and VoIP services like Viber and Skype, the actual self actualization of the connection does not seem to be on Facebook on a sustained basis.
So a simple example of how we transcend from a Facebook account, my business school gang has been one of the most savvy internet buffs since 2000, we had a email group as early as 2000 and then at some point we moved on to Facebook. Recently with the view of celebrating our 15 years reunion one bright soul linked us all as a group on what’s app! And lo! It has never been quite since.
What I realised is that while we were connected on Facebook individually, as a group, and we could ‘pm’ each other we were not active as we are on what’s app. On an average the group posts around 350 – 450 messages a day, it’s a combination of messages, pictures, video files and voice messages. I noticed that the groups’ Facebook time seems to have been eaten into. And interestingly, how come what’s app has made something happen that Facebook could not!
It could be any number of reasons, what’s app had an instant ness to it, it was lighter to use, it does not hang like Facebook, its very network and wi-fi friendly, or it is like plain old SMS but free! And does what MMS failed to do.
So coming back to the initial question again, if there was a federal law or a dooms day problem and if there were only one social networking thingy on earth what would we believe was the most required and most dependable. Remember there could be network issues as well!
And the answer I felt was not the Viber, the Skype, it will never be the Instagram or the twitter, it could be Facebook but may not be very network friendly, but I am sure it probably will be What’s App! Because its simple, practical and makes connections happen in an instant!
And I guess then it was worth the $19Billion after all in “connecting the worlds peoples”. Smart move I say!
The Author is an Independent Brand Professional; all views are her
own and do not represent any organization.
anitapradeep 