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Is Voice-Based Bubbly the New Twitter?
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Ash
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In India, thousands of consumers are going from tweeting to bubbling.
A hot new social-networking service dubbed Bubbly, which is essentially a voice-based Twitter, is quickly gaining popularity among Indians. And thanks to Bollywood celebs being early adopters, Bubbly is growing virally and with virtually zero marketing spend.
Bubbly is the brainchild of 5-year-old mobile and social app firm Bubble Motion, which is based in Silicon Valley and Singapore. Its first product was BubbleTalk, a person-to-person voice-messaging service that, instead of SMS, sends mobile audio messages and has about 100 million users now.
Here's how Bubbly works: Anyone can sign up to follow a friend, family member or favorite celebrity or brand. Posting messages and following is free, and once a new message has been recorded and sent out, users get an alert. If they choose to listen, they pay for the airtime.
Bubbly's business model is based on its revenue-sharing partnerships with telecoms. In India, that includes two giants, Reliance Communications and Bharti Airtel.
In a country where many have access to cellphones but far fewer to the web, this type of mobile blogging service seems to make sense. By some estimates, India has the fastest-growing population of mobile phone users in the world as cellphone operators add millions of new customers each month. By 2012, India may have 650 million cellphone users.
But Mr. Clayton said Bubbly is targeting five major global markets -- India, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia and Brazil -- because they all offer large, mobile-savvy populations whose telecoms and cellphone users are "also open to cool, new innovative stuff." A web component may have a role in the launch of Bubbly in Japan, but in most markets the focus will remain on a mobile-only version of Bubbly for now.
By DOMINICK | WASHINGTON, DC March 12, 2010 08:57:13 am: "In a country where many have access to cellphones but far fewer to the web, this type of mobile blogging service seems to make sense." This is all we need to know. Asking myself: Would I rather read a text or listen to a Bubble?... the answer is always to read. Social courtesies, privacy, and signal availability dictate this answer. Also - how does a reply work? Replies are half the fun (and in many cases even more so!) cheers//dom
By maitis | Mumbai March 12, 2010 09:08:04 am: Sorry, to spoil the party, but this article is not written without adequate background research. Twitter is now ranked #12 in USA and hold your breath #11 in India (on Alexa. It is the fastest growing service in India. Every month we are seeing trending topics (globally) come up in context of India. The service (bubbly) being reviewed may be in pilot mode with some telecom providers, but clearly has no place in minds of consumer, and thus the claims in this article are clearly misleading. We should know, as one of India's leading digital agencies. Sandip. CEO | experiencecommerce.com
