The loyal customers of BlackBerry still stick to the device and its services.
WhatsApp recently announced that it would end its support from BlackBerry by the end of the year. The move did shake Canadian organization but it still has something to rejoice. Although its relevance in global smartphone market might be shrinking, its instant messaging is still a major hit in Indonesia.
BlackBerry Messenger, dubbed as BBM, is very popular among the loyal Indonesians, which use the service to stay connected with their friends and family. An Indonesian user cited that he has been using BBM accounts for so many years to efficiently manage online business that comprises of selling imported goods from China. He added that three out of four BBM accounts are run on a BlackBerry device and the reason he has chosen BBM is that in Indonesia, a large number of people use BBM instead of Line or WhatsApp.
Facebook’s WhatsApp has major dominance in the global messaging market with a whopping billion monthly active users but not all is same in Indonesia. In a statement in January, BlackBerry disclosed that the BBM has over 55 million monthly users which make it significantly dominant in Indonesian messaging app market. In comparison, with around 50 million active users for each app, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp apparently tread behind, deduced by the estimates of We Are Social – a U.K. based social media consultancy.
A segregated account representing the number of users of both applications has not been provided by Facebook, which owns both messaging platform. It has only told that currently, worldwide 800 million people use the app. Last year, as of fourth quarter, the social network, was reported to have 82 million monthly active users in Indonesia. According to a Facebook spokeswoman, 77 million out of 82 million active users access the app through mobile devices.
Due to its secure ecosystem, many Indonesian companies and professionals chose BlackBerry over the rest of the devices which made the Southeast Asian nation top market for its BBM. Furthermore, BlackBerry has dominance in Nigeria and South Africa.
In 2014, BlackBerry introduced new features which include an in-app shop. The in-app shop enabled users to get stickers along with other virtual items, advertising tools for brands, sponsored contents, and mobile payment. In Indonesia alone, 750,000 channels were created including major online retailers so that they use the platform for the efficient promotion of their goods and services.
The app also made the interaction of the sellers with the consumers convenient. Also, the company reported that stickers became significantly popular among the users which can be supported by the fact that over 1 billion stickers were received and sent by the users monthly.
The $4 billion organization envisions creating an app which is the amalgamation of advertising, chat, and e-commerce similar to WeChat – an app created by China’s Tencent Holdings.
Although the company is hopeful about maintaining its dominance in the Indonesian region but the analysts showed their skepticism, fearing that other messaging platforms have a lot of potential to take over BBM. Few analysts have purported that in order to maintain its lead in Indonesia, BlackBerry should choose a singular platform – either a multifunction platform like WeChat or like WhatsApp – a pure chat application.
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