Messaging apps are built to offer a free alternative to SMS, expanding themselves to a range of platforms. To sustain their business and to raise funding for some/additional revenue, most opens up a sticker shop. And that includes Viber.
Viber, a cross-platform instant messaging voice-over-Internet Protocol developed by Viber Media has gone premium on October 2013. It has begun selling stickers following its latest update, version 4.0, and also rolled out a push-to-talk function a month later in November 2013.
Viber 4.0 sees the debut of the Sticker Market, from which Viber users can download more than 1,000 new stickers. Some of these stickers may be downloaded for free. Stickers (glorified emoticons) have proved quite popular for other popular messaging apps, most notably Line and KakaoTalk.
Although Viber has been offering free stickers in a Facebook-like fashion since December 2012, with its 200 million registered users comfortable with them, it's about time Viber finally jumped on the sticker-selling business.
It's push-to-talk function, which lets users send short voice messages to each other, is claimed to be faster than other messaging apps:
Typically, Push To Talk is a four-step process - record, send, download, play. Viber does all four at the same time. This way, the average response time to a 15 second message is 4-6 seconds, rather than 45-60 seconds.
The new version of Viber also offers support for Android tablets, with the new user interface taking advantage of the tablet form factor. The new tablet-optimized interface works in a way similar to the app's desktop version, bringing the user's mobile contacts to the tablet and offering full synchronization with messages and calls from other devices.
"This version of Viber is all about expressing yourself in more fun, exciting ways. Our new Sticker Market offers over 1000 unique, fun, expressive characters, many of which were designed specifically for our users in Asia," said Talmon Marco, CEO of Viber. "Also, we are the first of the major messaging services to add Live Push To Talk, streamed instantly between users. No sending, no waiting."
Other new features for Viber’s updated version include group conversations for up to 100 participants, message forwarding to any group or contact, and the option to choose conversation backgrounds from a gallery.
Version 4.0 of this cross-platform messaging app also introduced new features specifically for Android, which include improved notifications for Android 4.0 and up, lighting up of the screen for incoming notifications, and the ability to access Viber messaging while on a Viber call.
Viber started off predominantly as a calling app, a Skype-like service that lets users call any mobile or landline number in supported countries. Viber had previously enabled Viber Out for users in the Philippines in the aftermath of Typhoon Haiyan. To provide free calls from the Philippines, Viber partnered with providers across the world including Telecom Austria, Telecom New Zealand, Hutchison, Bharti Airtel, Telecom Italia, Citic, Netvision Cellcom, Mada Communication and Omantel. Viber also partnered with Globe Telecom to allow users worldwide to call the Philippines for free.
Now with the official worldwide launch, Viber version 4.1 introduces Viber Out that enables all Viber users to call anyone worldwide at low rates. Viber Out credit can be bought with an in-app purchase. Additionally, Viber Out has a significantly lower price-per-call than other competing services due to lower per minute rates and the omission of connection fees.
"We will continue to improve Viber Out, keeping our users connected at the most affordable rates possible," said Marco.
Now, it's eager to catch up the success other messaging platforms on the market now, especially Asian ones. However, its main target is to take a step further to appeal particularly to the Western market.
With more than 200 million users in 193 countries, Viber is available in Android, iOS, Windows, BlackBerry, Bada, Mac, Linux, Symbian and Nokia S40.