Viber Completes A Decade of Instant Messaging
It’s hard to remember what life was like a decade ago, but for Rakuten Viber, this was the start of its incredible journey to become one of the world’s most popular instant messaging apps.
Available on all major devices and operating systems, the free messaging app is offered in over 190 countries, with key operations in the CIS, CEE, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. Presently, Viber’s services are used by over one billion people, with 7 million interactions happening every minute! It has also earned the title of the most secure messaging app in the world.
As Viber’s audience accelerated, in 2015, the company realized that connecting with such large numbers of consumers would matter for businesses – especially those looking to create personalized, one-to-one experiences. That’s when Viber for Business entered the market, and our partnership truly took off.
Viber through Infobip
Since 2016, we’ve helped Viber develop its Viber for Business solution in response to market trends, business needs, and of course, the ever-changing messaging habits of modern consumers.
Our partnership started in CEE, but as Viber has grown, so have we – building our client portfolio in CIS, MENA, and APAC. We now work with them to serve over 2,000 brands across the world and in the last four years, have sent almost 1.5 billion messages through Viber to Infobip clients. Pretty awesome, right?
Bringing value to businesses across the globe
Many different industries use Viber to communicate with customers. Whether a transactional notification or delivery update from an online retailer, an appointment reminder from your bank, or even a new product update from your favorite tech brand.
Here are some of our favorite partnership stories with Viber:
- BlaBlaCar: Following difficulty in coordinating conversations between drivers and passengers, BlaBlaCar turned to Infobip’s web interface to send real-time notifications – including booking confirmations, booking statuses, and last-minute ride requests – to passengers over Viber. Introducing new channels like Viber through our interface has helped BlaBlaCar meet customer demand and increase user engagement.
- DPD: With a goal to increase the number of successful deliveries and minimize costs, this European parcel company introduced Viber with SMS failover as a new communication channel with customers. As a result of using Infobip’s platform to send delivery updates over Viber, DPD managed to reduce costs by 20% and improve overall customer satisfaction.
- Würth: In needing to efficiently communicate promotions to customers and help clear overstock, technical equipment wholesaler Würth used Infobip’s web interface to sell and promote products via Viber. As a result, the company has sped up the sales cycle by six times.
- NLB Bank: To increase digital communication activities in line with global banking trends, the Montenegrin bank wanted to serve and speak to customers on their preferred channels. Infobip helped the bank launch Viber as an official communications channel, creating rich two-way conversations with customers to arrange meetings and promote special financing offers. Since implementing Infobip’s Viber messaging solution, NLB’s sales of certain products have increased by 5 to 15%.
A partnership for the future
There is a need to go deeper into the conversational aspect of messaging, which fits perfectly with Viber’s focus on creating a native, natural customer experience on the channels we know today’s modern consumer prefers. In fact, we are currently one of two partners piloting Viber Business Voice – a free service for customers where they can instantly dial business numbers to get support or find out more about a service or offer.
The future lies in adding value to the user experience both for brands, and the customers they serve. We’re proud to be alongside Rakuten Viber for the next decade of business message innovation.
Happy 10th Birthday to our partner Rakuten Viber, who we’re honored to have worked alongside in delivering relevant, rich, and reliable messaging to customers around the world! We look forward to future collaborations and bringing conversational Viber messaging options to brands and their customers. Here’s to the next decade of business messaging innovation!
Veselin Vukovic
VP of Strategic Partnerships at Infobip
