An update on 2go. Growing at 30k users a day.
2go currently boasts 7 million users and unlike some other well funded local mobile start-ups who appear to have bought there way to 1 million users (not that there is anything wrong with buying users) 2go’s user base has grown organically and is increasing at about 30 000 users a day of late. That would equate to an additional 1 million new users in the next 34 days. Their success in the African market can be seen by topping Google’s Zeitgeist list for fastest rising searches in Nigeria and Kenya during 2010 shows that people have heard about the application and searched Google to download it.
The new features in 2go version 3.0:
- Saving of chat history – private conversations are now saved on your phone
- “Is Typing” – You are given an indication as your friend is typing to you
- Improved compression – 2go is now cheaper to use and saves airtime
- Look-n-feel: new splash screen, new icons, improved navigation
- Privacy and security enhancements
- Numerous bug fixes and performance improvements
- 2go now gives you the option to talk to your Facebook and Google GTalk contacts through the application
We know that privacy is of great concern to many users and some parent of younger users. The full list of safety and privacy features in 2go version 3.0 is available at http://www.2go.co.za/safechatting , but the new features in this version 3.0 are:
- Profiles must now be previewed before accepting a user as a friend
- Users can be blocked when being removed from a contact list so that you cannot be contacted again
- Minors can file abuse reports through the application to report users for abusive conduct such as bullying, offensive files being sent or abusive behaviour.
- Most importantly, users cellphone numbers are not exposed to other users in the application. We make use of usernames which mean that chatting is completely anonymous.
It is great to see a company playing in the extremely competitive mobile IM space achieve such great growth without much fanfare.