Tech Crunch Article –
With the skyrocketing popularity and billion-dollar sale of Instagram, there’s an ongoing race to apply Instagram’s wildly successful photo sharing model to mobile video. There are a number of startups vying to claim the “Instagram for Video” title, with Socialcam, Viddy, Klip, Mobli, and even the infamous Color all in the running. Yet, today brings evidence that Viddy may now be the one to beat, as the social video sharing app became the top free iPhone app on the App Store — with much of that growth emanating from its new Facebook Timeline app.
Viddy, which celebrated its first birthday on April 11th, enables users to shoot, customize, and share 15-second video clips directly from their mobile devices. Its video creation platform allows users to choose from custom video overlays and audio effects from their favorite musicians, movies, and celebrities, and share their short video clips across across social platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTubes.
The startup closed a $6 million Series A round back in February from investors like Battery Ventures, Greycroft Ventures, Qualcomm, and Bessemer Ventures, bringing its total funding to $8.2 million. Viddy saw over 40 million app views in January, thanks to the effort the startup has put into recruiting celebrities and influencers custom premium Video FX layers, giving artists, movie studios, etc. a way to promote their brand through mobile video.
Today, Viddy’s community is 8 million-strong, according to Viddy Co-Founder and CEO Brett OBrien, but the app has seen an even more significant bump in growth since launching its Facebook Timeline app in February. For some quick background, back in January, Facebook announced a new product called Actions, which saw it partnering with over 60 startups to give them the ability to add their “stories” through apps created specifically for Facebook Timeline. Actions basically create a new way for your favorite apps to present their structured data, with Facebook turning their content streams into visually engaging experiences.
The new Timeline features have been a boon for video apps, as Colleen reported earlier this month, and Viddy is no exception. Since launching its Timeline app in February, Viddy has seen over 15 million interactions with its content on Facebook, with over 1.7 million users signing on. Viddy also says that it’s averaging 300K new registered users per day, an average that has seen a significant bump since February.
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