A few months back I got a chance to explore an app called BeReal. It was a very fulfilling minimalistic designed app to share photos with friends. The more I explored it the more I was surprised at how they created an authentic social media experience in an age of filters and curation. What is this app all about, their business model, and what impact on competitors
What is Be Real?
It is a social photo-sharing app launched in 2021 and raised $60 mn series B funding in May 2022.
Let's go through some data points to understand Be Real in more detail
Downloads till Oct 2022 — — — — — — — — — — — — 67.2 mn
DAU In Oct 2022 — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 20 mn
Play store rating — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — -4.6/5
It caused a ripple across social media, so much so that Instagram launched a clone called “Dual” and TikTok launched “Now” to get back gen Z users.
Product concept a blue ocean strategy
Around 2020 -21, when social media was bleeding red with several payers fighting furiously for users’ eyeballs and time. Instagram was the undisputed leader, but TikTok and Snapchat challenged it and a filter war started with 100s of new filters added every month. Everyone was trying to out-filter the other. The common assumption of that time was more filters and more users. But Be real offered a new concept of less is more rather than no is more. With many such decisions, they created a niche blue ocean in this red ocean of social media.
In Beral users can
· Post only once a day
· Only see others’ post once he/she has posted
· post within a window of 2 min after a daily notification, which can come any time of the day
· Late posts would be allowed but labeled as late by X hr
· React with their selfie as a reaction called RealMojie
· Add friends, a post can be shared within friend circle or with everyone
That’s it these are the only things you as a user can do in the app. They are on a mission to create authentic social media
Why it became so popular so fast?
Be real took various unorthodox decisions to position itself as an authentic social media app.
· Having the name as the Be Real name itself says half of the story
· No filters show the real you
· Giving a small window of 2 minutes to post so that real photos without curation should be shared
· Randomizing the time of notification so that users should post their on-the-spot pic without any pre-photo preparations
· Using both cameras to curate photos so that real surroundings along with selfies should also be visible
· By default location is on so that the user’s actual location can be tagged in the post automatically, showing the real location
· It shows no. of re-takes users took to post, another attempt to discourage retakes
· Notification to post comes at a random time in the day, so users get a real connection with what their friends were doing at that time
All these decisions made Be Real posts as authentic as possible, which made it popular among college students who were fed up with never-ending feeds of carefully curated content having all positive things possible, which is far from actual socialization.
How competition reacted?
Meta is quite known for their competitor-killing strategies by either purchasing the company, which brought anything new into the market or cloning that feature in its product. Instagram launched a similar feature called dual, where the post would be created using both front and back cameras, a little more authenticity in the world of filters and AR.
TikTok also launched a similar feature called “Now”. This is the same as Be Real with some cosmetic changes.
Can Be real beat Meta?
It is too early to discuss this possibility, but Be real is not in the same category, so it seems like both can co-exist. The strength and weakness of Be Real are extreme simplicity. There is nothing much to do on the app, user cannot spend more than 2–3 minutes on the app
Business model
As of now, there is no business model in Be real. Because of explosive initial growth, a few companies started using influencers to promote their products on BeReal.
Potential problems
1: Its simplicity could be a significant major problem when competing with other social media apps that are built to increase user’s time spent on the app, which in turn converts into revenue, if users are coming only once a day and spending 2–3 minutes, then they should find some other innovative way of monetization
2: Two-minute window to post creates pressure and the user must drop everything and post. Sometimes it could be frustrating as the notification to post comes while you are in a meeting or having dinner with family etc.
3: The fact that you should post a pic to view what others have posted is disappointing. It looks like the app is pushing users for their data to give them access to the posts of their friends.
4: Because there is only one post in a day, there is no incentive for users to come again to the app.
Conclusion
With these unique propositions Be real has created a niche social media space for itself, others copying these features is a testimony of the same but to match such a simplistic experience, they need to change their product business model, which is quite difficult.
E.g. if Instagram wants to truly compete for users of Be real, it should eliminate all filters, which would disappoint its current users same is true for TTikTok as well, but they would make a dent in the user base of Be real.
As of now, it seems that Be Real has carved out a niche product, they may not be able to pose a serious challenge, but at least there is a decent user base that would like to have a minimalistic social media experience.
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