Vonvon, the Korean startup’s app that creates the many fun quizzes available for Facebook users has seen phenomenal growth since its inception in 2015. The success of Vonvon is despite the app facing issues regarding user privacy and a lot of media scrutiny in the initial launch months.
Creating fun and viral content for all
Vonvon had launched the famous ‘most used words’ feature for Facebook users in its initial days, which had become quite popular. The startup now caters hundreds of fun quizzes for users, who have to sign up with Facebook details. The user who wants to enter the quiz must share details and personal information such as age and birthday, along with their friend list, entire timeline, photos, hometown, and likes. The app then delivers fun results of the quiz based on the algorithm of the user’s social media details.
Sharing personal details for Vonvon had raised a lot of concern among the Western media initially and it was termed as a ‘privacy hazard’ by media. However, the chief executive and founder Jonghwa Kim had abated the fears of the users by giving a statement to the media that “We only use information to generate results, and we never store it for other purposes. We are dedicated to create fun, engaging and innovative content.”
Working towards building user-trust
To build user trust, Vonvon has put up a page-long privacy policy information for each of its quizzes, besides a short statement depicting the protection of user details. As per Vonvon, the information gathered from the user’s timeline to create personalised results are not sent to their servers, which means they have no chance to share it or sell it.
Vonvon makes its revenue mainly through display ads, which appear when the user logs into its viral content. The startup also develops branded quizzes with corporate partners like Samsung, Australia Tourism and online gaming platforms. The company had raised $3 million for its seed funding in 2015 in a round led by Altos Ventures.
While there might have been questions raised regarding privacy issues with Vonvon, the increasing user base for the app portrays a different story. To date, Vonvon’s various viral content has attracted over 200 million user interactions across 15 languages since the company’s launch. Vonvon wants to build a trustworthy relation with its user base and has been putting in efforts to better user experience.
