TikTok parent targets 100 million users by end of 2019 for Helo app

ByteDance, the parent company of popular short video app TikTok, has another winner up its sleeve. Its local language content app Helo, launched a year ago for India, has reached 50 million users by June.
 
The company has now set its sights on expanding further, eyeing 100 million users by the end of 2019. 
 
“For Helo, the growth story is language and the machine learning on the app, so that users get personalised and localised news...In one month (of the launch), we had 1 million downloads. In six months, we had 25 million monthly active users, and in April we had 40 million. Currently we’ve seen 100 per cent growth and we have 50 million monthly active users,” said Shyamanga Barooah, head, content operations at Helo.
 
Barooah attributed the popularity of the app to the content creators, celebrities, influencers, and licensed partners on the platform. 
 
Initially aimed at tier-II and tier-III cities in India, Helo has expanded to 13 more countries to cater to “global desis” or the Indian diaspora. These countries include the US, Canada, Singapore, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, South Africa, and Bangladesh. It currently supports 14 Indian languages. 
 
In addition to holding topical and regular campaigns related to ongoing festivals and sports events like the Cricket World Cup, Helo has partnered locally popular television shows.
 
“We do a lot of campaigns. We have done a lot of branding with Bigg Boss Kannada. This year, we have tied up with Bigg Boss Marathi and also partnered for Super Singers in Tamil,” said Barooah.
 
ByteDance has more than 500 employees in India, working on TikTok and Helo. The company does not break down numbers by app, but both of its products have separate teams because of the completely different nature of the apps.
 
Having been at the centre of a storm for the content hosted on it, ByteDance's other app TikTok got banned in India for about a week in April. The company has since been vocal about hiring locals and increasing its content moderation efforts. 
 
Helo has learnt from the experience, partnering media organisations and fact-checking website AltNews for identifying and removing fake news.
 
“Our moderation teams are trained by AltNews on how to detect and flag fake news, and if anything (is) not in line with our community guidelines, we take appropriate action,” said Barooah.
 
Chasing growth
 
The Beijing-headquartered ByteDance has made waves for being the first Chinese company to make it big outside of its home turf. It also helps that ByteDance is now the world’s most valuable start-up, valued at $75 billion.
 
At the heart of what ByteDance has done is having figured out an algorithm that serves users a feed of content that keeps them hooked and also keeps them coming back for more. The company has several apps, which hit a combined 1 billion users worldwide this month, according to media reports. 
 
While TikTok is driving the growth of its parent company, the fact that it is investing heavily in India shows that the company means serious business in the country.
 
To ensure the interest in the app and its content doesn't fizzle out, Helo is working with the creator community  — users of the app who create text, videos or images that get shared and discussed — to help them make better and engaging content.
 
“Our priority is to create something which is addictive for the users...Time spent on the app is a big derivative, which currently is 30 minutes a day. We expect it to go up as we make content and creator ecosystem more rich,” said Raj Mishra, head of Creator Strategy at Helo.
 
Helo plans to identify 100 content creators who are potential “stars”, and help them clock a million followers on the platform.
 
According to the plan, it has introduced a personalised analytics dashboard for creators called Helo Insights, which will help “creators know how well their audience is engaging with them, engagement of their followers and how the post performed in the last 30 days”, said Mishra. This will be available to creators once they update the app.
 
There is also a “Playbook” to help these users with tips, tricks, and hacks to enable them create more engaging content on the platform.  The firm will look to monetise in different ways, including advertising and gamification, but the current focus, said Mishra, was on getting more users on the platform. 
 
Helo has been downloaded more than 100 million times on Google's Play Store and continues to be a chart topper on Apple's App Store.

‘App’ to date

• Most content on the app is posted between 9 PM and 10 PM

• Sunday is the day of the week that sees the highest engagement among Helo users

• Mother’s Day saw the most number of posts in one day with more than 900,000 posts

• Marathis and Bengalis love emotional content, while entertainment is most popular for Tamilians