Google steps into Facebook's turf with hyperlocal query app Neighbourly

Beta version out in Mumbai, available on Google Play Store, in eight Indian languages apart from English

Google is stepping into social networking giant Facebook’s territory with its new app called Neighbourly that will allow users to ask queries and get them answered by other users in their vicinity. 

The internet giant on Thursday launched the beta version of the hyperlocal app for the users in Mumbai, and said it would take a call on rolling out in other cities based on the response the company receives. Available on Google Play Store, the app supports smartphones with Android Jelly bean and higher versions operating systems. 

While Google has existing platforms like Search, Assist and Local Guides to cater to a number of different queries that users may have, the new app will be a standalone platform without integrating any of these services for the time being, said Josh Woodward, Group Product Manager at Google’s Next Billion Users team. 

“Google Search got started by connecting people to information on the web. We found that most of life happens within one km radius of where you live, so we created an experience from the collective knowledge within the range,” said Woodward. Neighbourly lets people share their own expertise and keep up with their neighbourhood safely through multiple queries they can post and view on the app.

While the app is available in Mumbai for now, users in other cities can join the waitlist for the service. Google will take a call on new regions to roll out the service based on the response to the waitlist as well as feedback from users in Mumbai, said the Neighbourly team. It is currently available in eight Indian languages besides English.

With Neighbourly, Google has waded into the territory so far occupied by Facebook and Whatsapp in the sense of helping users create hyperlocal interest groups on the platforms to discover local services. Hyper local service delivery/ discovery ecosystem consists of the likes of OLX, HouseJoy, UrbanClap, MilkBasket and Magicpin among many others who provide different forms of hyper local engagement. 

“Discovery is emerging as a way to find products, especially on platforms like Facebook. Instagram have started a personalized discovery in the feed and it’s getting more data driven personalized feeds and a lot more competitive,” noted Mary Meeker from Keiner Perkins at the recent Code 2018 conference. 

She noted that while ecommerce platforms like Amazon are evolving their ad tech capacity, ad tech platforms like Google are increasingly evolving into commerce platforms.

For technology giants like Google and Amazon who have already reached most of the population in their home turf which is the US, with China still remaining a guarded territory, India offers a huge opportunity with over 400 million smartphone users. The sudden flood of cheap data services in the country brought in by the price war among telecom giants, has but added to this. 

Last year, Facebook started the pilot of its Marketplace service in Mumbai where people could discover and trade products free of cost. Ecommerce players like Amazon and Flipkart apart from retail giant Future Group are all in the fray to provide hyper local services to a small community as the next big market opportunity. Even, online grocery platforms such as BigBasket and Grofers have also already managed to create a presence in this space.

Late last year, Google invested around $12 million in Bengaluru based hyperlocal delivery fulfillment startup Dunzo, which was its first direct investment in an Indian startup. Interestingly, Dunzo was initially started as a Whatsapp group where people could request delivery of items. 

Google also has made investments in real estate discovery platform Commonfloor (which was later acquired by Quikr), healthcare platform Practo and shopping portal Fynd.

The Mountain View-headquartered company also launched UPI based payment service Tez last year which has already witnessed over 10 million downloads in less than a year.

“The fact that it is available in multiple languages coupled with the hyperlocal reach would mean that in the event that Google monetizes the service, it would be a huge incentive for small and medium businesses like the neighborhood sweet shops to advertise on Google, something that only larger enterprises tend to do,” said Vidhya Shankar, Executive Director Grant Thornton India. 

Google isn’t monetizing or linking Neighbourly with any of the apps in its ecosystem yet but will allow user feedback to lead the product development for the time being. So, the product is expected to undergo a lot evolution before a fully packaged version is launched.