Naver announced that the community platform BAND, which celebrated its 10th anniversary, has surpassed 150 million cumulative application downloads.
Band was first launched on August 8, 2012, and has established itself as Korea’s representative gathering platform for the past 10 years. The cumulative number of bands is 53 million and the cumulative number of posts is 6.1 billion. The number of chat messages accumulated so far exceeds 50 billion and the number of comments exceeds 20 billion.
Band has continuously evolved its services and expanded its community usability in response to changes in the way people gather. It started as a platform for gatherings between acquaintances, and expanded into interest-based gatherings through public bands in 2015, and then further refined the nature of the gatherings into mission bands to achieve goals at the end of 2019, and at the end of 2021. We introduced a small band that shares interests based on the neighborhood.
In particular, during the COVID-19 period, as demand for non-face-to-face meetings increased, non-face-to-face functions were expanded, such as the launch of ‘video call’.
Accordingly, Naver explains that there is a steady influx of users in their 10s and 20s who are sensitive to trends. In fact, the proportion of users in their 1020s out of all band users amounts to 26%. In particular, it is analyzed that Mission Band was well-received by the MZ generation who pursues ‘new life’. In fact, one out of three users participating in Mission Band is in their 1020 generation, and of the approximately 20 million cumulative mission verification posts, posts left by users in their 1020s account for 31%.
In the future, Naver plans to further diversify the community within the band, focusing on ‘Mission Band’ and ‘Small Group Band’. This month, the band service was also reorganized and a mission tab and small group tab were added to the band home, making it easier for users to find mission bands and small group bands.
A marketing campaign is also being carried out to commemorate the band’s 10th anniversary. Through an interactive site created to commemorate the 10th anniversary, the band’s 10 years of history and data, various band usage experiences, and stories from band service personnel are gathered and released. There is also a ‘My Group DNA’ test that allows you to share your group type with friends, and a ‘My Band Report’ that allows you to check your band activities at a glance.
In addition, if you save or capture an image celebrating the band’s 10th anniversary and verify it on SNS with a congratulatory message, an event will be held where a total of 1,500 people will be drawn and Naver Pay points will be awarded. Additionally, if a new member joins a recommended band through the 10th anniversary page, 3 people will receive an iPhone 13 and 1,000 people will receive Naver Pay points through a drawing. The band’s 10th anniversary event will run until the 21st.
Kim Joo-gwan, CEO of Naver Group & CIC, said, “The reason Band was able to grow over a long period of time is because we sensitively looked at users’ needs and trends and worked hard to quickly integrate them into our services.” He added, “We will continue to use Naver’s differentiated know-how and “Based on our technological capabilities, we will develop the band into a platform that contains ‘all gatherings in the world.’”
Source: Pangyo Techno Valley Official Newsroom
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