Yang Li
Instagram-like photo sharing social network, Nice, has adopted new functions to strengthen its social attributes.
Nice’s photo tagging function has attracted many celebrities to the platform, with its photo sharing feature proving popular with social media darling Angelababy. The company claimed to have over ten million registered users at the end of 2014.
Taking inspiration from Tinder’s photo-swiping, the app has recently added a horizontal-swipable homepage and direct messaging into its pictures.
CEO of the company, Zhou Shou, told 36Kr that most photo sharing apps, including Instagram, adopt vertical displays for their photos and only show part of a users’ comments which can be distracting to the user experience and reduce participation.
The horizontal-sliding homepage which Nice has adopted allow users to focus on the upper part of the screen where most of the photos are displayed. By clicking on a photo, users can go through the entire comments of a photo, providing more opportunities for users to get engaged.
Nice has also enlarged the size of its user profile photos, as well as having added a message delivery button, which the company hopes will help it to transform into a social network encouraging users to communicate among each rather than simply sharing photos.
Nice was launched in 2013. It raised three rounds of funding in 2014 alone, including USD eight million in an A-series, USD 20 million in a B-series and USD 36 million in a C-series. Investment was helmed by leading capital firms, VY Capital, Tiger Fund, and Matrix Partners China.
“The last round of fundraising was intended to accelerate the growth of our team and to ensure further development,” said Zhou.
Zhou also revealed that Nice will concentrate on the following strategies:
1. Strengthening its social features, by enabling users to find, share and comment on new photos within their private networks and among the public.
2. Improving its data mining abilities, which will provide better content for users.
3. Promoting the overseas market, because 10% of the company’s users are located overseas.