Line: We've Added 5 Million New Users in India Since Rolling Out TV Ads

At the start of this month we noted that NHN’s smash-hit social messaging app Line had rolled out TV adverts in India. So how’s that going? According to Line’s global strategy and marketing dude Jun Masuda, Line has “gained five million users only in three weeks” in India since the TV ad blitz began.

Jun told the WSJ Digits blog that Line’s push into India has been successful so far as it battles Whatsapp and Facebook Messenger as well as other Asian-made messaging apps like WeChat. There’s no number for total Indian users of Line so far; the well-established app surely had some users in the country before its official launch in the country on July 1.

(See: Infographic – India Passes 60 Million Social Media Users, Still Has a Long Way to Go)Line – which hit 200 million registered users yesterday – has 70 percent of its users outside of Japan, Jun notes. Speaking of international expansion, he compared Line’s progress to that of WeChat and KakaoTalk by saying “I think we have been able to fare much better.”

Looking to gaming and drumming up revenues in India, Jun notes:

Our platform is not about being a simple messaging platform. We have a lot of other services which we offer, and it is built in within the platform. Even in India we would like to offer games and news and many other features. We have already launched games in the local Indian languages.

There are other countries we want to expand next like Africa, Russia, Middle East, and South America.

(Via: NextBigWhat; Source: WSJ Digits)

(Editing by Anh-Minh Do)