Bebo Returns But Not As You Know It

This article originally appeared on 60 Second Social.

Remember when Bebo was a ‘thing’? Back when I first started on social media, Bebo was the place to be at the time. Everyone was signing up to Bebo and of course as we all know, Facebook came along and blew the competition out of  the water. Bebo and MySpace were soon as good as gone.

Bebo was once the most popular website in the UK boasting 10.7 million unique visitors per month, it was purchased by AOL in 2008 for $850m. Within a few years it had wilted and vanished, founder Michael Birch bought the company back for a mere $1 in 2013.

In August 2013, Birch posted a video on Bebo’s website announcing that he wanted to wipe the slate clean and that the new Bebo would be very different from the old Bebo.

Bebo kickstarted their return with a video chat app called ‘Blab’ in February of this year allowing users to send instant video messages to anyone.

Now Bebo have launched a second app called ‘Bebo’ which is a messaging app with a completely bonkers twist. Users create their own avatar which they can customise. You then add friends and chat away with them. What makes this app different is that it is fuelled on hashtags. For example, typing #slap will result in something like this in the app.

You can use many different variations of hashtags and they also launch different features of the app too. For example typing #draw allows you to draw with your finger in the app. It is so insane it might just work for a younger audience. Clearly the target market is the pre-teen and young teenager audience.

It is like emoji on steroids, and while it is definitely not for me, I could see an appeal for some users without doubt. I’m going to stick with more conventional messenger apps.

About The Author

Mark is the founder of 60 Second Social media where he provides social media news and digital marketing analysis, he is also a proud father of his bearded dragon, Lola. You can follow him on Twitter here. You can also follow 60 Second Social on Twitter here.