Moving from one place to another is never an easy task. You are subjected to an entirely new neighborhood where you know nothing about. However, if you wanted to connect with anyone for anything, social media platforms could help but aren’t location-specific. It’s where companies like Amplichat come to the rescue.
Amplichat is an application that lets users send messages and other pictures in and around their location to other users. Moreover, the platform can be used by local vendors and budding stores in the neighborhood to attract potential customers through the application. Venture Mirror had an exclusive interview with the founder of Amplichat, Shujia Liu, and a detailed conversation can be found below.
What is the startup / product / venture about? Give us a brief description of it.
Amplichat is a local social networking service for people within the same area.
One of the principal features of Amplichat is that pictures and messages are usually only available for a short time before they become inaccessible to their recipients. Also, posts made to the website are available to other Amplichat members nearby.
The app has evolved from originally focusing on location based message sharing to presently featuring local news and events.
The company was founded in 2018 and is based in San Jose, California.
Amplichat launched in the United States in October 2018, and is currently available in 56 countries.
How many co-founders are there? Please introduce them and their backgrounds.
Amplichat was created by Shujia Liu, a former Googler. Shujia relocated to California Bay Area from Guangdong, China about 6 years ago.
How did you come up with the idea? What motivated you to do this?
The initial motivation was to attract people to join board game meetups in physical stores.
Location-based messaging, i.e., delivering mobile phone messages using data about the recipient’s location when that recipient is near the sender, has been said to enable such attraction. And it grows into sharing secure messages across neighborhoods, organizing various local events, connecting to local people for travelers.
Who is your target market? Why do you think your product will appeal to them?
Imagine you’re the owner of a local dry cleaning business with limited time and money to spend on advertising. To make the most of your budget, you don’t want to waste time on low-quality leads. Instead, you want to focus on your ideal prospects. That is, people who want to have their clothes cleaned professionally and who happen to be near your physical location.
That’s where Amplichat can come in as a powerful marketing strategy.
Amplichat enables businesses to connect with local residents based on their location, whether that be a few blocks or multiple neighborhoods from the business location.
Who are your competitors? How are you different from them?
Meetup, Nextdoor, Snapchat, are the big competitors. Amplichat provides a unique perspective of combining parts of the user experiences from those, and moving up to the next level with elements of mobility and virtual reality in the future plan.
What are the future plans with the product/startup? Any new features you are planning on?
The future plan is more about building great user experience and moving into virtual reality. Imagine there are a bunch of floating messages in the air or on top of people’s heads and moving along with people. That’s the future of messaging we believe in.