An exciting Facebook alternative that was released in 2015, but has only recently seen a huge influx of new users, is the social network Vero. At the beginning of March 2018, for example, CEO Ayman Harari, worth billions of euros, announced an increase of more than three million users, after Vero had previously been a relatively niche app with around 200,000 active members. Not only effective influencer campaigns played an important role, but also the current offer of free lifetime membership won users over. The app, which is available for iOS, and Android, might only be available with a paid annual subscription in the future. However, the offer has been initially extended until further notice.
The annual fee, however, is intended to help out the developing company, Vero Labs, by being its main source of income. The idea is for the platform to remain free of advertising in the long run and not to share any user information to make a profit. In addition, the company generates revenue through transaction fees that merchants have to pay when selling products through Vero and implementing the “buy now” button.
Although Vero is similar in many respects to competitors such as Facebook and Instagram (profile, structure, timeline, news feed), the platform offers some interesting unique selling points: The messages in the timeline are not pre-filtered by an algorithm, but appear in chronological order. Contacts can also be divided into four categories: “followers”, “acquaintances”, “friends”, and “close friends”. These groups can then be selected or deselected as the target group when a post is published, so that only the desired audience is informed. The app can now be used to make video calls too.
To create and verify a Vero account, a private telephone number has to be entered.