Auto Awesome, The Perfect Hook For The Google+ Line
It took a little while, what’s it been, a couple of years since we first saw Google+ arrive onto our screens? It’s been a battle to say the least (from an outsiders perspective anyway). Google+ doesn’t seem to have resonated with any of my friends or colleagues, until now that is, until Auto Awesome came along.
Auto Awesome creates fun new versions of your photos and videos. Your photos will be combined into short animations, wide panoramas, or merged into group shots where everyone looks good.
Rising above the cries of ‘stop’ as Google steamrollered its ‘integration’ of the social network across it’s other products and platforms, most notably YouTube; Auto Awesome has more than any other app in recent weeks, caught my attention.
The Hook
Every good app has one, a hook that is, it’s an essential ingredient to generating the traffic and download figures we all dream of. Some of the obvious ones are:
- Instagram’s filters.
- Snapchat’s limited image lifetime.
- Twitter’s 140 character limit.
Thanks to Auto Awesome, I once again feel inspired to snap photos on a regular basis. Then it’s a case of leaving them to quietly backup (upload) to Google+ and moments later they’re automagically ‘enhanced’ and if I’m lucky gif-ed (other effects available).
The first time I noticed Auto Awesome’s work on one of my photos I was confused but equally delighted. Had I somehow forgotten about the gif I created with that app buried on the 4th page of apps on my phone, that I’d long stopped using? It wasn’t until I started to notice other peoples lively images on the network that things began to click. I was hooked.
New Apps and User Investment
Instagram inspiration has been lacking and Facebook fatigue has more than set in. I’ve been regularly visiting the App Store to find the next big thing that i can get my teeth into. Well that’s what every startup with a mobile app wants isn’t it? Users who invest time and effort into their profile or their gallery or their whatever it is the apps providing me with - so that before I know it, I’m so emotionally entwined with their brand I couldn’t leave even if I wanted to.
Well Google+ has finally got me. I’m following communities, adding people to circles, posting my own content and once again, uploading a shed load of iPhone photos to the web.
Power & Money and Creativity
I know what you’re thinking. This is Google. They’ve got enough money, knowledge and data to build a fleet of Death Stars. And ok Auto Awesome might never have been a ‘thing’ without any of the aforementioned. However, the maker in me believes that deep in a Google Development Dungeon somewhere, an extremely talented team of developers and designers have given birth to this extremely creative asset. Auto Awesome is the hook that Google have been looking for and that will finally see Google+ become a genuinely popular platform.
Well done Google. All that’s left is to learn from your creativity and establish our own hook for our products over at Beta Hive.