While Kakao launched the “Sympathy Sticker” on KakaoTalk’s personal profile area on the 7th, which presses “Like” like Instagram, users are showing various reactions.
Kakao explained that this service was designed reflecting the usability of users who want to communicate in a simple way. While some users responded positively, saying, “It’s nice to be able to communicate in a useful way even if I’m busy,” others said it was burdensome, saying, “It can be seen as a measure of popularity.”
“Function useful even when I’m busy” VS “Purchase 1,000 won for each heart”
According to Industry 8, a new “empathic sticker” feature was recently introduced in KakaoTalk profiles. Users can select and decorate a sticker containing the desired emotion from a total of 48 emoticons in the background area of their personal profile. There are a total of 4 types: 3 simple empathy types and 1 slide type that can contain text. Select the empathy sticker you want, resize it and place it in your profile area.
If you press “Edit” in your personal profile, you can immediately attach empathy stickers by pressing the heart-shaped tab on the right side of the camera-shaped tab where you can change your profile picture. A Kakao official said, “In addition to text communication, this service has been designed so that people can feel free to share comfort and empathy by sticking stickers.” It is interpreted as reflecting the recent trend of users preferring “light communication” rather than having a conversation through the message chat window. Once you empathize, it lasts for 7 days and you can undo the empathy.
User reactions have been somewhat mixed. Some users gave a favorable review, stating that it was a “cool and new feature”, but some showed a negative reaction, stating that it was an “inconvenient and burdensome feature”.
A 20-year-old KakaoTalk user said, “It’s a handy feature that lets you intuitively grasp a friend’s current status at a glance,” adding, “It feels like a useful service because you can share your feelings just by hitting ‘Sympathy ‘ on a busy day.” Another user also said: “There seems to be an advantage in being able to communicate with each other without burdens because it is not possible to know the details of liking a third person.”
Average length of stay for KakaoTalk is 13 minutes… Expect “lock-in effect”
However, there are opinions that this is a “burdened feature”. A 30-year-old user said, “I have been in the sales industry for over 10 years and already have more than 2,000 acquaintances in my Kakao Talk friends list. business and business partners.” A housewife in her 40s said, “I don’t use SNS (social networking service), but I feel burdened because I have a similar function.”
Kakao designed it so that only the KakaoTalk profile owner can check the friend who clicked on the “Sympathy” sticker. Friends who visit the profile may not know who sympathizes with them, so privacy can be protected. The Empathy Mark can be pressed indefinitely with no limit on the number of times. In the case of friendship-sensitive young student users, there are cases that they feel oppressed.
One middle school student user said, “My friends will, but I think the number of likes will be a concern.” In addition to this, some netizens from the Internet community have responded by saying, “Should I pay for popularity now?” “Should I sell 1,000 won for empathy?” Please release a light version of Kakao Talk. It is interpreted as a show of tiredness from the recently boosted KakaoTalk service.
It is noted that the reason Kakao is looking to retool Kakao Talk is due to the low dwell time versus the high usage rate. According to the “Social Media Search Portal Trend Report 2022” released by data platform Open Survey in March, KakaoTalk usage frequency ranked first with an average of 8.6 times per day, but the average usage time per time was 50.3 minutes, followed by YouTube (50.3 minutes) and TikTok (32.8 minutes), Naver (25.4 minutes) and Instagram (18.2 minutes). The longer KakaoTalk users stay on the service, the more time they spend exposed to the board, which increases their revenue.
By activating the communication feature through the profile, related sales such as emoticons and gifts can also increase. The introduction of empathetic stickers is one of KakaoTalk’s reform plans announced by Kakao in May. In the future, Kakao plans to update the feature so that you can “gift” easily in the profile area. A Kakao official said, “There are no further KakaoTalk reforms this year.”
Journalist Jo Ara Hankyung.com [email protected]
