What you feel, say it with a GIF. One the biggest trends in private messaging of the last couple of years has been to sent moving images ala Harry Potter directly to your friends (or on Facebook comments) to try and put a little color on text messaging. The need for GIFs came to be from the need of adding more emotion to text message and it’s probably a testament to the evolution of emoticons back in MSN Messenger.
¿Who or what is Giphy?
We´ve all seen the Giphy button since it began to appear on Facebook Messenger. Giphy is a site created by Alex Chung and Jace Cooke on a rather historical breakfast if their story is to be believed. At first, the site was only a search engine for GIFs that grew strong with the help of partnerships with social media platforms, starting with Facebook they went to Twitter next and now they are on Instagram. The company has also made partnerships with Universal, Disney, Calvin Klein and Pepsi. The site has kept its growth year after year, according to Statista, 28% of users in the US between 28 and 24 use Giphy on a daily basis.
Percentages of users who use Giphy in USA
How does it work?
It’s a lot like how it works on Facebook Messenger, you press the GIF button on the Compose bar, the trending GIF tab will open and you’ll be able to swipe to choose your favorite or write a keyword on the search bar to find the right one. As we said, it’s very similar to the one on messenger, it looks a bit less complicated since on Facebook we have more options between authors, searchers and editing tools to go with our moving images. Something that is new on this tool is that now we have a Random button that allows us to send a surprise GIF associated with a previously searched keyword.
The road is already paved
The future of GIFs contains more and more partnerships, thanks to their nature, using the likeness of popular TV shows and fan favorite movies to illustrate your point or feeling, it’s possible to stretch a hand to Giphy to promote brand recognition. Many times, GIFs use scenes directly from ads or brand mascots that stay in the mind of millions of consumers. The use of GIFs to give more feeling to our texts can lead a brand to become of daily use on its fan base, meanwhile, Giphy keeps growing and it won’t stop as long as social media stays alive and relevant, and brands cannot afford to stay behind.
Sources
instagram-press.com