Viber Advertising: Running a Creative and Optimised Campaign

• Easy media and file-sharing.

• Being available in multiple languages; messages are automatically translated into the language the user's Viber app is set to. To see other languages, users can use the 'tap to translate' feature.

• Different methods of communication: 'Groups' for private discussions, 'Communities' for interactive chats with like-minded members, and 'Channels', which let you broadcast to an international audience.

Group chats are ideal for chatting with up to 250 members. In contrast, Communities are a bit like forums – up to 1 billion members can join and engage with each other.

Imagine your business offers a body-positive clothing line, and you want to support your customers and anyone else who worries about body image. Members could freely join your community to get help and advice, and share body-positive clothing images with other members.

Does Viber have ads?

As well as promotional messages, there are various ad formats on Viber that'll boost campaign performance. Through Viber advertising, you can build your brand from the ground up, engage your audience, grow your reach and generally enhance your presence on the app.

How do I advertise on Viber?

The first thing to know about Viber as an advertising tool is that it offers sophisticated contact management and market segmentation options to help you optimise your advertising performance and costs. You'll also get advanced data insights from in-app analytics to inform your campaigns.

There are three ways to utilise ads on Viber: ad placements, stickers and lenses:

1. Ad placements

Viber ads are displayed in six locations within the app and can be targeted according to user demographics, e.g. age, gender, location, app usage behaviour, interests, device type and language. Viber also considers the number of times a particular user has already been shown an ad to prevent advertising fatigue.

Viber ad placements consist of various formats, including banner images, videos (with or without audio), animated visuals and text-based ads. These appear either natively or as a display ad, as follows:

• In the 'Chat's tab – within the user's chat lists (the most visited screen).

• In the 'Calls' tab – the ad is placed above the user's recent calls.

• Post-call – after the user finishes a call, a pop-up banner appears that links to a landing page.

• In the 'More' tab – users manage their accounts in this section.

• In the 'Explore' tab – where users go to find brands and content.

• In the desktop app – rather than displaying ads on mobile devices, you can choose banner or video ads on the PC version of Viber.

*Ad formats vary depending on your chosen location, e.g. post-call ads support banner images, animated graphics, text and a call-to-action button.

2. Branded sticker packs

Stickers are a fun way for users to express themselves on Viber. In addition to the library of free and premium pre-made stickers, businesses can create and publish their own custom-branded sticker packs, which can be static or animated with custom sound effects.

Just as Viber users share photos, they also like sharing stickers, adding them as visuals to text to convey emotion. Thus, stickers can organically boost your reach and may even go viral.

You can let people download your sticker packs for free (and achieve brand awareness through those stickers being shared), or you can ask for something more tangible in exchange. For example, why not ask people to subscribe to your chatbot or join your community in return for downloading your stickers? This way, you’ll increase engagement and interaction.

3. Branded lenses

Finally, there are Viber Lenses, which are interactive augmented reality (AR) lenses. Users can overlay images on top of backgrounds, add beautification features like lipstick and hair colours, and select expressive masks that follow facial movements.

You can create branded lenses for your target audience, which they can use through Viber's camera feature. These can be shared both inside and outside the app, allowing you to reach an even greater audience.