By Daniel Kucher

It has been around 10 days since April was left behind, and Sensor Tower has released a list of the most downloaded apps in the past month, based on estimates. Communication applications marked the lists.

Some changes were also observed in downloaded applications due to the coronavirus epidemic and people’s closure to homes around the world. Sensor Tower shared the 10 most downloaded applications of April based on forecasts.

There were some changes in the applications that people downloaded and used on their smartphones during the quarantine process. As you can imagine, video chat applications were among the most downloaded apps last month.

Most downloaded apps in April 2020
In April 2020, ZOOM was the most downloaded application in both Google Play and App Store. The application, which received 131 million downloads, has grown 60 times compared to April 2019. 18.2% of the downloads came from India and 14.3% from the USA.

The second most downloaded application in non-game applications was TikTok. TikTok was downloaded 107 million times in April 2020 and experienced a 2.5-fold growth in a year. The country where the application was most downloaded was India with 22%, while the USA followed ZOOM with 9.4%.

From the third row, the most downloaded applications in the App Store are listed as follows; Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Netflix, Instagram, YouTube, Tax Report, Facebook and Google Classroom. The most downloaded applications from the third place in the Google Play Store are listed as follows; Facebook, WhatsApp, Aarogya Setu, Messenger, Instagram, Samsung Security Update, Telegram and Likee.

When we look at the most downloaded applications in the past month, we can say that online communication applications have a dominance. After ZOOM and TikTok in total, the most downloaded applications were Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger. In addition, Microsoft Teams was able to enter this list for the first time.

The data was collected by Store Intelligence on the App Store and Google Play between April 1, 2020 and April 30, 2020. Previous downloads have been excluded. Data from third-party stores was not included in Android estimates. But different versions of the same app like Facebook and Facebook Lite were combined.

Andrew Hutchinson

With messaging use on the rise during the COVID-19 lockdowns, Facebook now appears to be looking for more ways to prompt direct engagement between users.

Along with a new ‘DM Me’ sticker for Instagram Stories, which would enable users to message a Story creator with a tap on the sticker, Facebook is also working on a ‘Hit Me Up’ sticker for Facebook Stories, which would provide the same functionality, just with a different look (and on a different app, of course).

As you can see in this example, shared by reverse engineering expert Jane Manchun Wong, the new ‘hit Me Up’ sticker would enable Facebook Stories users to prompt a quick DM response via the sticker, which could help to facilitate more intimate engagement, which, as noted, would align with the rising use of Stories and messaging, particularly during the lockdowns.

Indeed, according to Facebook, messaging activity across both WhatsApp and Messenger has increased some 50% on normal levels over the last few months. Without the capacity to connect in real life, people are looking to direct connection options to stay in touch, and a new prompt within Stories to further facilitate such engagement could be a good way to generate increased conversation, and give people more ways to stay connected while apart.

That’s likely the main impetus here – seeing the increases in messaging, it may well be that more people are looking to have more message interactions, but they need to know who else might be interested in the same. By adding a simple prompt within your story, highlighting that you’re interested in chatting, it could spark new message interactions, and help to relieve some of the loneliness of the social isolation period.

But of course, it could also lead to problems. As we noted on the Instagram ‘DM Me’ option, while people might want to get more private messages in response to their Stories, it could also open the door to more unsolicited attachments and the like, which has become a problematic element, particularly for younger users. Users would, however, still be able to limit who sees their Stories, and block unwanted responders, but broadening your call for more messages could be problematic in some cases.

Still, it makes sense, and the numbers would suggest it could be a good option.

Given the current focus on direct engagement tools, it seems likely that we’ll see these options roll out sooner, rather than later. And from a brand and marketing perspective, that could also mean that you’ll soon have another CTA prompt to help advance connection with potential clients.

https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/facebooks-testing-a-hit-me-up-sticker-to-prompt-message-interaction-from/577228/