Do we really need more things to distract us?
Apparently we do.
Enter Distractify, a new media startup that wants to make content go viral.
After launching just last month, Distractify says it reached 21 million monthly unique visitors worldwide in November 2013, according to its data from Google Analytics.
Quantcast pegs its traffic at about 8 million monthly unique visitors, but that’s only from the last few days since Distractify registered with Quantcast on November 18.
What’s also impressive is that Distractify is only a three-person team, and is entirely bootstrapped.
Obviously, Distractify has a few competitors. There’s BuzzFeed, Viral Nova, and Upworthy, which is widely regarded as the fastest-growing media startup ever.
“We’re all fighting for the same spots on your Facebook feed,” 20-year-old Distractify founder and CEO Quinn Hu tells Business Insider.
So far, Distractify seems to be putting up a good fight. In November alone, its content was shared 4 million times on Facebook. In fact, 90% of Distractify’s traffic comes from Facebook, Hu says.
But Upworthy is still a force to be wreckoned with. Today, Upworthy is touting 46.7 million monthly unique visitors. Back in February 2013, Upworthy hit 10.4 million monthly unique visitors, almost a year after it first launched. Distractify, on the other hand, hit 21.6 million unique users worldwide and 12.2 million uniques in the U.S. within about a month of launch.
That’s pretty impressive for a small, bootstrapped startup. But we’ll have to wait and see if Distractify can maintain its audience and continue to grow it.
Some of the most shared Distractify content includes The 29 Whitest Family Photos of All Time, 26 Black People Not Amused By White People, and Advertisers Should Just Quit. Nothing Will Ever Top This Volvo Commercial.
Distractify aims for a mix of original content and repackaged content meant to go viral. Down the road, Hu says he wants to hire creatives, expand production, and get into native advertising.
But just how has Distractify attracted such a massive audience in such little time?
“We don’t have a big secret,” Hu says. “We just focus on listening to people and hearing what they have to say.”
The idea is to bring people closer through a shared experience. Hu says he wants to make people feel an emotion that’s universal.
“There’s no agenda outside of that,” Hu says.
Author: Megan Rose Dickey
Source: businessinsider.com