Snibble offers Canadians a new way to access the latest content on all their favourite topics.
The platform shows users 20-second previews of videos — everything from world headlines and sports news to movie trailers and the world of entertainment — in vertical mode.
Snibble is all about having “snackable TV clips,” founder and chief product officer Andrew Shortt told MobileSyrup.
Users desiring to view the clip in its entirety don’t have to track down the original source of the video; all they have to do is click on the clip to watch it in full.
The mobile-only app shows users the newest content in each subject category, saving them from fishing through older content to find new information. Users also never have to type to find clips, Shortt explained, as videos are categorized under different subjects that can be customized based on the user’s preference.
Combined with the ability to share these clips on social media, the app allows users to discover, curate, and watch short-form video content with friends, or as Shortt calls them, the “most powerful recommendation engine in the world.”
Sharing videos this way is a concept Shortt takes very seriously, as the method isn’t based on an “evil” algorithm but content people genuinely are interested in.
Snibble in preview mode (left) and collab mode. Image credit: Snibble
All of the clips come from professional content producers. Snibble doesn’t contain user-generated content that appears on platforms like YouTube or TikTok. “In every video category, it’s curated to be the absolute best of the best,” Shortt said.
To share content, users can select “Reco” on the clip they want their friends to see. The button is available under the clip’s title. The video is added to the tab titled “Collab.” Users can invite their friends to sign up for Snibble and access their list of recommended videos. Users can differentiate what each of their friends has posted by clicking on their avatar.
“You’ll have a curated feed of what you and your friends think are the best videos,” Shortt said.
At this time, invites can only be sent through email, SMS, Whatsapp, or Telegram.
Snibble further differentiates itself from other vertical short-form video platforms through its use of ads.
Any ad included in a preview is roughly six seconds long, appears at the beginning of a clip and isn’t skippable. The platform doesn’t feature multiple ads at the beginning of clips, and ads aren’t included between videos. Snibble does feature the occasional ten-second ad, which can be skipped about halfway through.
The platform was specifically designed this way, Shortt said, to create a “very premium experience.” Users can rest assured this ad format won’t change any time soon.
“As long as I’m alive and in charge of this, we will never have a mid-roll ad because digital content wasn’t designed for commercial breaks like TV was,” Shortt said.
The founder specifically takes issue with platforms that make users watch long periods of ads for videos that are only a couple of minutes long. “It’s not a fair trade-off for their time.”
Snibble is free to use and is advertiser-supported.
Currently, 95 percent of the platform’s audience is in the U.S., but Shortt’s ambitions for Snibble are global. The app is available in several European countries with “sizeable English-speaking populations,” including the UK and Germany.
Shortt said the company is also working on partnerships in India. The company held a four-month-long test in the country, and the results “encouraged us greatly.” Users are flocking to the platform without any advertising, Shortt said. During the week of November 27th, Snibble saw 2,000 new users in India.
The unexpected growth is part of a long-standing trend. When the company first did a market test, Snibble got 600,000 downloads in three months. These figures were unexpected, and the platform quickly crashed. The company rebuilt the app, which was first released two years ago. It’s now on the “more traditional and scalable AWS backend,” Shortt said.
The company is working on releasing a list of new features on Snibble, including one that involves artificial intelligence (AI) recommending content for users to watch.
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