Meet Aymeric, CEO at Wizz
Created 2 years ago by a team of developers from Voodoo, Wizz is now a fully independent social media, which already counts more than 300,000 daily users. The goal is simple: allow all GenZ people to meet and chat online, instantly, without barriers. Aymeric Roffé, after launching an AdTech startup, joined Voodoo until becoming its CTO in 2019. Since March 2020, he has devoted himself exclusively to Wizz, and has assembled a team of 11 entrepreneurs now working on the project.
- Why did you want to create yet another social meeting app?
A.R : The question of value is central to Wizz. The risk in creating a new social network is to repeat the pitfalls of existing applications. Wizz has two advantages over its competitors. Firstly, it instantly allows you to connect with unknown people, your age, and in complete safety. Secondly, the absence of social ranking between the profiles, and the absence of potential for the transformation of the profiles into marketplaces makes it possible to ensure neutral and easy going discussions. No other social network allows such advanced and simple instantaneousness approach.
Bored ? You can talk directly about anything and everything with strangers on Wizz, with whom you can establish the links of your choice.
2. How is the relationship between Voodoo and Wizz structured?
A.R : At first, Wizz was therefore a shell within a larger whole represented by Voodoo and its 6 billion downloads. Wizz was first founded by a team of developers whose manager had left Voodoo and who organized themselves. They all participated in the construction of the product, and this DNA still lives on. All team members have an opinion on the evolution and the trajectory of the app, and it is even frequently asked.
Now, even if Wizz continues to rely on Voodoo’s financial means and business resources, the product and the team are 100% independent. On the one hand, the team benefits from a tasty balance between entrepreneurial freedom, encouraged risk taking and the possibility of testing all sorts of ideas to build a promising product. On the other hand, thanks to Voodoo, Wizz can lean on a comfortable structure to ensure the continuity of the project (and attractive offices in the 2nd arrondissement of Paris). All members remain entrepreneurs at core: this allows Wizz to evolve quickly and find its market fit.
3. What are the user feedbacks on the app?
A.R : We’re constantly talking to users, and we’ve even built a community of 5,000 beta testers who give us constructive feedback on the product.
We are constantly testing new features. GenZ is very demanding: teenagers are used to digital apps, to permanent new and exciting content, and we have to satisfy them so they’ll stay on the app. We tested a lot of features: video, group chat, profile tag, adding favorite music, and of course we couldn’t forget to integrate games into the application.
We also benefit from data coming from a large use base (4 million downloads), which is valuable to analyze. Each time, we combine qualitative feedback from users with feedback from data analysis. The intense growth of the application also requires to have a strong capacity to adapt our mindset in order to ensure that what we create is scalable.
4. How do you consider safety on a GenZ app?
Safety is a central subject for Wizz, which is aimed at teens from 13 years old.
First, the less the better: we design the app to collect a minimum of data. Then, we have set up processes to control the age of users with photo, and a verified profiles policy too. We are also often in touch with the regulators of the countries where the app is available, to ensure that we are compliant.
This has a real influence on our product: we receive a lot of negative reviews because of our strict policy. Nevertheless, this policy has good outcomes. Our users directly take up the subject of safety. Feedback is positive, 35% of profiles are verified, and they can moderate and report harmfull behavior on their own. These reports are then processed almost immediately by a team of moderators.
5. What are the next steps for Wizz?
A.R : Over the past few months we have been able to demonstrate that there is real traction among young people for a product like Wizz. We managed to build a revenue-generating app that users keep coming back to, while being only available on iOS in the US. Today, we have no brakes, no shadows on the horizon.
Now it’s about developing the app, testing even more features, while conquering new markets. We are working on launching the app on Android, and very soon we will launch Wizz in other countries. Our next goal: expand the team to iterate even faster and reach one million daily users.
Open positions
Senior Back-End Software Engineer
→ Or send an email to joinwizz@voodoo.io.
Article written by Nathan Freret, Talent Acquisition Associate at Wizz
