What is Thinkly the Indian 'Mobile Medium' Platform for Idea Creators?
Social 2.0 is sprouting on India's mobile ecosystem of English speakers.
With LinkedIn becoming so popular in India and apps all the rage with a ban of most Chinese apps, it was only a matter of time when India would spawn a Medium or Substack type product.
I first heard about Thinkly from this obscure LinkedIn post that had somehow appeared on my LinkedIn feed.
Thinkly App offers a subscription-based monetization channel for content creators including writers, thinkers, and journalists.
Thinkly, a new age knowledge platform and one of the torch-bearers of India’s social media 2.0 story has entered into a unique partnership with Free Press Journal, one of the most reputed and respected newspapers in India.
I have no idea what a new age knowledge platform or social media 2.0 is, but I assume they are talking about the Creator Economy.
LinkedIn is giving out “Influencer status” to Indian brass in an attempt to lure Indians to use their app more, which they have been doing so in droves so far in the 2020s.
The CEO and founder of Thinkly is Vivek Saxena.
The Creator Economy is Low Hanging Fruit for India’s Millennials and GenZ
So is this a Creator Economy platform in the making? My answer would be yes. Their motto is after all: “Follow Your Passion”. They currently have an Android and iOS app but no web based platform (yet!).
They are a scrappy startup out of Mumbai, Maharashtra and their product Thinkly is also about where the Curious meet the Wise.
Looking into the Thinkly App, my own face is reflected back at me, with a tag beneath it saying “My Snippet”. That’s certainly not the pen name I remember entering, but who's counting.
Social 2.0: Subscription-based social media options to create opportunities for creators
To summarise it for you, Thinkly is Substack++ or a Social 2.0 company. Meaning, while you get to create your newsletter on Thinkly, we help you get discovered too, which isn't the case with Substack, their Marketing pro Karishma Mehta calmly explained to me.
There was generally much insistence that I “download the app”.
To answer your questions:
1. On Thinkly
- a social media app for thinkers, independent creators are empowered to decide how much and when they wish to monetize their content. Therefore, addressing the innate need of creators to make rich-content as against shrill & clickbaity content.
2. How it works?
All you need to do is download the app and create your own publication where you can put content in the form of blogs (unlimited words, nope not only 500), videos (we have YouTube integration) and podcasts (via Spotify integration).
3. Monetization
We have an unique in-app wallet where the virtual currency is stars. So your followers can start subscribing to your publication and gift you stars. For eg: Once you accumulate 10000 stars there's a payout of Rs. 50,000 or $650. Sharing links of the content that you could consume
𝐄𝐱𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐲 𝐨𝐧 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐥𝐲: Watch the cricketing legend 𝐌𝐢𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐞𝐥 𝐇𝐨𝐥𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 on Thinkly Talks https://thinkly.me/Worldcup83
Read 50 𝐍𝐨𝐛𝐞𝐥 𝐋𝐚𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬, 120 Heads of State and other global leaders https://thinkly.me/ThoughtLeaders
Get free access to curated articles from 𝐌𝐈𝐓 𝐒𝐥𝐨𝐚𝐧 𝐌𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰, 𝐈𝐧𝐜, 𝐅𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐲 & 𝐐𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐳 https://thinkly.me/ThinklyBiz
Best from 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐯𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰, 𝐌𝐚𝐲𝐨 𝐂𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐜 & 𝐏𝐬𝐲𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐓𝐨𝐝𝐚𝐲 https://thinkly.me/ThinklyWellness
Latest from 𝐌𝐈𝐓 𝐓𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 & 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐒𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐭 https://thinkly.me/ThinklySciTech Read Variety,
𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐀𝐭𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐜 & 𝐁𝐚𝐧𝐠 𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐰𝐛𝐢𝐳 https://thinkly.me/ThinklyPopular
Best from 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐃𝐢𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐦𝐚𝐭, 𝐃𝐞𝐟𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐞 𝐎𝐧𝐞, 𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐢𝐠𝐧 𝐀𝐟𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐬 & 𝐆𝐥𝐨𝐛𝐚𝐥 𝐕𝐢𝐞𝐰 𝐏𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐭 https://thinkly.me/ThinklyGeopolit
The company said they raised a bridge round of 𝐕𝐂 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠, sharing an eclectic mix of thinkers who have joined our app:
Mr. @Gaurav Kalra - Sports journalist for two decades, covered Olympics and grand slam tennis. https://thinkly.me/GKVibes
Mrs. @Kaveree Bamzai - Author, columnist, event curator at Independent Consultant https://thinkly.me/KavereeBamzai
To start with is it possible the company kindly requsts you to please download the app and explore it a bit? thinkly.me/download.html
Imagine being at the beginning of a new Medium ('“Where Good ideas Find you”) or Substack (“The Home for Great Writers and Readers”), imagine the shear opportunity to be among the first? The lure of the Creator Economy platforms is always interesting.
Of course I’m not Indian, I have no idea who these influencers are or how they will manage to try to kickstart their app.
I’ve somewhat outgrown the clickbait of Medium and Thinkly assures me there are no trolls on their app/platform and “no shrill clickbait”. After spending too much time on Reddit this week, I do indeed have a serious and very real fear of trolls.
https://www.thinkly.me/
Anything is better than being ignored on Twitter, who claim to want to have another 100 million users by the end of 2023.
All you need to start on Thinkly is an account and a publication and you can start right away.
Bonus points if you live in South India.
I really need to be gamified with stars on another platform full of grand promises to revolutionize the spread of good ideas.
I just want to be among real journalists, thinkers and informationally inflated new age knowledge experts interested in the same things I am! Is that so much to ask?
In my feed are already articles on A.I., Covid-19, ESG and surging Nickle prices, just my cup of tea. Or do I really mean Chai? Orange spicy masala chai maybe?
I think I’m going to get the hang of this THINKLY app after all. If Quartz, MIT Tech Review and INC are here already, I must be in the right place.
Seriously though, founded this year by serial entrepreneurs Vivek Saxena, Navin Pai and Deepak Choithramani, Thinkly is inspired by the global success stories of Patreon and Substack.
Their seed round took place August, 2021. . Thinkly helps independent writers, thinkers, journalists, and other content-creators to monetise their content via subscriptions. Making money has always been a challenge for creators, and Thinkly hopes to become the preferred solution for this problem.
They might want to re-think how “stars” translate into money, but that’s their business. I’m not here for the tips. I’m not trading stars for Rupees. After all, 1 Rupee amounts to 1.7 Canadian (CDN) cents where I live or $0.017.
See you guys in the Creator Economy!
