Most or all of us hate the sound of an alarm first thing in the morning. That chirpy sound feels like we are on the border in an ongoing war or aliens have attacked and it’s time to run.
To counter this feeling some smart-ass created the button “Snooze”. But, does it help? Oh come-on, yes it does help to make us late for work!
So in an attempt by co-founders Hrachik & Tat Adjamian – to make our mornings more happy and cheerful we have – WAKIE!
WAKIE…???
As mentioned on their website, “Wakie is a fun, friendly community of people who wake each other up in the morning. It’s a brand new way to wake up, made especially for those of us who hate the jarring noise of an alarm clock. When you use Wakie, you get to start your day with a smile instead of a frown!”
In other words, Wakie is an app that helps millions of strangers to wake each other up or get woken by each other. It makes people happy by waking them up by the voice of a complete stranger from some part of the world.
If you keep an alarm you tend to snooze it and eventually end up sleeping again. But research suggests that a 1 minute talk to a stranger makes your brain wake up, that to with a ninety-nine percent guarantee and after that you don’t even feel like taking a nap. And because you have to be kind to them, you end up feeling positive and happy throughout the day.
Originally, Wakie was setup just as a website in Russia in 2011 but due to its immense popularity it eventually grew on to become an app with 1,000,000 registered users and more than 10,000,000 calls already made through the service.
But the beauty of this achievement was that, all of this was achieved with just word-of-mouth and absolutely ‘zero’ marketing budget.
Wakie is presently available in Android, iOS and Windows Phone operating systems. It has 1.5 million members across 80 countries and so far has successfully completed 30 million wake up calls. Although, the concept of Wakie is very much similar to wake up calls we receive in hotels, but what differentiates the app is the social feel given to it.
Wakie is like a Social Alarm Clock!
HOW DOES IT WORK?
The process of setting up alarms to receive calls Wakie is actually very simple and self-explanatory.
– To begin with, you can either choose to be woken up by someone or you can also choose to wake someone up.
– So for instance if you want to be woken up; you have to set the alarm for the time you wish to be woken up, say 7:00 AM.
– At sharp 7:00 AM, you will get a call from a stranger i.e. a Wakie member from some part of the world.
– These calls last for exact 60 seconds and at 50 seconds you will get a warning about the same, after which the call will be automatically be disconnected at the 60th second.
Generally, these calls are quick & casual, so that either of the members doesn’t feel the awkwardness.
This way there are no awkward goodbyes or forced long conversations, etc.
If there are no Wakie’s available to call you to wake you up, then the app will play an automated wakeup message. But that’s not the case usually.
Likewise, if you wish to wake someone up then all you gotta do is choose that option and if there is someone who requires a wakeup call then you shall be notified. (Although, you would require a good internet connection for it)
Now the best part of this service is that, it’s completely anonymous and no phone numbers or any sort of contact details are visible!
Apart from the basic service, Wakie also provides a Wakie in-app forum where the users can connect with the ones who woke them up or vice-e-versa.
So far, Wakie has raised two rounds of investments from Leta Capital. These included USD 2 million in May 2012 and the other one worth 1 million in August 2014. Currently, the company is working on a paid version of Wakie which will have extended talking hours of upto 5 minutes, will also allow you to choose the gender of the person you wish to receive the call from and will also give you the access to their profile after the call which again would depend on individual privacy settings.
Along with that, they are also working on adding clever robo-calls wherein you will have the luxury of setting up alarms just for yourself and it will inform you about the weather in your city, news from your industry, interesting facts and much more. They are also testing an option for its consumers of a Celebrity alarm clock. Wherein one can buy an alarm clock of their favorite celebrity and get different pre-recorded calls from them every day.
