Reviving Your Brand: Chatroulette

By now everyone should be familiar with Chatroulette, the internet site that allows users to video conference with random people from around the globe.  As the media and television shows like South Park have made very clear, the site is heavily used by individuals looking to perform sexual acts.  Despite the large market for a website serving this purpose, pornography had never been the original or desired intent of the site's creator.  This unwanted usage has lead to a surge of backlash from the media and a large portion of users disassociating with the site because they are tired of seeing naked images every time they try to hold a legitimate conversation.  For the last seven months, Chatroulette has done nothing to prevent or deter such behavior, most likely on the grounds of fostering free speech and expression; however, allowing the brand to grow organically and earn a negative reputation, especially in the US, has put the brand at risk of permanently becoming nothing more than another internet sex site.  Now, it appears founder Andrey Ternovskiy is taking a stand to intervene before it is too late.


According to an article on TechCrunch, Chatroulette is employing a series of new technologies that will use video recognition to weed out pornographic images and flag users who are repeatedly skipped.  Assuming the new technology works, will this effort be enough to save the decaying brand?  With the right set of actions, the answer should be yes.  Alone the technology improvements would not be able to re-energize the brand and reengage users who have already jumped ship, but with the right amount of crisis communication and a solid brand platform, Chatroulette can reinvent itself and ignite a growth in video communications and global networking.  


Similar to BP, but on a much less disastrous scale, Chatroulette needs to first initiate crisis communication to begin apologizing to its audience for the current state of the brand.  Following a current trend of using CEOs as spokesmen, Ternovsky needs to engage media representatives directly, stating that this was not the intended usage of the site, explaining why the situation was allowed to escalate to its current state, and thoroughly educating users on the technology being put into place to address the problem.  Second, Chatroulette needs to develop a new brand platform and positioning that sets the course for the brand's future.  If not pornography, what is the true intended purpose of the site? How can the service benefit its users? And what will the future hold if the brand revolutionizes the way we communicate and socialize.  The new positioning should give the audience a reason to care about the company and a promise of change to hold on to for the future.  Together, these two steps should display an effort to abandon the past and launch a new direction.


Of course, the last step is to carry through with what is promised.  Aside from the improvements to the underlying software, the biggest way to reflect the positive changes associated with the new brand platform is to improve the user experience on a visual level.  As the site looks now, Chatroulette is a very visually disengaging experience, resembling an early Windows 3.1 feel.  Although this may have accurately portrayed the brand as a startup (the vibe gives an old school feel, focusing on substance over quality and aligning with an initial audience that most likely isn't swayed by just a pretty visage), combined with the current perception of the brand, the visual scheme of the site actually portrays a very low tech and even distrusting persona. If Ternovsky cares enough about the brand's perception to change the technology, he should also care enough to create a visual scheme that appears modern and professional (Apple-esque I'm sure).


With all this in place, the brand should have the legs it needs to reposition itself in the market and reengage lost audience members.  After a trial period of testing the updated software and analyzing some initial feedback on the overall user experience, I would further suggest that Chatroulette begins to sponsor or partner with other aligning interests.  If the new positioning aims to bridge language barriers and span distances, sponsor a pen pal program for high school foreign language departments.  If the new positioning is focused on networking and meeting new people, partner with dating sates and social media networks.  Not only will this drastically increase the site's user base, it will further build trust in a brand that had once been greatly discredited.