Google to shut down Helpouts in April due to slow growth

Google is planning to shut down its expert video chat service, Helpouts, in April. The tech giant confirmed the news despite its previous plans for improving the service. Google had previously made an announcement that has partnered with Ambarella to develop wearable cameras. But the plan has now been scrapped, and Helpouts will be discontinued from April 20. The service hence meets the same end as the other Mountain Products, such as Latitude, Schemer and Reader.

Helpouts was launched in 2013 as a service that brought people in touch with experts from varied fields, like healthcare, science, home-improvement and a host of other options. The real-time interaction service offered users a better experience than other community forums. The service also allowed users to take paid sessions from several industry experts.

However, Google’s Helpouts failed to gained popularity with the people, even after the company introduced a mobile app for the service. Hence, Google has announced scrapping the service because it failed to grow as the company had anticipated. Apparently, Google had expected it to gain more popularity within the two-year time frame for which it was available. The company has already notified existing users of the service’s shut down through e-mails. But they will be allowed to download their history via Google Takeout until November 5. The company has also stopped accepting new applications.

With the service, Google aimed at competing with its own video service, the YouTube. But it faced tougher competition from rival Amazon’s Mayday service. Mayday connects a user with a customer representative and has received the highest satisfaction ratings from users. It is also expected that Helpouts users will now be forced to make a switch to other tutorial websites. Some potential services include Udemy, which provides both free, as well as paid tutorials on a variety of topics.