Opinionaided secures $4.3M for real-time mobile Q&A

The Series A round is led by SoftBank Capital and BlueRun Ventures

Following on the heels of its $1 million seed round in March, mobile Q&A app Opinionaided has announced its $4.3 million Series A round led by SoftBank Capital and BlueRun Ventures, with help from all seed investors, including General Catalyst, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, DreamIt Ventures’ Mark Wachen, Jonah Goodhart of Point Ventures Group, Facebook advisor and Path investor Karl Jacob, ENIAC Ventures, and former Googler Vince Monical.

Additionally, Opinionaided is announcing the release of version 3.1 of its iOS app, which features a revamped user interface and allows users to post questions to the Opinionaided community, as well as friends outside of Opinionaided, using SMS, Twitter, and Facebook.  The new version also features comprehensive bios, online image search, and improved content targeting.

If you’ve never tried it, you simply must (I insist).  The process is simple and straightforward: users can connect via Facebook and post a question along with an associated image, select the age and sex of the users they want to query (very useful when you want to avoid emo tweenage melodrama), or keep it within their own intimate circle of friends. 

While waiting for responses, users can browse among the questions posted by other users and vote, comment, or offer an opinion. Users can select among different categories of questions, including Food, Drink & Lifestyle; Music, Movies & TV; Dating & Relationships; Health & Fitness; Parenting & Family; Pets & Animals; and so on. 

And responses come pretty quickly.  The last time I tried out the app, I got 38 responses in fifteen minutes.  Could it be the compelling photo I posted?

To date, Opinionaided members have contributed over 125 million responses to member questions since the app launched last summer.  And the average user spends three hours a month playing around on the app.

“Opinionaided addresses a massive user opportunity—real-time mobile Q&A— with a fantastic product experience,” said Jay Jamison of BlueRun Ventures. “Their team has built a product that is optimized for mobile devices and has created standout user engagement and traction that has long-term appeal. We think this positions Opinionaided as the market leader in this category.”

Opinionaided is available for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad.