I am a big fan of Telegram, the instant messaging platform most commonly referred to by people outside of my circles as “the one that nobody uses”.

I am constantly amazed at the reaction that I get from people whenever I mention Telegram; usually in response to some new feature that I am gushing about or out of frustration because I’m forced to use another service to speak to them. Almost always, the reaction is the same — “None of my friends use it.”

I’m never quite sure how I am supposed to respond to that statement. On the one hand, they are probably correct; in all likelihood, their friends have no idea that Telegram even exists. How could they, when Telegram has not spent a cent on marketing or advertising and has relied on word-of-mouth to build up its numbers?

But on the other hand, most people I speak to will almost always concede that Telegram is the better instant messenger when compared to the giant that is WhatsApp. So it boils down to a question of what is more important —using the better product, or simply using the product that everyone else uses.

As someone with a passion for software and internet technologies, I was not about to let a great product like Telegram pass me by because my less-informed friends may not be aware of its existence. So I went on somewhat of a recruitment drive with those in my close circles (friends and family), and pointed out the strengths of Telegram and why it deserves their attention. The result was that almost all of the people that I speak to on a regular basis are now Telegram users and together we reap the benefits of using the best software for the job.

We didn’t replace WhatsApp with Telegram. Most of us have kept both in order to stay in touch with the broadest possible group of people and to still be able to make use of WhatsApp’s excellent VOIP functionality (a market-area that Telegram has repeatedly said they were not interested in). However, I can say with certainty that because the people I speak to regularly chose to think for themselves rather than merely follow the herd, I now use Telegram almost exclusively.

Yesterday (23 February 2016), Telegram hit a milestone of 100 million active users, sending a total of 15 billion messages daily. Some 350,000 new users join every day! Make no mistake, Telegram is growing.

So when someone tells me “but nobody uses it”, I have to scoff. To those people, I say “Do something about it!” Yes, your blissfully ignorant friends might be able to say that they don’t know any better, but you do.