Krista Neher
Mar 28 2023
Messaging App Advantages For Businesses
For many consumers, messaging app advantages are what drive them to mobile purchasing, particularly because they are convenient-it is easy to share text, video, and images or video chats than calling or visit a store. In fact, according to WhatsApp CEO Will Cathcart, 175 million people a day use WhatsApp to contact businesses and WhatsApp has a 20-27% conversion rate.
They are popular! As of 2022, WhatsApp had 2 Billion monthly users, WeChat 1.2 Billion and Facebook Messenger 988 million. It is no question that with only 20% of the US market on messaging apps like WhatsApp, usage is expected to continue to grow significantly over the next few years, as businesses start to optimize to use more features. The time is now for businesses to take advantage of the power of messaging.
So why is messaging so popular?
After the Covid-19 pandemic, we saw an upward trend with consumers, of which 92% saying they would like to shop online and be in control of their experience. The idea is that consumers want to build the brand relationship throughout their online experience, from ads to messaging.
Why Your Business Should Be on a Messaging App
Messaging Apps are a powerful platform for businesses for a few reasons:
- It is where people are – People are already spending their time in messaging apps, and as younger people prefer non-traditional channels, messaging apps will continue to increase in importance.
- It is mobile first – As mobile is more and more important, businesses need to have an easy way to connect with customers on mobile.
- It integrates – Many messaging apps, now integrate with websites and other platforms. For example, if my bank offered it, I could check my bank balance or transfer funds through a messaging app.
- Natural language conversations – With messaging apps (even with bots) people can have natural language conversations. For example, instead of logging in to a website or app, I can just ask what my balance is, how far away my taxi is, or my flight status.
- The power of AI (artificial intelligence) – Chatbots bring the power of AI to messaging. With this, businesses can anticipate your needs to provide superior service.
- Speak to a Human? – Despite all the technology, often people want to speak to a real, live human, and more and more that happens on messaging apps.
- Subscriptions and push – One of the reasons businesses LOVE messaging apps is that they can have people subscribe and push their messages. Messaging app messages have a high open rate and show up as a notification on most phones. This may change as more businesses adopt the process, but at the moment businesses can get a lot of visibility.
The power of messaging apps is huge. In China, where messaging apps are more popular, people use them to order and pay for taxis, pay their bills at a restaurant, and to get ads from businesses.
How Businesses Use Messaging
Businesses use messaging platforms in a few different ways. This will continue to evolve as the platform becomes more robust.
- Live chat – Some businesses use Messenger as a way to speak to a human, similar to live chat on a website. Businesses need to manage expectations of response times. Facebook has a variety of tools to make it easy for businesses to use Messenger for customer service.
- Voice calls – WhatsApp allows texts, voice, and video calls, so many businesses use it as their main voice line. If you travel in Asia, you’ll see WhatsApp numbers promoted on everything from tour groups to restaurants. The flexibility of text and voice makes it appealing.
- Mass messaging – Businesses that have embraced chat are starting to use it to send mass messages to people. In this way, it is used almost as email.
- Functions of a mobile app – Chat (through bots) gives businesses the ability to provide many different robust features through messaging. Businesses can create services for clients through Messenger.
As you can see, messaging app advantages are numerous and include the functionality of multiple different services all in one. This is what makes it so powerful.
This based off an excerpt of Krista Neher’s best-selling book, “Digital Marketing That Actually Works”. You can find this and more books at Boot Camp Digital
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