The Messaging Revolution is Here.
Be it with an old school friend, or a long lost relative, mass media has us covered with its social apps. But as we are progressing through this wave of social connectivity, it is seen that the social messaging apps like WhatsApp and Messenger are becoming more indispensable than social media apps like Facebook or Instagram.
The reason why teenagers and youngsters who made up the majority of the social media along with business enterprises are moving from social media to social messaging is simple. If evaluated, social messaging apps though look like a part of the social media apps offer a lot of advantages over these media platforms. To start with, social messaging apps give more privacy when it comes to protecting information. As compared to social media where information is meant to be shared with the site as well as a large number of people, messaging apps are encrypted and protect the information through a mono channel between the sender and the receiver where even the company cannot see the data.
Apart from that when it comes to productivity, a message sent over a messaging app has way more impact than an information on the social media which is easy to skip amidst a vast sea of contents on the platform. When it comes to businesses, a query posted on a social media is responded within an average time of 60 minutes whereas a much faster reply can be expected on the social messaging sites. When it comes to the social media, there comes a portion of negative publicity. If a customer finds a problem with a business or an individual and posts it on the social media, as is the structure of the platform people tend to remember the negative more than the positive, whereas the same query or problem can be resolved in an one on one conversation on the social messaging app.
When it comes to social media giants like Twitter, the characters provided to express a certain message is far lesser than a person might need. In other social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram, a message or an opinion has to be kept short in order to make it captivating. In social messaging apps individuals can type freely for as long as they want and thus their opinions become more clear and valuable.
When it comes to interacting with people most of the social media apps follow a procedure of adding or following a profile of an individual whereas the social messaging apps make use of either the e mail address or the phone number which makes it more personal while giving an option to the individuals where they can choose the people they want to keep in touch with or interact. Apart from these, the social messaging apps are capable of handling all the social media functions like sending an image, video, attachment and at times surpasses the social media where you can send an audio file or document via a messaging app but not a social media app.
In the year 2020 we have already moved away from the basic modes of communication like phone calls or SMS and most of these are also handled over an internet connection now. This not only becomes easier, it is cheaper and more convenient too. Mobile companies like Apple are trying to merge their messaging service iMessage in the form of a social messaging app with over 1 billion users worldwide. Apart from individuals, more and more businesses are also coming on social messaging apps and thus WhatsApp has incorporated features like assigning business tags to business accounts for better safety of the users. Adidas has been using direct messaging to find and target brand advocates. Through Twitter DMs and WhatsApp group chats, Adidas has been inviting ambassadors to private group conversations where they can reward them in a number of ways; releasing news through these channels first, sending out invitations to events and connecting advocates with sportsmen and women sponsored by the brand for exclusive online discussion. Social media apps are going on to be a growing substitute for the social medias by offering better privacy, app stability, features and reliability to the masses.
The humble messaging app is overturning our lives. We use Siri to set our morning alarm, Alexa to book ourselves a Uber, Slack to connect with colleagues, WhatsApp to connect with friends and family, and snapchat to don disguises. We are truly living in Planet of the Apps !