Best Practices for Businesses Using Instant Messaging Software

Whether your goals are to streamline internal discussions or enhance client-facing conversations, here’s how to make the most out of your enterprise communication software.

With the pandemic establishing hybrid work as the new normal and geographically disparate teams becoming par for the course, coordinating with colleagues who aren’t physically present at the same location is a major challenge facing companies, from small start-ups to multinational corporations. At the same time, consumer expectations around customer service have reached new highs, with more demanding expectations when reaching out to businesses. Customers want the on-the-go convenience of being able to interact with brands via their mobile phones, replete with ultra-responsive to their concerns and questions.

Instant messaging software for businesses is helping fill the gap, by creating a speed-first pathway for streamlined conversations, both internally within an organization’s teams, external communications between brands and consumers. It’s clear that enterprise messaging provides a boost to both company – client relations and collaboration between colleagues.

If you’re ready to begin leveraging instant messaging software for your business, whether your goals are client-facing or internally-motivated, there are a number of best practices you should keep in mind in order to make the most out of your communications software.

Establish a clear instant messaging policy

Instant messaging for business is an amazing tool for facilitating lightning-fast answers to queries and establishing a friendly, casual channel for communication between colleagues and strengthening accessibility for customers to reach organizations. You can think of instant messaging for business almost like tapping someone on the shoulder – it gets a quick response and immediate attention.

Discussions around critical business matters should be discussed via the appropriate channels, and it’s up to employers to set clear standards about what’s okay to talk about through instant messaging and what needs to be shared in an email. This also applies to client-facing interactions. Companies must establish guidelines about customer queries or complaints that warrant a phone call or email as a response, or a formal note about the conversation elsewhere. 

Embrace easy, intuitive options to ease adoption

Research multiple communication platforms for business to ensure that you choose the solution that’s the best fit for your organization’s unique needs. Investing in an advanced enterprise instant messaging platform with tons of bells-and-whistles features, but one that’s not user-friendly, will likely not be properly utilized by your employees. 

Conversely, you need to select a program that offers benefits that go beyond text messaging or phone calls, so that your teams will be eager to utilize it. The key is to find a system with benefits that your employees will appreciate, but with a simple and easy interface that won’t make using it a chore.

You may want to consider integrating platforms that your employees already use such as Microsoft Teams or Slack with technology that connects to popular messengers used by customers such as Whatsapp, WeChat, and Telegram to help smooth the transition and encourage widespread adoption within your company. 

Keep it short and sweet

The main advantage of instant messaging for business is simple – speed. Rather than sifting through email chains, searching for information across a wide variety of mediums like email, text messages, or website content, people can ping someone for a fast answer to their question. 

Customers love instant messaging with businesses so that they don’t have to suffer through a byzantine chain of “press four for this issue” phone prompts, and employees appreciate that instant messaging helps cut through the noise and facilitates real-time decision making.

Encourage your customer success teams to focus on giving clients quick, off-the-cuff answers. Explain to them that an extended sales pitch or review of your company’s terms and conditions are going to be a turn off for customers who are looking for concise responses.

Remind both managers and employees that instant messaging is meant for short conversations, and recommend that longform discussions be saved for emails, face-to-face, or Zoom meetings. Don’t lose the energy that makes enterprise messaging valuable for employees and consumers. 

Prioritize instant messaging compliance

As regulators crack down on organizations that use instant messaging for communication but don’t adhere to record-keeping requirements for business-related discussions, compliance has become mission critical. Failure to keep proper records around internal and external company communications has led to very public multimillion dollar fines, which seriously hurt an organization’s financial standing, investor relations, and consumer trust.

But instructing your employees about the importance of remaining compliant simply isn’t enough to protect your business. You need a solution that seamlessly integrates with your organization’s preferred instant messaging platforms that provides a safety net from human error. You need to be sure that noncompliance is either impossible or immediately detected so that real-time action to correct it can be taken.

LeapXpert provides a responsible business communication platform that keeps a complete digital record of all messaging conversations between your employees and your clients, no matter the application. This gives you unprecedented insights into user behavior and customer communication preferences, as well as ownership of critical data. 

The solution also empowers businesses with the option to apply settings that can detect potential leaks of sensitive data (e.g. Personally identifiable information, or PII, confidential documents) and even send out warning messages to employees when this kind of activity is spotted.

Businesses using instant messaging platforms can leverage LeapXpert to ensure that they remain in compliance with industry regulations, as well as protect their organizations in the case of a dispute or audit down the road. As the new normal means that instant messaging has become an integral part of business communication, LeapXpert can help guide your company to developing a responsible communications strategy that keeps your organization in compliance and provides the best experience possible to your employees and customers.