What is Slack and how does it work?
What is Slack?
Any business that focuses on flexibility and remote working options knows that while a lot is gained in terms of efficiencies, a little is lost in communication. Slack is basically a messaging app that has a whole host of attributes that most messaging apps lack – including email and other forms of communication, whether new or traditional. Slack is a cloud-based team collaboration tool. It enables teams to talk to each other, and privately within their team, through the cloud. It’s mainly free, but you can get access to greater storage and archival of old messages for a dime a month.
Why is it so great?
There are so many collaboration tools and collaborative software apps, so what makes Slack better than the rest? Firstly, Slack is organised well in a structure that makes sense. You can talk to the whole team, or simply invite someone to a private channel. You can share files, send direct messages, and change your settings so you get the most important notifications. The integration features mean that it is streamlined to perform a range of functions that go above and beyond its own core functionality.
What will it really cost?
For a small business, you only need to ever pay zero dollars forever. Yes, you read that right. You can access more by paying a little, but you don’t need to. Slack’s offer is free to talk to anyone, forever.
What about other collaborative apps?
Slack actually offers built-in (still free) integrations with over 60 partners, including many collaborative tools, like Trello, Facebook, Google Drive, and many more.
How do I use Slack for my team?
At iFactory, we use Slack for projects and internal communications; we love the fact that the mobile integration enables us to receive push notifications for important messages out of hours or out of the office. We can set it up so that it doesn’t bombard staff, but everyone is kept informed when something important happens.
Slack can be used to send an alert to your marketing team whenever your company is mentioned anywhere on social media, and you can even integrate it to deliver a message when:
- Someone (say, an employee) is out of the office
- Someone updates a file
- You want to put a sales manager at the point of transaction for every point-of-sale
- You need to kick off an automatic face-to-face meeting
- Important server alerts
Since we opened our doors in 2004, iFactory has grown to become one of Brisbane’s leading digital agencies. We are an end-to-end digital marketing service. We are the experts on how technology can develop your business. Call us to discuss how the latest in collaborative technologies can help your internal communications and bring your company to the next level, or how innovative design can provide intelligent business solutions that will solve your business needs.
