Workplace by Facebook Reviews

I use the solution in my company to create chatbots for our clients, like BMW in India. We have been working on WhatsApp chatbots and Facebook marketing, where we have integrated Adobe Marketo for overall communication. That is how we created a network, which was finally integrated for the consumer side with Meta facilities. That is how we integrated tools.

Facebook does not allow you to take APIs directly from them. There are BSPs or business service providers where you can access the APIs. There was a tri-party agreement between our organization, BMW India, and Route Mobile Limited, which is based out of India, and that is how we got integrated with BMW's existing system. We created BMW's existing system, and it is where we integrated Microsoft Dynamics with Meta API, of course, provided by Route Mobile Limited, and we also integrated that with Adobe Marketo. Since Adobe Marketo and Microsoft Dynamics are legacy systems, they do not give you any open endpoints for integration with modern conversational APIs like the ones of Facebook, and this is where we have made the development happen. With WhatsApp, it is from the conversational API sense. WhatsApp is pretty great. It gives you a lot of information about people, and it also offers you a lot of flexibility. Google RCS is a pretty compatible platform. We have worked with Google RCS for Meta APIs.

There are a couple of things that can be improved in the tool. When we are talking about communications, the tool has interoperable cataloging. The only thing that needs a certain level of improvement within Meta is the vernacular, which can be dependent, as we cannot choose the process of communication that is happening in it. After I launch a bot, if I move from one country to another, and if the entire communication is happening in German, while I have just moved from France, and I need to buy a particular choice of vehicle, then I would want the entire communication to happen in my language. What Meta does not allow as of now is that if I am reaching out to you in French, then only you can have the conversation in French. You cannot select a language in the middle of a conversation. If I want to have a conversation in French, there is a very limited selection. Until and unless a conversation is triggered from a particular language, we do not have the option to choose another language. The tool gives you flexibility in the language, but that is on the business and not on the customer, which sometimes limits the approachability aspect.

I have experience with Workplace by Facebook.

As Meta does not get involved directly, we were working with a business service provider, Route Mobile, and so the communication was supposed to happen from Route Mobile to Meta and not with us directly.

Route Mobile has been pretty good. Actually, a couple of times, we faced challenges with Facebook. As we were working on an existing application, and we had already made a lot of stuff, the project ran for about three to three and a half years. We have built a lot of internal systems, including how the data is supposed to be pushed to the APIs and how that communication should happen. When Meta used to change its policies, which happened twice, it kind of disturbed our communication, and we had to do a little bit of tweaking with respect to the codes in order to make it work again, and that is where there was a slight bit of challenge with the support. With regular support, we haven't ever faced any challenges with Meta or Route Mobile Limited.

I rate the support a nine out of ten.

Positive

Considering the traditional methods of reach outs and the overall cost of having a salesperson reach out to people, WhatsApp is incredibly cheap. The cost has become one-tenth of the cost in comparison to the old techniques. As we were able to qualify and nurture these leads, the overall cost of the entire sales process was reduced. Earlier, if you were getting 200 communications, you had to reach out to a hundred people, but now, with WhatsApp, you are able to engage with many people. We are able to qualify them if they are genuine leads, and out of the 200 leads, you are probably getting 50 or 60 leads who are properly qualified and who are willing to interact. You do not need 200 calls but just need 50 calls to happen because you have better chances.

In our company, we integrate with Workplace through Facebook's tools that were provided to us, and it is there that we created a middleware system for communication back and forth. Whatever data we were receiving from that chatbot that we created on WhatsApp, we were able to push that to the CRM system, which was Microsoft Dynamics and Adobe Marketo, the marketing campaign system.

The tool's integration feature benefited the workflow since it boosted BMW's sales by 28 percent.

In terms of the tool's costs or productivity, the overall use case that we were working on with BMW had three steps. Firstly, the communication was mainly through the dealerships, where there was a slight bit of ambiguity. A dealership in one place was not reacting, and the communication was not similar to that of other dealerships. The first thing that the tool helped us with was creating a very homogeneous environment for communication with the customer. Anywhere you go across India, you are going to receive simple communication that is authorized by BMW India. There was no different marketing at different dealerships, which is quite a common problem. If you go to any dealership, you will be getting the same kind of experience. That was the first thing that happened. Secondly, it helped centralize communication. Any information that the dealership had, BMW also had it on the top-level majority. If even the CEO wants to access something, they can see it. Anyone at the bottom level, including the marketing head or marketing manager, who wants to see the information can access whatever they want, so there is complete transparency across the system. All these things related to communication and business transparency happened on the business side. Thirdly, we were able to achieve in the area of the time of communication. As soon as you fill up the form, as soon as you react to any campaign, and as soon as you have any communication or any interaction with any of BMW's campaigns or the website, based on the information that you have provided, you will be reached out to in two minutes on your registered WhatsApp number.

The time taken before the tool was implemented was actually dependent upon dealers. If you have submitted your documents, your phone number, and your matter of interest, then it is up to them to contact you. If the dealer wants to reach out to you on the same day or if they want to reach out to you the next day, even if you might have submitted it at midnight, it depends on them. The best or the fastest communication that you are going to receive is the next day. With WhatsApp, we were able to send messages to customers within two minutes, and we were able to qualify the leads. Before it reaches our dealers or our actual salesperson, it was already qualified with respect to three questions, which include if they are actually interested in test drives, they are interested in understanding what the financials are with respect to the NBFC, like the EMIs and all those things, or if they have some other queries, so we were able to qualify them before it reaches to any human intervention.

Speaking about AI, Meta does not allow AIs. Templates are supposed to be approved by Meta first, so we cannot have this NLP-based communication on Meta because the templates need approval. On BMW's main website, which is the main dealership website or the main website of BMW, we have created an NLP-based web bot, which has all the communication capabilities.

When we are talking about sales processes, Google RCS is a great option. Meta is also good. Along with Meta, Google RCS is also a good option. The only challenge with Google RCS is that it is restricted to Android phones only, so you cannot utilize those for communication with Apple users.

I rate the tool a seven out of ten.

The product was used company-wide as a communications tool. The HR department put announcements on it, and the chief executive had a blog where we could catch up with what was going on. It was mostly used for information about the business.

The product was easy to use. Everybody was familiar with the interface because it looked and felt like Facebook. It was really familiar, and it was easy to learn the features. Most of the functionalities were spot on.

In our company, a lot of people created a lot of groups. Suddenly, we were given membership to 150 different groups. We had no idea what was going on anywhere. The implementation could be made easier.

The solution could introduce chat rooms in the next release.

I used the solution for three years.

The tool was really stable.

It was quite easy to scale the tool. In my organization, 6000 people were using the tool.

We did not need support.

We have switched to Yammer now. As an end user, it looks very similar. We get Yammer as part of our Microsoft 365 subscription, so we have no additional cost. There was a significant additional cost for Workplace.

The product was deployed on the cloud.

It took us about two weeks to deploy the solution. Most of the maintenance needs were covered by our cloud service provider.

The solution seemed expensive to me. However, our communications team thought it was okay. That is why they implemented it. The cost of the solution could be improved.

We stopped using the solution in June this year. If someone is already using Microsoft 365, they should see if they could use the built-in capabilities of Yammer rather than paying additional licensing for Workplace. If they are not using the full Microsoft 365 suite, using Workplace would probably make sense. It's safe and familiar looking. Everyone is familiar with the look and feel of how it operates. The licenses seemed quite expensive. I don't think we used all the functionalities of the solution. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

I use the product for internal communication within the HR team. We keep track of activities and project updates.

Storage is the best thing about the solution. We can check the conversations and files from projects that we had three years ago. If we have some training or files and the new hires need to review them, we can store them in the solution. The product also provides a knowledge library that people can access.

The product should provide features similar to KiSSFLOW. The product should allow users to assign tasks and automate processes. Then, everything that we need for work will be available in one place.

I have been using the solution for about three years.

The product works perfectly.

The scalability is useful. If we need to add more people, we can easily give them access, and if we need to offboard someone, it's easy to deactivate. The number of users would reach up to 70 when we include our clients for ease of communication.

We chose the tool because, at that time, the pandemic had just started. It was the best tool. It provided us with ease of use.

The initial setup is easy. We are used to Facebook and Messenger, so the product is just like a work version. The product is deployed on the cloud.

The regular package costs us $4 per user per month. The solution also has a free trial.

I would recommend the solution because it is so easy to use. If we need to go back to our old files, it's pretty easy to search for them. It is also easy to store new files and videos. The streaming feature is pretty useful for organizations that are similar to ours. The product is useful but does not have all the features an organization might need. It would be better if the features in KiSSFLOW and Workplace were available on one platform. 

Overall, I rate the product an eight out of ten.

We use the solution for collaboration and information sharing.

The solution is used as a knowledge platform for sharing knowledge and information that everybody can easily access.

There needs to be a restriction on who can download content. You don't want people to download organization documents from the system, and currently, there's no restriction to that. There should also be a restriction on taking screenshots. The knowledge platform should be specific to groups rather than it being general.

We've just started running our first test with the solution. We've had Workplace by Facebook for about a month. So, we are still in the very early stages.

The solution has been stable so far.

The solution’s technical support is good.

Positive

The solution's initial setup was straightforward.

We decided to go with the solution because, from a user point of view, our staff already understands what Facebook can do. So it would be easier to onboard them and the experience felt smoother. We weren't going to teach people very difficult things.

Overall, I rate Workplace by Facebook an eight out of ten.

Our primary use for this solution is basically for corporate communication.

It helped us move from using an overly simple solution to a full communications package.

We use all of the product's features (e.g., posting, groups, collaboration, and surveys) and really they work together to provide the solution. 

I'm not sure that anything needs to be added. As far as things that could be improved, the biggest thing that we seem to have problems with is multi-party telephone conferencing. It works very well one-to-one but not very well one-to-many. Similarly, video conferencing works fine one-to-one with just two parties, but it' is difficult to bring in a third party. This problem with the video and call conferencing to multiple parties is probably the only problem I have with the product. With one or two people, it's fine. But as soon as we try to add a third location, we have to switch to a different tool and that is not very convenient. 

Workplace is very stable. We have not had any issues with stability at all.

The product is very scalable. We just add more users as we need to. Right now we have about 1,300 users working with this solution in our company. There are various people doing various tasks and their roles can change. I'm confident in the scalability.

The technical support from Facebook is actually very good. The last issue that we contacted technical support for was probably about six months ago. Obviously, we don't have to use them often. The issue was also not a problem or a bug in the system, it was simply something we didn't know how to do. They were able to help us out pretty quickly.

Before using this solution we just used email. It seems that was rather rudimentary now because this is much more sophisticated.

The initial setup was pretty straightforward. The deployment took about an hour to get up and running.

We did the implementation ourselves and we do it for clients. We are a partner and a reseller.

For anyone considering Workplace it is very easy to deploy and anyone who can use Facebook can use this as well. The transition between any other tool that you may be using will be easy because if you have used Facebook, you can use Workplace.

The biggest lesson we have learned from working with a Workplace is that we should have made the change a lot earlier.

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Workplace about a nine-and-a-half. The lone problem for us is really the limitation on video and call conferencing.