The popularity of instant messaging (IM) has skyrocketed in recent years. A study shows that the number of instant messaging accounts worldwide will reach eight billion in 2022. Team messaging apps help people accomplish their tasks either in person or remotely. But the real question is whether you are maximizing the benefits of instant messaging. Check out the top instant messaging apps for businesses to use for efficient internal and external communications. 

1. WhatsApp 

WhatsApp is the most common instant messenger app around. With more than 2 billion users, there’s a good chance your customers are using its texting, group chats, file sharing, and voice and video calls features. There’s a group chat feature allowing only admins to send instant messages.

WhatsApp has an exclusive business tool to connect small enterprises with their customers. WhatsApp for Business offers a business profile, a greeting message, a quick reply, and an away reply.

2. Facebook Messenger

Facebook Messenger is on WhatsApp’s heels as a step to boost your business’s external communication capabilities. It is available in almost every country except China. Your company’s Facebook page comes with a Messenger app that can be reached by customers who don’t have Facebook accounts.

3. Skype

Skype is a famous communication platform that allows users to make voice and video calls, send instant messages, and share files with other Skype users. It has evolved into a comprehensive tool for online communication. Particularly, it’s one of the widely-used instant messaging apps for businesses.

Skype provides real-time translation of voice and text conversations between users speaking different languages. Users can also make landline and mobile calls to non-Skype users at a low cost. Overall, Skype offers a variety of features to enhance online communication and collaboration.

4. WeChat

WeChat is a multi-purpose social media app developed by Tencent in China. It is one of China’s most popular messaging apps, with over 1 billion monthly active users. On top of instant messaging, this app offers other features for comprehensive communication and lifestyle platforms. 

For example, users can make voice and video calls, send text messages, photos, and emoticons, and share their location with others. WeChat also includes a feature called “Moments,” which allows users to share their life events and experiences with friends and followers in a social media-style feed. 

5. Telegram

Telegram’s user base is lower than other instant messaging services on this list. The messaging app is gaining popularity among businesses because of the features like supergroups, bots, and secret chats. Telegram also allows users to send files up to 1.5 GB, especially in countries with tight restrictions on messaging apps. However, several unique features can boost your lead generation. This instant man, like public channels, groups, and supergroups, allows up to 100,000 users per group.

6. Slack

Slack is a team collaboration platform that provides a central hub for communication, organization, and project management. It was founded in 2013 and has become one of the most popular instant messaging apps for businesses.

With Slack, users can send direct messages to individuals or groups and participate in public or private channels for specific topics or projects. The platform integrates with many other tools, like Google Drive and Dropbox. Slack also has a searchable archive of all messages for easy searching and access to information. It is popular among remote teams for being s a comprehensive communication, collaboration, and project management platform. 

7. Discord

Discord is a communication platform established in 2015 for online communities and gamers. It provides various tools for text, voice, and video communication, as well as file sharing and collaboration. 

The platform includes voice and video calling, direct messaging, server-based text channels, and file sharing capabilities. Discord also offers a range of customization options, including creating custom emotes and adding integrations from other tools, such as Trello and Spotify. Discord is a versatile platform for communication and collaboration, making it a popular choice for online communities and gamers.

8. Microsoft Teams 

The Microsoft Teams features a few key selling points, one being its in-messaging word-like formatting. You can change font styles and create bulleted lists within each IM. Then there’s Teams’s deep integration with Office 365. Collaboration within the entire Microsoft Office toolkit without leaving the app makes it great for the corporate environment.

9. Brosix

Brosix has been providing an all-in-one business instant messaging app for enterprises of all types and sizes since 2006. It is a versatile business solution with dynamic productivity tools, robust security, and comprehensive administrative control.

Voice and video capabilities, screen sharing, and a native whiteboard solution streamline communication and collaboration. Broadcast messages let you target your message to a handpicked audience.

Unlike other instant messengers for business, Brosix’s unlimited-size file transfer never restricts file transfers, neither by size nor volume. Companies looking to boost customer support can quickly deploy the engaging live chat solution.

10. Fleep

Fleep is an excellent tool for inter-business communication. With Fleep, you can chat with other Fleep users and teams outside your organization. The app delivers the core messaging capabilities you’d expect from an instant messaging app. There’s also unlimited messaging history, native task management, and the ability to send emails through the app. The disadvantage, however, is that Fleep doesn’t have collaboration tools. Moreover, you don’t get native voice and video calling.

Conclusion

The rapid growth of messaging apps as a communication channel for billions, not to mention the enhanced security and productivity of business instant messengers, make IM technology an essential business tool. When choosing the right messaging app for your business, examine your internal and external communication needs.

Are you looking to create a stunning presentation that keeps your audience engaged? It would be best if you had excellent presentation software to take your slides to new heights. Let’s review the ten best presentation software so you can choose the best for your business.

1. Visme

Visme is a cloud-based presentation software that enables users to create visually engaging and interactive presentations, infographics, and other visual content. Its user-friendly drag-and-drop interface makes it easy for users to add text, images, charts, and other elements to their presentations. Likewise, it offers design options like custom color schemes, fonts, and layouts. On top of that are interactive features like videos which can engage audiences and make the presentation more interactive.

Visme also offers collaboration features that allow multiple users to work on a presentation simultaneously. Users can also share it for feedback and review. 

Best for: Visme is perfect for small and large businesses, marketers, project managers, content creators, and educators.

Pricing: 

• Personal: $12.25/month paid annually
• Business: $24.75/month paid annually
• Enterprise: Custom

2. Prezi

Prezi offers a great alternative to the typical presentation format that goes slide by slide. Prezi’s creative idea is to create an animated, non-sequential flow of slides with hidden topics and subtopics until you zoom in. While Prezi’s interface can be slightly complicated, it is a good option for people who wants to add a creative touch to their slides.

Best for: Businesses and educators.

Pricing: 

• Free plan: $0
• Plus: $12/month
• Premium: $16/month
• Teams: Custom, contact sales team to Request pricing information

3. Google Slides

Google Slides is a web-based presentation software part of the Google Suite of productivity tools. Google Slides is a web-based presentation software part of the Google Suite of productivity tools. It enables users to create, edit, and share presentations online, and it is similar in functionality to other presentation software such as Microsoft PowerPoint.

With Google Slides, users can create a new presentation from scratch or use one of the many templates provided by Google. Users can add text, images, charts, and other elements to their presentations using a simple drag-and-drop interface. Google Slides also offers a wide range of design options, including custom color schemes, fonts, and layouts, as well as the ability to add animations, transitions, and other effects to slides.

Best for: Business professionals, educators and students

Pricing:

• Free to use for anyone with a Google account.
• Plans for business accounts tart at $6/user/month.

4. Keynote 

Keynote is an Apple presentation software and one of the original alternatives to Microsoft’s PowerPoint. The best thing with Keynote is that it is the most similar to PowerPoint and Google Slides.

Best for: Keynote is good for businesses, educators, and individuals.

Pricing: Free for anyone with Apple ID

5. Microsoft PowerPoint

Microsoft PowerPoint is the world’s most widely used presentation software. It is similar in functionality to other presentation software such as Apple Keynote and Google Slides.

PowerPoint also offers collaboration capabilities, including sharing presentations for feedback and review. It also allows users to work on presentations with other users simultaneously. Plus, it enables users to export their presentations in PDF, PPTX, and JPG formats.

Best for: Businesses, individuals, students, teachers and individual who use a Windows PC or device.

Pricing: 

• Free to download on desktop or mobile devices 
• Business plans start at $6/month

6. Ludus

Ludus is one of the coolest presentation tools available online. The main attractions of Ludus are the clean black screen to edit on and the number of integrations that provide importing capabilities for all sorts of content.

Best for: Designers and business owners

Pricing: 

• Starts at $14.99/month for teams of 1-15 people. 
• Offers a 30-day free trial

7. Slides

Slides promote itself as “pixel-perfect” presentation software. Its editor includes a built-in grid to help with composition. Slides have a lower cost at the highest price tag, which suits smaller businesses.

Best for: Small business owners, startups, and individuals.

Pricing:

• Free plan
• Paid plans start at $5/month 

8. Slidebean

SlideBean is a cloud-based presentation software that enables users to create visually engaging and professional presentations quickly and easily. The software is developed as user-friendly and intuitive, making it easy for users to create high-quality presentations without any design experience.

Best for: Small businesses, startups, and entrepreneurs.

Pricing: 

• Free plan
• Paid plans start at $8/month

9. Beautiful.ai

The cloud-based presentation software Beautiful.ai uses artificial intelligence to help users create visually stunning and professional-looking presentations. It has user-friendly and intuitive features, making it easy for users to create high-quality presentations without any design experience.

Best for: Beautiful.ai is a perfect tool for beginners and non-designers.

Pricing: 

• Pro plan: $12/month, billed annually
• Team plan: $40/month, billed annually
• Offers a 14-day free trial

10. Zoho Show

Zoho Show is a web-based presentation software developed by Zoho, a company that provides a suite of productivity and collaboration tools. It is part of the Zoho Office Suite, which also includes tools such as Zoho Writer for word processing, Zoho Sheet for spreadsheets, and Zoho Meeting for online meetings.

With Zoho Show, users can create a new presentation from scratch or use one of the many templates provided. Users can add text, images, charts, and other elements to their presentations using a simple drag-and-drop interface.

Best for: Businesses, entrepreneurs, educators, and students. 

Pricing: 

• Free plan: up to 5 users
• Paid plans start from $3/user/month, paid annually

Conclusion

Presentation software is the most common tool used to pitch an idea to investors and present proposals to prospective clients. Likewise, it is utilized by many organizations to introduce new products or services, train staff on new policies, or teach students new or complex concepts. The collection of the best presentation software will help broaden your choices regarding the tools that will improve your productivity.

The amount of documents written in an organization comes in large volumes. Managers, marketers, entrepreneurs, and individuals jot down quick notes or write long-form content daily. With the help of word processing software, this mundane and time-consuming task is made easier and faster. Here are free and paid word-processing software tools you can try. 

1. Google Docs

Everyone has undeniably heard of Google Docs. This cloud-based word-processing program is a team’s go-to for collaborating on documents. It has a clean interface packed with many helpful features when editing your document. Since it’s cloud-based, you can access it anywhere and from any device with a Google Doc app.

Features:

• Templates for faster writing
• Table of content for easy navigation
• Work in offline mode
• Personal dictionary
• Voice typing to enter text
• Bookmarks for quick reference
• Version history to monitor changes
• E-signature tool

Pricing: 

• Business Starter $5.40/user/month
• Business Standard $10.80/user/month
• Business Plus $18/user/month
• Enterprise (Contact sales)

Visit website. 

2. Microsoft Word

Image Credit: TechRepublic

Microsoft Word was one of the first-ever word-processing platforms before the cloud-based online tools took over. It’s a powerful word processor that anyone can use, from jotting down notes and writing meeting minutes to creating blog posts and reports. 

Features:

• Check grammar, capitalization, spelling, punctuation, and more
• Share documents with anyone
• Add comments and suggest changes in real-time
• Save documents to OneDrive so that anyone can access them from any device
• Offers customizable templates and content

Pricing:

• Microsoft 365 Apps for Business $8.25/user/month
• Microsoft 365 Business Standard $10/user/month

Visit website.

3. Grammarly

Image Credit: UIT

Writers, editors, entrepreneurs, and marketers have used Grammarly to proofread and edit write-ups. The best thing about this word-processing software is it provides fantastic integrations with many other apps. It can be downloaded as a browser extension to ensure everything is error-free. 

Features:

• Catch grammatical errors, typos, insufficient punctuation, etc. 
• Full-sentence rewrites for hard-to-read sentences
• Custom style guides to ensure a unified voice within the team
• Available in more than 500,000 web, desktop, and mobile applications

Pricing:

• Free
• Premium $12/month
• Business $15/month

Visit website.

4. Scrivener

With versatility at its core, Scrivener caters to all kinds of writers. This word-processing program is tailored for long-form writing projects and fits lawyers, novelists, and blog writers. Users love this tool because it helps you compose thoughts and ideas by allowing you to scribble anything that comes up and squeeze it into the right place later.

Features:

• Powerful software that lets you gather writing materials and browse various parts
• Familiar text editing
• Use Styles to indent block quotes and make texts smaller at the same time
• Import writing projects from other apps to Scrivener projects
• Use the Corkboard to work with synopses you’ve written
• Check the overview of your manuscripts through Outliner
• Create templates and icons for new sections
• Keep track of progress like word count or writing history
• Take a snapshot before revising your docs so you can return to the former version

Pricing:

• 30-day free trial
• Standard License for macOS $59.99
• Educational License for macOS $50.99

Visit website. 

5. Dropbox Paper

Image Credit: Capterra

Dropbox is one of the leading cloud-based services online, and Dropbox Paper is nothing new in companies worldwide. This is where you can keep everything on the same page by gathering all your meetings, docs, minutes, agenda, and task assignments in one place. This co-editing tool is also free, which makes it an even better alternative for startups!

Features:

• Enjoy task management tools that let you add due dates, assign tasks, and mention people
• Use annotations and emojis to add comments to any part of an image
• Integrates with your meeting calendar so you can easily find the particular document for a meeting
• Drop a link from your Pinterest board, YouTube channel, SoundCloud, or Google Map
• Capture inspiration on tablets and phones
• Transform docs into presentations

Pricing: 

• Free

Visit website. 

6. ProWritingAid

ProWritingAid is a robust word processor that offers unique features you won’t find elsewhere. It is built for every writer, and this tool dramatically improves your writing.

Features:

• Over thousands of spelling, grammar, and readability improvements
• 20 in-depth writing reports 
• Use hand-coded rules to help you with your writing style and strength
• Enjoy in-app suggestions, videos, quizzes, and explanations
• Find the right words through Word Explorer and contextual Thesaurus
• Integrate with other apps, such as Open Office, Google Docs, Scrivener, etc.
• Install as browser extensions
• Use data visualization for an in-depth understanding of writing projects

Pricing:

• Free
• Premium $6.58/month

Visit website. 

7. Evernote Web

The genius behind Evernote was aware of the growing amount of information online and how the human brain couldn’t contain it. And this is why Evernote was born. It is meant to save your quick notes, schedules, and tasks in one place. 

Features: 

• Create a space for your essential ideas and information
• Quickly search your notes via keyword tags
• Add images, files, and to-do lists to notes
• Flexible organization
• Annotate and save images, web pages, and PDFs via the Web Clipper feature
• App integrations, including Slack, Outlook, Zapier, Google Drive, Gmail, Zapier, etc.

Pricing:

• Free
• Premium $7.99/month
• Premium Professional $9.99/month

Visit website. 

8. JotterPad

Image Credit: Android Community

Android users can make JotterPad their writing assistant. It lets you format your texts into MLA or APA papers, articles, mindmaps, screenplays, books, presentation slides, and more. This word-processing application is convenient as you can access it from any device, allowing ideas to flow.

Features: 

• Simple text formatting via Lightweight Markup
• Seamless integration with Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.
• Powerful integrated plugins
• Brainstorm and generate content with Wizard A.I. 
• Embed images to markdown files
• Quick Research lets you search words 
• Export to multiple formats
• Create formatted eBooks
• Over 100 beautiful-designed templates

Pricing:

• Free
• Monthly plan costs $6.99
• Annual plan costs $29.99

Visit website.