When your small business team members are scattered around the workplace and juggling dozens of different tasks, a texting app can make it easier to check in with your team throughout the day and share work-related news and updates from anywhere.
A tool like WhatsApp may seem like your best bet for team communication: It’s a straightforward, cost-effective app that lets you text individual team members, create group chats, and share files, images, videos, and other media.
But choosing WhatsApp to keep in touch with your team means you might be missing out on business-specific features and integrations that can keep your everyday operations more efficient. Plus, it could mean putting your business and your team at risk when it comes to security, compliance, and well-being.
Let’s take a closer look at how WhatsApp works, explore its pros and cons, and provide suggestions on effective, budget-friendly team communication alternatives you should consider instead.
Why WhatsApp might fall short for your small business
While WhatsApp may be a convenient way to stay in touch with your busy small business team, it may not be the best option for your future. You may find that it’s hard to keep administrative control over group chats, which means that essential news and updates can easily get lost and employees may start to feel information overload.
If you’re worried about compliance, you might also become frustrated with how difficult it is to save and keep track of essential employee data on WhatsApp, especially across various group and individual chats. For instance, it will be hard to ensure new hires remember to sign and return paperwork over the app as your team gets bigger.
Also, consider that WhatsApp isn’t designed with small business communication in mind, so their customer service team may be unable to help you address your business-specific technical issues.
Homebase’s team communication feature is a better choice for small business owners and their hourly employees. With Homebase team chat you’ll simplify day-to-day communication with an app that can:
- Customize group chats and use pre-created group channels to keep in touch with your entire team, managers, employees in specific roles, and everyone working today or tomorrow.
- Share onboarding documents and get automatic confirmation that team members have reviewed and signed essential paperwork.
- Receive auto-reminders for upcoming shifts, clock-outs, and schedule updates.
- Get notifications and alerts when team members are late for their shifts.
- Empower team members to arrange shift swaps independently — then managers only have to approve or deny requests.
Pros of using WhatsApp for team communication
The great thing about WhatsApp is that many of your team members may already be using it to communicate with friends and family, so they’re likely already familiar with how it works. Let’s look at the other advantages of using the app to communicate with your staff.
Convenient instant messaging and real-time communication
When you’re continuously communicating about changing schedules, shifts, and workloads, WhatsApp is useful because it’s easy to create group chats or message team members one-on-one. Plus, messages on WhatsApp are time-stamped, which can help you resolve workplace disputes and clarify past conversations.
WhatsApp also lets you create custom groups for specific teams, like your waitstaff, sales team, or managers. That way, team members aren’t overwhelmed by irrelevant notifications and texts. However, if you want to send an announcement to multiple people while avoiding recipients getting spammed with everyone’s responses, you can use WhatsApp’s Broadcast Lists function, which lets you send the same message to multiple individuals simultaneously.
Using WhatsApp can also help you create a more approachable, informal work culture, which may be ideal if you want to foster a more collaborative, casual working environment.
Accessible and user-friendly
WhatsApp is a cost-effective option for everyone — employees can use it anywhere they have an internet connection and avoid using cellular data. Because it’s available on mobile and desktop devices, it’s great for team members that work from multiple locations or off-site, and the fact that it’s iOS and Android compatible means anyone with a smartphone can use it. And while they’re off-site, team members can share their location with their managers as an added security measure.
WhatsApp also has a straightforward interface that most people are already familiar with, so team members won’t need training to use it.
A variety of ways to communicate
With WhatsApp, employees aren’t limited to texting alone. Team members can call and video chat with each other and send voice and video messages. Managers can also send essential documents and files for employees to sign and submit through the app. Then, they can verify that employees have read their messages with read receipts.
Cons of using WhatsApp for team communication
Unfortunately, the disadvantages and potential risks of using WhatsApp to stay in touch with your team members far outweigh the advantages. Here are a few examples.
Information overwhelm
Employees that use WhatsApp to communicate with friends and family may find it hard to separate work-related conversations from personal chats. They may also get easily overloaded by notifications, which could lead to them missing key updates and announcements.
Limited administrative control
With WhatsApp, you don’t have much power over the groups that employees create or the conversations they have over the app. For example, team members might choose to create a separate group with their coworkers that you can’t access, which means you won’t be able to intervene if group chats become disrespectful or toxic.
At the same time, you might have difficulty keeping records of important conversations, which could put your business in a vulnerable position if you run into HR and compliance issues.
Security and privacy concerns
While WhatsApp offers end-to-end encryption and data privacy, it’s hard to overlook the fact that its parent company, Meta, has run into legal issues in the recent past for the unauthorized collection of user data. And WhatsApp still shares some user information with Meta, so employees may feel uncomfortable sharing sensitive data on a third-party platform.
Lack of integrations
WhatsApp may not integrate with the tools you use to create team schedules, track time, and hire new team members. That might lead to issues with double data entry for managers and confusion for team members who have to switch back and forth between apps to verify their schedules and trade shifts with teammates.
Alternatives to using WhatsApp for team communication
The great news for small business owners is that there are better team communication apps that have a more professional feel, rival WhatsApp’s user-friendliness, and can help team members create better work-life boundaries.
- Homebase team communication — Homebase was designed to support small business owners who employ hourly, shift-based employees. With our messaging app, team members can communicate with each other without having to exchange phone numbers, allowing them to keep their personal and work lives separate. Plus, our chat tool makes it easy for employees to coordinate shift swaps with each other and submit a request for their supervisor to accept or reject.
The best part, though, is that Homebase’s team messaging app integrates with our hiring and onboarding, scheduling, time tracking, employee happiness, HR and compliance tools. That means:- New employees get added to the chat app as soon as they’re hired.
- You can use the team communication app to send and receive onboarding paperwork, which gets stored automatically in each team member’s profile.
- Employees get notified via text when they have an upcoming shift.
- Managers are notified when an employee is late for a shift.
- Teammates can send each other shout-outs for a job well done.
- Microsoft Teams — Part of the Microsoft Office 365 suite, Teams offers chat, video conferencing, and file sharing. It’s available on Android and iOS, and it integrates seamlessly with other Microsoft apps.
- Slack — Slack is a widely-used team communication platform that allows you to create different discussion channels for different topics. You can also use it to send direct messages and start group chats, share files and documents, record and leave voice messages, and host video calls.
- Wire — With an extra focus on privacy and security, Wire is a collaboration and communication platform used by governments and enterprises looking to safeguard their most sensitive communications.
Simplify communication with Homebase
As a texting app, WhatsApp has its upsides. It’s well-known, used around the world, and allows you to communicate in a variety of ways. It may be a practical option for new small business owners who are still growing their teams.
Still, we don’t recommend it as a long-term solution. Over time, your team members may have a hard time separating work from personal chats, and, with little administrative control, you may have a hard time maintaining a professional, respectful environment. And when you consider the legal issues WhatsApp and Meta have faced surrounding user data, is it really worth the risk?
With Homebase’s team messaging app, it’s easier to foster a positive, professional team spirit and communicate efficiently. With our app, premade group chats help you cut down on unnecessary notifications for employees, and automatic reminders and alerts prevent no-shows and late clock-ins. And, because it integrates with our suite of tools, like our scheduling and HR and compliance features, it allows you to send and receive onboarding paperwork, and it lets employees swap schedules with little effort from your managers.
Ultimately, Homebase is the right option for small business owners who want to simplify their daily operations and improve the work experience for their entire team.
FAQs about WhatsApp team communication
Is WhatsApp a professional way of communication?
WhatsApp can be a professional way to communicate with your small business team, particularly because:
- It’s cost-effective and easy to message employees one-on-one and create custom group chats.
- You can easily share documents, videos, and images within the app
- It’s also easy for employees to download and compatible with iPhone and Android, and team members won’t need to use their data as long as they have access to a wifi connection.
However, it’s worth noting its pitfalls:
- WhatsApp has faced privacy issues in the past, specifically around data sharing with its parent company Meta. Some team members may not feel comfortable using it for that reason.
- Employees may find it difficult to separate personal from work-related group chats, especially if they use the app for communicating outside of work.
How can I communicate with employees on WhatsApp?
You can use WhatsApp to send individual messages, create group chats, and even call team members, making it a convenient way to keep in touch with your team on the go. WhatsApp also lets you share files, documents, videos, and links, which means you can use it for onboarding and training as well as sharing general announcements and updates.
What type of communication does WhatsApp use?
WhatsApp is primarily a texting app, but you can also use it for:
- Group chats
- Voice messages
- Phone calls
- Video calls
- Video messages
- Image and document sharing
- Location sharing
Remember: This is not legal advice. If you have questions about your particular situation, please consult a lawyer, CPA, or other appropriate professional advisor or agency.
