

Introducing Messenger Platform and Businesses on Messenger - tayeed
https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/2015/03/25/introducing-messenger-platform-and-businesses-on-messenger/?__mref=message_bubble

======
Kronopath
Before anyone starts thinking this stuff is super-innovative and new, let me
tell you what's really going on here: Facebook wants to make Messenger into a
platform in the same way the big Asian chat apps are. Things like
Weixin/WeChat or LINE. I mean, just look at the most recent additions to
Messenger:

\- Stickers. These grew in popularity starting in Asian apps. [0]

\- Using Messenger for payments [1] and to send money to each other [2] have
been in WeChat since at least last year.

\- Offering "official accounts" for businesses to "chat" with customers. [3]
Yep, that's there too.

\- And of course, sharing of messages with rich-media content from other apps.
[4] To give an example, with WeChat you can pop open QQMusic (a music
streaming app) and share a song with your friend that they can play and stream
without leaving WeChat.

All of these features were pioneered in Asia. They're either trying to bring
the innovations westward in the hopes that they can build a similar platform,
or they're defending against the possibility that foreign apps like this will
expand and take over their marketshare.

I wouldn't be surprised if this kind of thing was the reason they split
Messenger from the main Facebook app in the first place.

[0]
[http://www.wechat.com/en/features.html#emoticons](http://www.wechat.com/en/features.html#emoticons)

[1] [https://www.techinasia.com/wechat-adds-payment-support-
for-b...](https://www.techinasia.com/wechat-adds-payment-support-for-brands-
and-retailers/)

[2] [https://www.techinasia.com/wechat-allows-money-transfers-
bet...](https://www.techinasia.com/wechat-allows-money-transfers-between-
friends/)

[3] [http://smallbiztrends.com/2014/03/how-to-use-wechat-for-
busi...](http://smallbiztrends.com/2014/03/how-to-use-wechat-for-
business.html)

[4] [http://dev.wechat.com/wechatapi/messages-
moments](http://dev.wechat.com/wechatapi/messages-moments)

~~~
sahara
>All of these features were pioneered in Asia. They're either trying to bring
the innovations westward in the hopes that they can build a similar platform,
or they're defending against the possibility that foreign apps like this will
expand and take over their marketshare.

There's likely a third aspect: Fb (& Snapchat, et al) framing/reframing their
services to be more familiar/comfortable for East Asian users as the business
case makes competing in those markets increasingly appealing/unavoidable.

As others have noted, the truth is probably some combination of all of the
above (and then some).

I doubt anyone has any idea how these concepts will play outside Asia.
Snapchat has been crowing for some time now about their intentions to become
Tencent West, but their success to date hinges entirely on the core offering.
Is anyone—aside from strippers[0]—using Snapcash, for instance?

There's definitely something fascinating about this sort of nested bundling
(social recommendations within a ridesharing service within a maps app, etc.)
but I don't know if there are strong indications that American/Western users
want that. It seems to me that the logic is "500 million Chinese can't be
wrong!"—maybe? But the West hasn't even seen one messaging platform to rule
them all since AIM, lately there have been far more web/mobile unbundling
success stories, and I'm not sure what would turn that tide.

[0] [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/style/strippers-go-
underco...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/style/strippers-go-undercover-
on-snapchat.html)

~~~
mimighost
Messaging apps are all about social connections. Any kind of monetization has
to build upon that.

Even if FB/Snapchat tries to make themselves more agreeable towards Asian
markets, they still need to face the question from customer like this: if I
have something (Line/Wechat/Kaokao Talk) that works great for me and my
friends, what is the reason for me to use their western counterparts
(FB/Snapchat)? Only because they are trying to make themselves similar to the
local competitors ? That is not convincing enough.

------
mladenkovacevic
Oh look NSA had a product launch today.

On a serious note I flirted with installing Messenger several times and
couldn't go through with it after facing all the app permissions.

As a platform I wonder if this will follow the same path as the Facebook
Games/Apps platform. Rampant use, rise of at least one game company (Zynga),
then gradual but consistent desertion.

As a service for businesses, this is interesting and only time will tell how
threatening the move is for existing customer support/communications apps. The
deciding factor will be how conducive Facebook's network is to customer/brand
interaction and if they can be a place for both personal and commercial
interactions.

~~~
th0br0
I agree with your stance on Messenger, yet I have found Cyanogen's Privacy
Guard more than satisfying to limit Messenger's "spying" powers.

Outside of the US(?) I don't think that this has got much chance of taking
off. The legal / data privacy ramifications of support knowing a customer's fb
profile and all the information contained therein are something I find quite
difficult to quantify.

~~~
sirkneeland
Hi from Cyanogen! Glad you like Privacy Guard!

------
txu
I got pretty excited about it, but I really can't trust Facebook as much as
before. They practically took "graph" off of "open graph" by disabling third
party's ability to list users' friends and invite them.

I won't be surprised if later in the year some apps get banned from Facebook
APIs because they touched Facebook's pie, which now covers pretty much
everything. It's no accident half of the apps in the showcase are for sticker,
GIF, and video replies as they pose no threat to core Facebook features.

So what's in it for us?

~~~
sgarg26
I think they will open up their ecosystem to let a apps grow really big
organically. Then they will try to figure out a monetization strategy with the
largest apps. App makers that do not play ball will probably get cut
regardless of how big they are... There are good examples: Consider Zynga vs
Lolapps when Facebook originally opened their API.

~~~
loceng
I posted this above - How long then for FB to develop apps or acquire apps for
the dominant use cases, and then squash out/limit the competing apps that
integrated and helped build up the user behaviour to begin with? There's no
way FB won't do this, that is part of their behaviour. How could they do this?
They could all of a sudden require apps to use their payment, with whatever %
taken that they please, and if you don't agree then they boot you and tell all
of your users about their replacement app.

~~~
sgarg26
You are right. Probably something like half the time that it took for them to
do this before.

------
ilolu
Now Facebook wants to track other things that were out of their control too.
If businesses start using the messenger, then facebook will know about my
buying habits and other information too.

And how long will it take for Facebook to sell as Ads, the information back to
businesses that helped them collect it.

~~~
loceng
How long then for FB to develop apps or acquire apps for the dominant use
cases, and then squash out/limit the competing apps that integrated and helped
build up the user behaviour to begin with? There's no way FB won't do this,
that is part of their behaviour. How could they do this? They could all of a
sudden require apps to use their payment, with whatever % taken that they
please, and if you don't agree then they boot you and tell all of your users
about their replacement app.

------
colinhowe
Disclaimer: I work for a company providing customer service over social media
solutions.

Allowing businesses to do messaging with customers is a big deal. It's been
there on FB messenger for a while, but, it hasn't had the attention. We're
seeing an increasing trend of customers wanting to contact businesses where
they are rather than being forced to follow the business' requirements.
Facebook is one of those places.

~~~
pbreit
It's criminal that you can't text message businesses. That seems to me the
most obvious route. Any IP-based phone system should support this. Not sure
how it would work with AT&T.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Are you kidding me? I'm only 32, and I'd never consider texting a business.
Call? Sure. Email? Sure. But texting? Seriously?

~~~
personlurking
I had a banking problem a few years ago and stumbled across a Twitter account
of a "super rep" for the (major) bank. I tweeted him, he tweeted back in 60
seconds with his email. I emailed him right away and we had quick-fire chat
over email and he said "let me fix your problem and I'll email you when it's
fixed". About 3 minutes later, he emailed me back. The quickness of it all,
plus the short-style emails going back-and-forth, reminded me of SMS and it
was wonderful. In fact, I've never had better, nor quicker customer service.
If it matters, I'm 33.

~~~
maxerickson
To me the key parts of that interaction are that he was immediately available
to you and empowered to fix your problem. If phone support picked up on the
first ring and did something more than try to deflect, it would be fine too.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Right! Is SMS communications with a business useful if its going into the same
workflow as call center phone calls?

People aren't wanting for new communications methods. They want what they've
always wanted: quick, useful support from someone empowered to provide that.

------
smrtinsert
Thanks to Facebook I uninstalled Facebook and Messenger and now my battery
lasts four times as long! Thanks Facebook!

------
bluthru
Another decade, another company trying to turn the web into AOL.

------
benaiah
I wonder if this is why they shut off their XMPP Messenger integration earlier
this spring.

~~~
wl
It's not gone just yet. It has a few more weeks of life. I saw this headline
and thought maybe there'd be a way to continue to use Facebook messenger in
Adium. Nope. Only if you're building an "app" for iOS or Android.

~~~
diminoten
Can't someone (either from Adium or from the community) just develop a
"Facebook" plugin for Adium using their "new" way of doing things?

Sure, you can't use XMPP anymore, but that's okay, right?

------
sushimako
The business messenger is the perfect complement to their recently released
Anonymous Login and a very smart move.

As a business implementing Anonymous Login, you give up having an email
address of your user (or _any_ other kind of contact information) for a very
simple and attractive login method. Now with the messenger you _can_ actually
contact your (anonymous) users, even if all you have is a facebook provisioned
ID.

All this at the cost of giving facebook complete control over your userbase
and your means and rights of getting in contact with them.

Brilliant.

------
mcintyre1994
Hopefully they approach this with more tact than they have the news feed.
Since I can't be bothered to help their algorithm find the tiny bit of signal
left there and it clearly values sponsored crap more than anything I care
about the value of it is below zero at this point for me.

Messenger on the other hand is my most used mobile messaging service, almost
everyone I regularly message is on there. It's useful and I actually care when
I see a message - hopefully it'll stay that way.

------
joaomsa
I'm very interested in the Messenger App platform, integrating rich media into
chat is the reason I hacked a client side Messenger chat bot a while ago.

[https://github.com/joaomsa/botman](https://github.com/joaomsa/botman)

Much faster to transmit intense disapproval or glee as a reaction gif.

------
strzalek
messenger.com must've been expensive one to acquire ;)

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zkhalique
What is the goal of all this?

Facebook used to be the platform, and apps could go viral there. Then they
made it so that you can't even get a list of all friends.

Now messenger is the platform instead of the newsfeed? OK, what can I embed in
it, and why would I do it? What benefits does our app get from it over SMS
invitations?

~~~
sirkneeland
I'm sure Facebook sees value in newsfeed still. They're just not going to put
their eggs in one basket. It makes sense to try new things and see what sticks

------
chatmasta
I'm surprised they haven't integrated WhatsApp and messenger into one app (or
platform) yet. Why?

~~~
coldcode
Maybe different economic benefits to keeping them different. FB is always
about the money.

------
weixiyen
Is this only media sharing like images, gifs and videos or can I share links
and text content too?

