Salesforce Chatter vs Slack, a comparative analysis

As part of its strategic acquisition policy, Salesforce surprised the world with the billion-dollar acquisition of Slack Technologies Inc. In the words of Marc Benioff, President and CEO of Salesforce, “Together we’ll define the future of enterprise software, creating the digital HQ that enables every organization to deliver customer and employee success from anywhere”.

However, with this acquisition, one question was left unanswered: what is the future of Chatter for the Salesforce platform and its customers? Until now, Chatter was the enterprise collaboration software for the CRM. So why would billions be spent on Slack, a tool with similar functionality to Chatter? Below, we highlight several points to help you understand this decision by Salesforce.

Asynchronous Communication vs. Real-time Communication

Chatter is more than a collaborative tool, it is an internal Salesforce communication and notification tool. It is asynchronous by nature, as its greatest strength is the ability to share information within the CRM’s own records. Its fundamental support is email, which makes it more functional for one-to-many communications, but not for conversational collaboration. Slack, on the other hand, operates in real time and relies heavily on users being online. In addition, it allows you to create private or group channels, as well as attach voice notes, videos and other files. Users of paid plans can meet using Huddle, a feature of Slack with many potentialities. With this, you can have an informal discussion or meeting by voice communication, just like in the office. Groups can have up to 50 participants and have the option to share screens and enable live captions.

Modalities of prices and accessibility

Salesforce Chatter vs Slack - prices

Chatter vs Slack, who uses them?

Chatter was developed primarily to be used by sales, marketing, service teams, as well as general project collaboration. Also, it works only within the Salesforce ecosystem and its users. This means if the entire company isn’t linked to the CRM, it’s considerably laborious to bring people from other teams on board and achieve effective collaboration. Even for exclusive Chatter members, the functionality is extremely limited and they still have to work through a Salesforce user interface. In contrast, Slack is generally adopted by the entire company. This is key for business collaboration, as no matter what your team is, any worker can have a productive and rewarding experience using this platform.

Integration

Slack was designed for easy integration with other systems and is backed by over 1,500 built-in apps with a robust set of APIs for creating custom connectors. In contrast, Chatter has a very limited set of connectors, as it was designed to be used within the Salesforce ecosystem.

Mobile versions

Chatter doesn’t have a good reputation on its mobile interface while Slack works seamlessly on any smart device and provides one of the best user experiences on the market. With Slack mobile, you can do just about anything you’d expect with your web or desktop apps. This functionality enhances real-time communication, since it is useful to start a conversation with a client on the move, during field work, or remotely.

With an eye to the future and given its respective features and potential, Slack has the makings to become Salesforce’s new collaborative participation and interaction software of choice.

Trusted by great companies.

From start-ups to Fortune 500s, we help businesses of all sizes get the most out of their Salesforce experience.

Sony PLSA
Green Building Initiative
Banco Sabadell
Boats
DHL
Norwegian Cruise Line
Larkin Community Hospital
Bupa
Discovery Channel
Bacardi

What people are saying

Five starts

Five stars on customer satisfaction and Salesforce appexchange ratings.

"Excellent Consultants. During the training I received by the SkyPlanner team, I was lucky to better understand the powerful capabilities of Salesforce.com. They were very effective, straight-to-the-point, and with a solid knowledge of the CRM and the Force.com platform. Definitively they showed us how to streamline the business process within our company. Great group of people spreading valuable knowledge to make businesses grow. I highly recommend them."

Ramiro Allen — Chief Software Engineer @ TurboPay Limited

"Excellent partner! We have been working with SkyPlanner for almost one year now. It has been a pleasure working with their team. If it wasn't for them we would have not been able to go-live with our platform when we did. They understood our needs and were not only able to execute but guide us in our decisions. We continue using them for our on-going projects. They have a deep understanding of the overall platform. Their team is always ready, willing and able to help."

Ivan de Moya — VP Innovation Technology @ SunStreet

"SkyPlanner was professional, creative, reliable and extremely accommodating. From the onset of the project, it was clear that we had found the right partner. Our project was complex and every time we hit a roadblock, SkyPlanner was helpful in identifying and implementing a solution. Jorge Fernandez [SkyPlanner's Co-Founder & Managing Director] was our primary contact and we cannot say enough about what an asset he was in bringing our project to resolution."

Ryan Borcherds — Marketing @ Deliver Lean

"On time, on budget, great quality on every project. Whenever I get asked to recommend a Salesforce.com partner, I do not hesitate on my reply: Go with SkyPlanner. I had the privilege to have worked with many teams over the years, none have brought to the table the enthusiasm the SkyPlanner team has. This combined with their professionalism and expertise are the reasons I ONLY recommend one partner: SkyPlanner. In every project (and we have done many) they have consistently delivered on time and on budget with significantly superior quality."

Juan Meza — Strategic Business Development Director @ Sony Electronics Inc.

"Outstanding Service! Happy to have them as our partner! SkyPlanner is by far the most experienced and reliable Salesforce partner. We almost gave up on Salesforce thanks to our previous partner, fortunately we found SkyPlanner and they came to the rescue! They took their time to understand our needs and complexity of our organization. Highly talented, professional and dedicated team. I cannot stress enough how happy we are to have them as our partner and we look forward to continue building our relationship."

Nolan Pereira — Project Manager @ BLU Products

Go to top