LogMeIn adds WhatsApp, WeChat integration to Bold360 customer engagement platform

• LogMeIn, WhatsApp
logmein-adds-whatsapp,-wechat-integration-to-bold360-customer-engagement-platform

LogMeIn announced on Wednesday new updates to its Bold360 live chat platform, making it possible for users to interact with their customers via WhatsApp and WeChat.

“We are working to add more channels including Apple Business Chat and Google Business Messaging, as well as creating new efficiencies for agents and supervisors who manage these channels behind the scenes,” said LogMeIn’s VP of Customer Engagement Products Yaniv Reznik in the news announcement.

We we care

Bold360 is touted by LogMeIn as an “omni-channel” customer engagement solution that gives businesses the ability to engage with customers on the customer’s preferred channel while providing customer service agents a single platform to manage all channels and conversations.

To stay competitive in today’s “always on” environment, marketers will need to meet customers when — and where — they want to be met. That means, making their brand available via multiple messaging apps that can respond in real-time to customer interactions. By adding WhatsApp and WeChat integrations, LogMeIn is creating a more comprehensive live chat platform — and catching up with other platforms like LivePerson’s Maven conversational bot solution that offers integration across various channels, including SMS, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp.

Also, LogMeIn’s ability to provide a single-view of all customer interactions helps brands see the “big picture” in terms of managing the total customer experience. LogMeIn user Neil Stotesbury, the customer service manager for Netflights, said having full visibility into customer conversations, regardless of channel, has been ideal for his team. “It’s been great to see how we can scale our digital support without compromising the quality of our interactions with customers,” said Stotesbury.

More on the news

  • Bold360 also includes Facebook Messenger and SMS Text integrations.
  • In addition to working on Apple Business Chat and Google Business Messaging, LogMeIn has a Microsoft Teams integration that is in beta.
  • Powered by AI, Bold360’s platform can handle “routine” customer queries via bots that analyze connected systems to serve up relevant responses.


About The Author

Amy Gesenhues is a senior editor for Third Door Media, covering the latest news and updates for Marketing Land, Search Engine Land and MarTech Today. From 2009 to 2012, she was an award-winning syndicated columnist for a number of daily newspapers from New York to Texas. With more than ten years of marketing management experience, she has contributed to a variety of traditional and online publications, including MarketingProfs, SoftwareCEO, and Sales and Marketing Management Magazine. Read more of Amy’s articles.



WhatsApp rolls out SMB product ‘Catalogs’ to support local discovery and commerce

• rolls, WhatsApp
whatsapp-rolls-out-smb-product-‘catalogs’-to-support-local-discovery-and-commerce

At Facebook’s F8 developer conference in April the company announced a number of new offerings, among them WhatsApp Catalogs for small businesses. Facebook is now formally rolling it out in selected markets including Brazil, Germany, India, Indonesia, Mexico, UK and the U.S., with more countries coming soon.

Showcase products or services. Catalog allows businesses on WhatsApp to showcase products and services and share them with customers via the app’s messaging function. Consumers can also discover businesses and see and browse products directly on the business profile.

The process is simple. Business owners upload images of products (or their work product), provide descriptions, product codes and pricing. They can also add URLs to product pages, menus and so on.

It’s not entirely clear but it doesn’t appear that businesses will be able (at this point) to sell directly on WhatsApp. But they can link to pages where products can be sold or other conversions can happen.

Why we should care. WhatsApp is positioning itself as a complete commerce platform for small businesses. Although transactional capabilities are currently not present, I would expect them to be introduced in the future.

While WhatsApp is not widely adopted in the U.S., it has massive global usage. It has more than 1 billion daily users and more than 1.5 billion users overall. Like Instagram, WhatsApp is a platform that Facebook needs to further monetize to drive continued revenue growth.


About The Author

Greg Sterling is a Contributing Editor at Search Engine Land. He writes about the connections between digital and offline commerce. He previously held leadership roles at LSA, The Kelsey Group and TechTV. Follow him Twitter or find him on LinkedIn.