What is Kik Messenger and How Can You Use it for Your Small Business?

Kik Messenger is a Canadian-based instant messenger for mobile devices. Commonly referred to as Kik, the app has effectively differentiating itself from the rest of the competition earning a growing user base.

What makes Kik standout and makes it loved by its users is the privacy. The app’s business model, which requires no phone number, has earned Kik a base of more than 300 million registered users. These users are able to register with simply their email address, date of birth and chosen username. To date, Kik is the only mobile messenger service to allow such a simple signup with so little personal information.

Kik employs a few key features that are especially attractive to small business owners. Here is a look at some of those features and how you can use the app to take your small business to the next level.

What Makes Kik Different?

The list of messenger apps seems to get longer by the day. The majority of them perform the same functions with a few tweaks to brand themselves. Kik, on the other hand, has managed to combine the more foundational enterprise-based way of communicating with the modern fast-paced, multi-featured app that the latest generation of users expects.

Kik could be described as a Blackberry-Snapchat hybrid. Blackberry was known and appreciated by businesses because of its enterprise-level foolproof security, while Snapchat is known for its creative means of communication and unique features.  Combine the power of both while again adding some useful tools for small businesses and you have Kik.

By using Kik as a marketing tool, businesses have direct access to their audience. More importantly, the features that power your client interactions can be automated and measured for their efficiency.

Kik Features for Small Businesses

At its foundation, a messenger app is simply a communication tool. The power of smartphones combined with apps like Kik allow small businesses to reach their customers in an interactive exchange. This new frontier in engagement is free of the barriers associated with standard marketing.

Kik has taken this concept of removing barriers to the core of its business model. Although users are “anonymous” because they are not required to provide their phone number, Kik definitely allows you to leverage their status.

The Kik algorithm logs users’ IP addresses, which allows businesses to target them based on their location. In addition, users’ age adds a demographic element that further streamlines your target market.

With the age and location of 300 million users at your disposal, Kik’s potential starts to become clear. When you add the power of automation via Kik Bots, you’ve instantly multiplied your business footprint on the web.

Kik Bot Store

The ultimate small business tool leveraged by Kik would have to be its automated bot systems.

Through Kik’s API, companies have the ability to create automated robots to manage client interaction amongst thousands of users simultaneously. The technology uses your chosen keywords as triggers that engage your clients with your chosen responses, ads or directions.

Just about every major brand, from The Weather Channel to Sephora, is using a customized Kik bot as one of its frontline marketers.

When you combine the live-chat feature, it becomes the closest thing to an in store experience with a “what else can I help you with” level of service. This attention to detail results in spending increases of 100-300 percent, the company says.

 

Clearly this offers the opportunity for you to leverage the power of the app to take your small business operations to the next level. Expansion of operations and market reach, for small businesses, has never been easier.

Team Collaboration

Internal teams are able to use Kik as a communication and collaboration tool. The cross-platform capability of Kik connects iOS, Android, Windows Phone and other platforms.  In a business environment where each team member may be using different devices, and be in different locations, this can be important.

Collaboration is taken to the next level in real-time exchange of messages, photos, business ideas and virtual conferences.

Kik continues to expand its collaborating scope, even reaching out to platforms that were otherwise seen as competitors. After a tumultuous affair with Blackberry, one that included lawsuits and settlements, Kik is now featured in Blackberry’s most recent update, allowing users to automatically cc: and bcc: recipients.

Conclusion

Kik has proven itself a valuable tool for small businesses. The future of messaging belongs to platforms like Kik, apps providing client engagement and satisfaction features.

The online-to-offline worlds are evolving into a richer experience for consumers and that’s something small businesses should want to be a part of.

So if anybody asks you “What’s your Kik?” Be prepared to answer.

Images: Kik

This article, "What is Kik Messenger and How Can You Use it for Your Small Business?" was first published on Small Business Trends