Slack is a group messaging or team collaboration app that aims to simplify communication for businesses. Features include open discussions, private groups, and direct messaging, as well as deep contextual search and message archiving, and file sharing. Slack integrates with a number of other tools, such as MailChimp, Dropbox, and Google Drive. Slack was acquired by Salesforce in December 2020.
The product is free to use, and also has paid plans with more features and greater controls.
The…
$0
per month per user
Zoho Cliq
Score 9.3 out of 10
N/A
Zoho Chat is a live chat tool, from Zoho Corporation.
$18
per month up to 25 users
Pricing
Slack
Zoho Cliq
Editions & Modules
Free
$0
Pro
$7.25*
per month per user
Business+
$12.50*
per month per user
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Professional
$2
per month per user (minimum 10 users)
Enterprise
$4
per month per user (minimum 10 users)
Standard
$18
per month up to 25 users
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Slack
Zoho Cliq
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
*Per active user, per month, when paying once a year.
Pro is $8.75 USD per active user when paying month to month. Business+ is $15.00 USD per active user when paying month to month.
My all-time favorite tool in this space is Slack but Cliq is a close second. Cliq is essentially built to mimic Slack but is not quite as cutting-edge with some of their features. We opted to use Cliq over Slack because of the interconnectedness it offered with all the other …
Essentially the same style of platform. Aside from any "bots" (which I don't use anyways), they appear to do the same thing. But Zoho Cliq comes packed into the Zoho One platform. It's a useful component in a suite of communication tools that allows our office to work and speak …
I would definitely recommend Slack to everyone who needs a messaging platform for work. The thing that I most appreciate on Slack is the possibility of talking to my coworkers without using my personal number or personal apps. This way, I can separate what is work and what is not. Slack even has the option to mute notifications after work hours. I'm able to keep track of every project and discuss them in an easy and fast way. Another great thing is that you can keep and check the history of channels and groups, this way the discussions are never lost when someone joins the project in the middle of it or someone leaves, the history is always there. The only thing that bothers me in the platform is the system of threads, where you can easily lose the messages cause they look kind of hidden. If you have multiple subjects with someone and the person only responds in threads, it's very common to lose their messages.
It is very well suited as a messaging tool, where one needs to communicate quickly to a colleague the status of a particular task or an update to the work. This is especially useful for field work where the field team can report the work done and any additional resources required. We have faced issues when virtual meetings are held for a team of 10+ members with a lot of drop-offs and poor quality of reception (audio & video). While some may be attributed to poor internet connection, we do not face the same issue when using Zoom meetings. This area requires strengthening
Automated Notifications: Integrated tools like Jira, Trello, and Google Drive to receive automated notifications and updates directly in Slack, improving visibility and efficiency within the team
Message Encryption: Slack encrypts the messages in transit and at rest, ensuring the security and privacy of sensitive information and making our IT team's life much easier.
Reminder Bots: We used Slackbot to set reminders, automate follow-up actions, and provided information based on user queries.
SurveyMonkey Integration: Integrated our Slack with SurveyMonkey to distribute surveys and collect feedback from team members, streamlining the feedback-gathering process which was a huge support to our HR and Admin team.
I do wish Slack made it easier to see your DM's. They added a feature that moves them around based on who is active, but if you're trying to find a thread with a teammate who isn't active on Slack at that moment, it's a lot harder to find.
I also think they could integrate with AI more and have apps for AI.
Lastly, it would be awesome if it would tell you when a coworker was last active. It would be nice to keep track of when people are logging off.
Initial set up can be a little daunting if you aren't a tech-savvy person. For large organizations, this might not matter since you would have a dedicated IT team that will handle it (as we did) but if you are a small business owner looking to set this up yourself, I imagine it would take some trial and error to get working.
As useful as Slack has become within our company, I feel fairly confident we will continue to use Slack as a communication tool. They continue to improve their software and add value to its use within our office. Customer service delivers, which is an absolute must. Looking forward to how they improve.
Zoho Cliq has become an integral part of our daily business. Every single member of our team who has a job involving a computer has an active Zoho Cliq license and uses the tool continuously throughout the day. It cuts down on meetings and allows the team to feel very connected to one-another even though we are distributed geographically.
As long as you use the basic chat features and nothing more, it really is super easy to understand and use. Once you want to take advantage of some of the more advanced features and capabilities, that's when things get complicated. Anyone who has use SMS or a chat program before will be able to figure out the basics though, so rolling this out should be relatively straightforward and not required exhaustive training. Teaching chat etiquette is something else though.
Ease of use! It's easy enough to open chat, start audio sessions, screen shares, or even sending files. The fact that individual "emojis" can be applied to normal chats is wonderful. Allows to "acknowledge" without lengthy back-and-forths. Automation via CRM turns Cliq into a productivity tool beyond communication. Simply put, I don't how you could improve the system (save for a few UI boosts). As it stands, it's a powerful tool that is easy to pick up and play with.
I've never had to contact support for Slack which is a great testament to its ease and use. Adding people outside of the organization takes a little getting used to, but ultimately allows for greater collaboration between FTE and contractors. There is no clear alternative to this software, so it's the best we can do for now.
It always helps if you communicate to everyone in the organization how important it is to drop whatever other chat tools they are using and jump quickly to Slack. They will all fall in love with it.
Slack is the superior offering for what we do and who we communicate with. The other programs offer basic features, but Slack continues to innovate and is business-first, which is very helpful for our small team. The feature set and integrations are better in Slack than other offerings we have evaluated
Functionality wise Zoho Chat fairs pretty well against the other options. I still use all the other options as I need to be flexible in how I communicate with clients. It is the integration into the ZohoCRM & Cliq that puts Zoho Chat above the others and is why I try to encourage clients to move across to the app
We have a story when one guy mentioned in a our site group with tag @here about his wedding, he didnt know that @here works only for people who are online, so most of the people missed the message, slack is not the best place to update about the important things
Slack helps to solve and be updated if you have an internal problems and you want to know how the solving goes
