The most popular social media platform, Facebook has always focused on providing unique ways for businesses to reach their customers in new and engaging ways. This feature has made Facebook a very valuable platform when it comes to digital marketing for healthcare as well, among other business niches. A few months back, Facebook introduced a Discover tab to better connect individuals with companies they’d enjoy, as well as improved chatbot functionality.
What’s New on Facebook?
This social media giant recently introduced version 2.2 of its Messenger platform that comes with a customer chat plug-in. This innovative plug-in allows businesses to carry on conversations with their customers on their websites using Messenger and continue those conversations across web, mobile, and tablet devices. By April 2017 Facebook Messenger had reached 1.2 billion monthly active users. So this new plug-in promises a greater advantage, with any business being able to make itself available within Messenger. Facebook Messenger platform already supports features such as bots that understand natural language, payments, and rich media among others. They say that these features will also be supported in the beta version of the website plug-in. They will be adding new experiences in the course of time so that the plug-in becomes as feature-rich as the Messenger app itself. Already there are many customer support and chat plug-ins for websites on the market, but the great advantage of Facebook is its platform and reach.
- Indicated by the blue Messenger icon, this Messenger chat plugin is designed to hover over the top the business’s web page.
- A customer starting a chat session with the business will be presented with the same sort of Messenger interface they are already accustomed to from using the app on their mobile devices.
- On leaving the website, customers can still view or continue their conversation from their phone or tablet using the app.
- Customers can thus remain in contact with a business in whichever way it is most convenient for them.
- This feature is especially useful if the business doesn’t respond immediately to user requests arriving via Messenger from the web.
New Chat Plug-in Could Enhance Health Content Marketing
The new Messenger Chat plug-in is bound to be beneficial for healthcare businesses striving to maintain the integrity of their presence on Facebook. Take the case of a multispecialty pain management center with diverse specialty offerings such as neurology, orthopedics, physical therapy, and pain management. Typically, their social media strategy would be built around those service lines, providing credible health information to their patients, mostly localized for their community. The new Messenger chat plug-in can help them effectively maintain their conversations with their patients regarding medical conditions, treatments and procedures, and the latest health trends and news important to their community. Healthcare providers need to maintain an “always listening” approach to their customers, which is important to ensure maximum patient satisfaction and quality care. There is no doubt therefore that this new Facebook feature will be well utilized for healthcare website design and healthcare digital marketing.
Customized Experience for Business Customers
Such live-messaging tools can help businesses create a custom experience for their unique audience. At present, Facebook’s chat plug-in is available to a limited number of developers as a closed beta. If you are interested in using the customer chat plug-in, register here to be notified when the plug-in is available for your company/organization.
Though supported for desktop, mobile and all message types and templates, this plug-in does not support Internet Explorer and In-app browsers on mobile.
To use the customer chat plug-in, include the Facebook for Javascript SDK in the page where the plug-in will be rendered. Note that the plug-in will not render in the webview inside any Messenger or Facebook app.
Other than customer chat plug-in, Messenger Platform 2.2 comes with Broadcast API, media template, and a bunch of other awesome feature enhancements. This plug-in allows customers to interact with your business anytime with the same personalized, rich-media experience they get in Messenger.
So, there it is! If you already have a significant Facebook presence and regularly engage with your customers via your Facebook page, this chat plug-in makes perfect sense because you don’t have to maintain a separate channel for user enquiries from the web. Surely, it will reduce the burden of your organization’s support email, which is where many websites at present direct customer questions. Hope you are convinced that Facebook’s new Messenger chat plug-in is a great option for digital marketing of your business website.
