It’s June 2013. You are just admitted into high school and your father has bought you a new mobile phone that has internet access. You open the browser, search for Facebook, and create an account. You search for the childhood friend who had shifted to another city a few years ago and send him a friend request. Soon, the request gets accepted and you start chatting with him, reliving memories you cherished together.
Got nostalgic, right?
Facebook was probably the first app that gave our generation this unique feeling. This feeling soon became a habit and other messaging apps also got into the competition, offering many more interesting features. Sadly, Facebook is not among the leading messaging apps today. The company, however, is looking to regain prominence by offering newer features and updates. In a recent update, the company said that it is bringing Messenger back to its mobile app. In this blog, we will shed light upon the why’s and what after’s of this decision.
The Rise of Messenger (Fall of Facebook?)
Messenger was launched in 2011 as a simple messaging app for Android and iOS. However, it was separated from the main Facebook app in 2014. Users had to separately download messenger to text anyone. The messenger app was easy to use and provided more features compared to the main Facebook app, however, the need to switch between apps to message someone was certainly not welcomed by the users.
As messaging was previously integrated into the Facebook app itself, users could easily send and receive messages while scrolling through their timelines. Messenger, on the other hand, made things complicated for users. Thus, the number of people using Facebook also started to decline. Alongside the Messenger thing, the rise of other apps like WhatsApp and Hike derailed the growth of Facebook. Moreover, Instagram, which started as a photo-sharing app introduced a chat feature and started attracting more users. Security concerns were also responsible for the downfall of the popular messaging app.
Will the Latest Move help?
Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg are taking this decision to provide the experience that attracted so many users. In an announcement, Zuckerberg said that the company is “testing the ability for people to access their Messenger inbox within the Facebook app.” The details of the decision, however, have not been disclosed yet. It is not clear if users have to keep the messenger app installed on their phones to use the new feature or if they can manage it without the app.
While we still await for details, implementation, and results of the decision, this surely seems to be a promising move as it will engage users by providing everything on a single app.
Till then, keep scrolling!
