Leveraging the experience from WeChat super APP for personal purposes, Tencent has developed an Enterprise set of tools for team collaboration, management, and communication with the idea of overcoming the drawbacks of using personal software at work.
WeChat at Work or WeChat Work, formerly WeChat Enterprise Accounts, is now a separate app.
Businesses are able to offer Enterprise-focused platform for the productivity of their employees.
1. 101: What is ‘WeChat at Work’? How do you create it? What are the benefits?
What is WeChat Work or WeChat Enterprise?
This is the enterprise version of super-app WeChat as a dedicated tool with the following objectives for all business entities:
- reduce cost
- increase efficiency
- carry out “people as service” to the end
Solution for Enterprise Messaging. A direct competitor is DingTalk (earlier player on the market) from Alibaba Group.
One unique advantage for WeChat Enterprise is the link with WeChat where all the customers are: the interoperability between WeChat users and WeChat Work users. A key feature to use across teams:
- Sales
- CRM
- Customer Services
- Customer Experience (CX) in an omnichannel journey
- Customer Success
- Any customer-facing department
- Human Resource
- Finance
- IT
- What is WeChat at Work? | December 2017 [Grata]
- WeChat Work – how Tencent redefines corporate communication | July 2018 [Creative Union]
- 4 Benefits WeChat Work Can Bring to Your Business | December 2018 [ITConsultis]
List of features available in WeChat Enterprise
What can be done with WeChat for Enterprise:
| Internal Communication | – Messaging & Calling – Project Management: Creating To-Do List – Community/Group Creation (up to 100 users – before: limit was 25) & Management – Community engagement: Votes & Survey – Contact Management |
| External Communication | – Customer Service Tools – Adding contact to WeChat Enterprise from WeChat (by scanning a QR) – Messaging with a WeChat User – Turover Features: Reassigning customer(s) to new team member – WeChat Moments Communication |
| Security Management | – Confidentiality protection in communication – Watermark system – Data disclosure security – Protect sender & receiver privacy (same logic as WeChat) |
| WeChat Workspace | – Team Management: leave, expense, announcement, processes – Reporting – Internal forum – Files Sharing system – WeChat Enterprise specific apps marketplace as extension to add services: CRM, HR, Supply Management, Traning, Revenue, etc… |
New features are continuously added to serve their initial objectives.
How to integrate WeChat Enterprise Account to fit your needs
There are 2 methods to integrate WeChat Enterprise Solution into the set of corporate tools:
- via APIs
- interface your existing corporate tools with WeChat Work APIs to aggregate business operations under one platform
- via user-facing Components
- build tailor-made modules (applications or Mini Program) to customize your WeChat Corporate ecosystem with the out-of-the-box services
2. Tips, tactics and best practices to relevantly implement this enterprise tool
3. Customize your ‘WeChat Work’ tool by building tailor-made applications via h5 or Mini Program and leveraging API integrations
How to develop a Mini Program within WeChat Work tool
4. Details on WeChat Corporate Account capabilities
Internal and external communications
- WeChat Work Users are able to post on WeChat Moments of their personal account in order to communicate between employees and manage customers.
- WeChat Work Users
5. Feature updates and timeline on WeChat Enterprise platform
| Date | Features | Source / more details |
| December 2019 | – Post to WeChat Moments – Create chat groups of up to 100 users (previously the limit was 25) – Stick the chat to the top – Shortcut menu withinthe chat – Calendar invite to make an appoitment | |
| July 2019 | – First features for chatbots integration – enhanced customer broadcast messaging – email signature ‘business cards’ | Grata |
| May 2019 | – 17,000+ third-party partners join the ecosystem – Integrating with third-party services offers more features within the platform: staff training, survey platforms, online contract signing, and more | Technode |
| May 2019 | – Section ‘Customer Dashboard’: capturing data about customer management – Punch In/Out App: new admin dashboard and new reporting views | Grata |
| April 2019 | – Welcome message: send it when a customer is added – Overtime system management improvements | Grata |
| March 2019 | – Business card scanner: scan a business card to connect with a customer in WeChat – Group broadcast messaging assistant: message some or all of WeChat contacts from WCW | Grata |
| January 2019 | Interoperability improvement – External contact management | Grata |
| November 2017 | Interoperability improvement (connection between WeChat users and WeChat Work users) – Chinese ID no longer required for the real name verification | Grata |
| February 2018 | Deploy your company Wechat Pay QR code to all your employee with one click. For sales team: employees can now individually collect payments from customers, deposit directly into your company account. | Grata |
| April 2018 | – Add external contacts from WeChat – Apps can create group chats – Star Frequent Contacts – WeChat at Work App Store – Employee Rewards – Reporting App – Group chat management – Connect Official Accounts to WeChat at Work | Grata |
| May 2018 | Grata | |
| June 2018 | – Link multiple Work accounts together (e.g. Main Brand account and all outlets) – Migration of contacts when an employee leaves the company | Grata |
| June 2018 | Grata | |
| September 2018 | Grata |
6. News and timeline on WeChat Corporate
| Date | News | Source / more details |
| Dencember 2020 | 2.5 million corporate entities registered on the platform 60 million monthly active users | Tencent |
| May 2018 | 1.5 million corporate entities registered on the platform 30 million active users | |
| January 2018 | During the WeChat Open Class conference in Guangzhou, the current tool is mainly used for internal company communication. In 2018, the tool will add a new feature that enables employees to communicate with users outside of the company. This is particularly interesting as a lot of salespeople are using WeChat in order to stay in touch with their clients or partners. WeChat for Work will enable to keep this convenient mode of communication while bringing the data back into the company’s database and CRM systems. | Walkthechat |
| April 2016 | Tencent release of the first version of WeChat Enterprise = a standalone version of WeChat for business operations to draw the line between the work and personal lives of WeChart users WeChat Work 1.0 was launched simultaneously on Windows, Mac, iOS and Android platforms. | Technode |
