“Go paperless”, and “Go digital” are the slogans of today’s digital world, and software for Biometric attendance systems can vouch for it. The archaic method of managing and monitoring attendance with huge stacks of registers for hundreds of employees and generating reports of each employee's attendance will be a nightmare. Courtesy of technological advancement, many software solutions such as Biometric attendance device is in front of us to ease our tasks now. Following the aforementioned slogans, Eliminate the manual methods of attendance management with “paper and ink” and revamp this system to a biometric attendance system with “scanner and biometrics”. Biometrics-iris, face, and fingerprints have become the digital signatures to the attendance of all employees all over the world in the full spectrum of industries irrespective of brands. These systems also can be used in   Schools, Colleges, Educational institutes, Visitor management, Citizen identification   Many designers and developers have already adopted this system and provided various feature-set software applications based on biometrics. Have a look at these top 10 biometric attendance systems and read on to know their features as well. Here we go! 10 Biometric Attendance Systems 1. Time Dynamo 2. mDESK7 3. A-ID Biometric 4. eSSL Biometric attendance system (E9C WIFI) 5. ACTAtek Biometric 6. 4Gid 7. Securetime 8. Qandle   9. Timecheck 10. Bio star 09 1. Time Dynamo Developer: Tvisha Technologies Inc. Specifications: This biometric attendance machine requires iOS 10.3 or later, compatible with iPhone, iPod, iPod touch, iOS, and Android devices. TPOS7 Product 7' TFT LCD, Network 3G Data/ Dual SIM, 7' IPS capacitive touch screen, resolution of 1024*600, Quad-core Processor, the memory of RAM DDR3 2 GB, Built-in Storage 16 GB, Support max.   32G with micro SD card, Rear 5 MP & Front 2 MP camera, Bluetooth/Wi-Fi connectivity, Integrated STQC certified Fingerprint scanner.   Description: TimeDynamo is considered the best Biometric attendance system in India. The compact professional real-time attendance management and leave management system empowers businesses with accurate tracking and monitoring of employee attendance with biometric automated solutions. This biometric attendance software, developed by leading software companies, scans each employee through either an iris recognition pattern, face recognition method, or fingerprint time attendance. With the advent of the uniqueness of these biometric patterns, it has become easy to eliminate proxy attendance. Features:  Real-time Attendance tracking, GPS tracking, Absence Management, Payroll generation, Scheduling Management, Notifications, Fingerprint Attendance Machine, and Reports. Accolades: Time Dynamo has been shortlisted by NASSCOM under the top 10 innovative product showcases in the 5th edition of NPC  2. mDESK7 Developer: Mantra Softech India Private Limited Specifications:   1.2 GHz Quad-Core processor, 7 inches or higher; 1024×600 resolution display, 8 GB of internal memory and 2GB of RAM, Wi-Fi or Bluetooth connectivity, Single SIM with 4G support, Audio-Microphone, Rear Camera, LED flash.   Description: This time attendance software is used for the registration and authentication of an employee through a fingerprint impression. This Wi-Fi-enabled thumb attendance machine is available at an affordable price. You can use it for Guest Management, Canteen Management, and Citizen Identification for government schemes. The data can be stored within this time attendance machine. Features: A separate port for pen drive connection, FBI PIV fingerprint sensor, 1:1 & 1: N matching, GPS 3. A-ID Biometric Developer: A-ID Systems India Specifications:    Dual CPU (32bit RISC + 400MHz DSP), The memory of 1GB flash and 34MB RAM, Fingerprint capacity of 200000 users(400000 templates), Log capacity of 1,000,000 events, and Biometric identification speed of 3,000 matches in 1 second (max 20,000 templates).   Description: This biometric time attendance system is well-known in the Indian smart card industry. Features: Records real-time entries and updates periodically and stores all the data in the form of cloud storage 4. eSSL Biometric attendance system (E9C WIFI) Developer: ESSL security Specifications:    10000 users, 1,00,000 logs of transaction storage, 500DPI optical sensor, Card storage of 10000.   Description: It is the best and most reliable centralized time and biometric attendance management system. The firmware (Push data technology) is easy to install and use. Used at canteen management, school attendance, gyms and clubs, and production management. Features: Attendance management and Payroll generation 5. ACTAtek Biometric Developer: ACTAtek Specifications:   500 DPI optical scanner, 20000 users and 75000 log events can be allowed.   Description: This advanced biometric device for attendance, equipped with powerful software, enables seamless remote user registration and authentication. It is specifically designed for security and workforce management applications. The biometric attendance system offers a wide range of authentication options, including fingerprint, smart card, ID, barcode, and PIN. With its intuitive multi-lingual interface, users from different backgrounds can easily navigate and operate the system. Notably, this device stands out with its remarkable scanning speed, taking less than a second to complete the authentication process. Organizations seeking a reliable and efficient biometric device for attendance will find this solution indispensable. Features: Attendance management, Payroll generation, leave and clock management 6. 4Gid Developer: 4G Identity Pvt. Ltd.  Specifications:   FBI scanners, Captures wet and dry fingers, Fingerprint live slap scanner.   Description: 4Gid is the largest biometric identification database, which you can use it as a thumb machine for the office. It is a fingerprint machine for attendance with iris authentication systems, which is used for a wide range of applications such as monetary transaction securities, ATMs, e-passports, e-visas, etc. Features: Time and attendance management, Blacklist management 7. Securetime Developer: Securetime Specifications:   Automated tracking with geo-fencing APIs for easy integration, Role-based dashboards,   Description: Securetime is a cloud-based SaaS application that aids in managing ties between employers and employees. It improves employee morale, transparent wage disbursements, and consumes less time to track and produce payrolls. Securtime's customized solution for managing absences and attendance reduces payroll leakages, makes it simple to report absences to payroll, and boosts productivity by controlling leave and overtime schedules. Securetime integrates with all payroll/HRMS and biometric systems without relying on hardware. It can therefore be used as a real-time biometric system. It is a fingerprint attendance system that can be customized to meet your organization's needs. Nevertheless, it aids you in monitoring your on-premise, remote, and on-the-ground personnel in real-time. Features: Integration with HR/ payroll, Workforce tracking, Absence management, and Timesheet management. 8. Qandle   Developer: Qandle Specifications:   Cloud-based APIs Customization   Description: You may reliably record attendance using any method you choose with Qandle on your side, including biometric, RFID, geo-tagged/geo-fenced apps, QR codes, and more. Create your attendance policies and easily keep track of attendance. Your preferred tools are integrated with Qandle, which streamlines the migration. As previously noted, you can use an attendance machine as an employee biometric attendance system to keep tabs on your employees' timetables, absences, and other information. Your data is protected by this secure time attendance system, which complies with bank-grade security (PCI DSS). All sent data is fully encrypted (SHA-2, 2048-bit) during transmission. Features: Visual analytics, Travel & expenses, Task management, Asset management. 9. Timecheck Developer: Timecheck Specifications: It uses various scanners such as Anviz FacePass Pro face recognition devices. Description: It is a web and mobile-enabled time and attendance management system. It is implemented in diverse work cultures. It can be integrated with any biometric systems Features: Accurate time and attendance tracking of various shifts and administrative management, Mobile application, Comp off management, Payroll generation, and Reports. 10. Bio star 09 Developer: Star link Specifications:   Larger graphics LCD, The storage capacity of 9,560 finger templates, 5 lacs recording capacity and TCP/IP & USB port connectivity for data transfer.   Description: This versatile biometric attendance device offers multiple access options, including fingerprint, card, or PIN, allowing convenient authentication for users. With its flexible nature, it can be applied across various industries, making it suitable for a wide range of organizations. Additionally, the device's features are highly customizable, enabling organizations to tailor the system to their specific needs and requirements. Whether it's for enhancing security measures or streamlining workforce management, this biometric attendance device provides a reliable and adaptable solution. Features: Attendance record and manage Conclusion These are the top 10 biometric attendance systems you can adopt in your organization, company, or industry according to your business requirements.

Slack is the boss of team collaboration software.   Don’t we all know that?   But here’s a fact we can’t unknow: Even the best of bosses make mistakes. They have their own set of flaws.    Slack indeed is helpful in several ways. It’s a tool that solves three different issues: team collaboration, communication, and staying up-to-date. Not only did this tool make private and group messaging easy, but also made third-party program integration and file sharing effortless.    Indeed, Slack established itself as a great tool through hundreds of updates. But yet, it falls short of fulfilling all requirements of an enterprise, which makes us seek an alternative.    Thanks to the dozens of team collaboration tools, customers have plenty to choose from. However, these options don’t save us from finding the best among the available ‘slack alternatives’.    While designing Troop Messenger - our comprehensive instant messaging application for businesses small to giant - we compared the features, functionalities, and limitations of each of these alternatives (who are, in fact, our direct competitors).    Apparently, we didn’t make these comparisons without conducting a deep analysis of each tool’s performance, efficiency, and delivery. Our team at Troop Messenger used these applications for a specific length of time to identify the pros and cons of all significant slack alternatives from the end user’s perspective.   After extensive analysis, our team shortlisted these two tools:    Mattermost  Rocket.Chat   These are the apps our team considered top Slack alternatives. Since we didn’t come up with a single name, people who are looking to replace Slack may get confused.    So, we decided to come up with an article comparing the features and functionalities of Mattermost and Rocket.Chat. Our goal was to analyze how they perform against each other and figure out which one stands as a better alternative to Slack.    Disclaimer: We are moving Troop Messenger to self-hosted for larger enterprises and government corporations. Since there are so many self-hosted chat applications out there, we’ve started this to perform an in-depth analysis of our competitors with their pros and cons from a customer’s perspective and tried to come up with a better, cleaner, and more user-friendly chat alternative. We have an entire article with the results of competitors’ research, covering our feedback on various options. However, this time we would like to focus on two rivals: the well-known Mattermost and Rocket.Chat.   Mattermost vs  Rocket.Chat: Who Will Take the Trophy Home?   Mattermost vs Rocket.Chat   1. Deployment Process 2. Onboarding Process 3. Layout and Design 4. Pricing and file sharing Storage 5. Conversation 6. Integrations 7. Search   Both MatterMost and f are open-source team collaboration tools that can be deployed by a user in their private cloud. Both of these provide users with an option to share documents and integrate with other programs. These tools have an option where users can customize their web-based architecture which uses Security Assertion Markup Language and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol for password authentication. These tools are available as mobile phone versions on the Android and iOS systems, and similar to Slack, they offer notification    Okay, Enough about the similarities.     Let’s check out the differences which make Mattermost and Rocket.Chat neck-to-neck competitors to each other.    1. Deployment Process  If you want to have complete access to your data and all archives without spending much, you definitely need to get started with Mattermost or Rocket.Chat. For this article, we compiled information about basic server security guidelines from both these tools’ official documentation and website. Setting up your secure chat server is not difficult. But it’s different for both Mattermost and Rocket.Chat. Let’s see how.   I. Setting up Mattermost  It took us about two hours to get everything done. Here’s a short summary of what we did to set up Mattermost: Setup Host Instance Creating a Database Server  Signing up at the Server URL The deployment process is simple. It might look daunting at first, but it becomes easy once you know what you are doing. You’ve to begin the host setup process, then configure your plan, set up the root password, and boot it. For the Database server setup, you need to create a database, name it according to the document/guideline, then set the login credentials. Once you’re done setting database server, open the registration link provided in the guideline to create an admin account.   II. Setting up Rocket.Chat Compared to MatterMost, Rocket.Chat’s deployment is simpler. It can be hosted on Rocket.Chat’s cloud or on your own server.  Here’s a short summary of what you need to do to set up Rocket.Chat for your team:   Install the .deb file your the Rocket.Chat official website Creating a Server URL Sign up for your team    I am not going into details because I don’t want to bore you with a step of instructions that is already available online. So, go, and check the tutorials. It's a great tool for companies willing to privately host their chat service or evolve their chat platforms.    Verdict on Deployment: Take a bow,  Rocket.Chat   If we speak only in terms of setup, I’ll have to give it to Rocket.Chat. Unlike in MatterMost, here you don’t have to set up web and database servers separately, which saves time and effort. And who doesn’t loves that?   2. Onboarding Process  With Mattermost and Rocket.Chat, it’s easier to board new users. These open-source slack alternatives allow easy boarding. Let’s check out who’s offering what.   I. Mattermost Onboarding If you choose MatterMost, onboarding is not something your team will need to worry about. The tool also has multiple tutorials that guide new users on how to use the tool to the full extent. Optional Tutorials make onboarding very easy. The app has an in-app support option which further accelerates the easy adoption of its functionalities. There are updated troubleshooting guides, administration guides, and upgrade guides, which make onboarding simpler. Enhanced Search tool offers easy filtering of in-context material about onboarding. Users can connect with community applications to interact with other users and learn about the application.   II. Rocket.Chat Onboarding With Rocket.Chat, and you get one week to familiarise yourself with the various applications and services. Here’s what this tool offer for easy onboarding. Each user receives a @rocket.chat email address within the first week. For the first seven days, all members receive invitations to the team meetings, where they get to know everything about the application’s features. You can schedule a one-to-one call with different people in your team and talk to them individually to get to know them. To get on the board properly, Rocket.Chat also offers users an option to add themselves to the team page.  Verdict on onboarding: Here’s your trophy,  Mattermost We are gonna give this one to Mattermost for their short, straightforward, and to-the-point tutorials, guides, and community applications.    3. Layout and Design  Talk about the Slack interface, and you’ll know why a lot of people find it overloaded. It has too many options, features, controls, icons, and information. That’s where we feel the need for something that is not as complex. I. Mattermost's Design   The user interface is neatly designed and is highly self-explorable check the interface in the screenshot. You’ll know what we are talking about. The UI is not clobbered. It’s simple with the amount of information you need to know.   II. Rocket.Chat’s Design   Rocket.Chat has a decent UI. It’s not clobbered. The navigation from one page to another is seamless, and there is no problem with UI as such. The dark mode and black mode themes do not disrupt the app’s performance.   Verdict on onboarding: It’s a tie. In terms of Layout and Design, both these tools are top-notch. We used these applications in trial mode and didn’t notice any issues with the UI. 4. Pricing and file sharing Storage  When speaking about these paid collaboration tools, pricing, and storage are the two determining factors. Both MatterMost and Rocket.Chat offers a 30-day free trial, but there’s a lot more you need to know to decide which one’s better for your team.   I. MatterMost MatterMost offers two Enterprise Editions using which you can avail a secured, scalable, and self-hosted team collaboration platform.   Enterprise E10 It’s for Small Businesses that need access to basic communication features and a user limit of up to 500 users $3.25 per user, per month  Enterprise E20 It’s for businesses needing access to unlimited features  $8.50 per user, per month    II. Rocket.Chat At Rocket.Chat, they’ve two categories namely Self-Managed and Cloud. If you are choosing to have your team on Rocket.Chat’s Cloud, you can choose among the Bronze, Silver, and Gold plans. And if you choose to manage it on your server, you can choose between the pro and enterprise plans.   i. Self-Managed Pro Plan It’s for Small Businesses willing to set up team communication with limited features  $3 per user, per month  $30 per user, per annum Enterprise Plan It’s for businesses needing advanced management and unlimited features  Tiered Pricing    Ii. Cloud Bronze Plan It’s for Small Businesses that need access to basic communication features and a storage limit of up to 1 TB  $2 per user, per month  $20 per user, per annum Silver Plan It’s for businesses needing access to advanced features and a storage limit of up to 5 TB  $4 per user, per month  $40 per user, per annum Gold Plan  It’s for businesses needing access to unlimited features  and storage limit of up to 20 TB  Tiered Pricing   Verdict on Pricing: Here’s your trophy,  Rocket.Chat   5. Conversation  I. MatterMost This fastest-growing messaging platform is super cool and super secure. Here are all the communication features that make Mattermost an excellent choice:   Organized conversations in channels Audio and video conferencing One on One texting and group messaging Fully searchable message thread Screen Sharing during video calls Screen Sharing Multi-language Link, image, and file sharing Markdown Formatting Do not disturb mode Keyword alerts Custom notifications on email, mobile, and desktop Favorite Channels Emoji rich formatting   II. Rocket.Chat As an open-source team communication tool, Rocket.Chat completely replaces email and texting. Team members can add relevant participants by mentioning @username. And @all to send announcements and notifications to all the team members. Here are all the communication features that make Rocket.Chat great.   Free audio and video conferencing Screen Sharing during video calls E23 encryption of chats Public and Private texting LDAP Group Sync Live Chat Users can add real-time chat widgets from their team chat Real-time translation The interface has more than 50 languages Verdict on Conversation: Here’s your trophy,  Mattermost   Will it take a genius to figure out who’s the winner here? I bet, not. Mattermost Clear outdoes Rocket.Chat with seamless communication and customized notification features.   6. Integrations  Both these applications are designed to support integrations seamlessly, which makes them a great cheaper alternative to Slack. Let’s see how Mattermost and Rocket.Chat are different in terms of features: I. Mattermost Mattermost stands as one of the great tools to promote third-party app integrations. These integrations will help your team to work better and faster. Some of the features that make Mattermost better than most of team collaboration tools are: Plugins and extensions Bots OAuth 2.0 applications Set Incoming and outgoing webhooks DevOps integration Custom slash commands Developer toolkit Robust API library   II. Rocket.Chat This open-source team communication tool opens a universe of possibilities through multiple integrations. You can add incoming and outgoing Webhook integrations to this tool and customize your platform by adding features and choosing your own integrations, themes, and plugins. It allows: Integration with popular applications like Pidgin and Drupal Personalized UI through any built-in-style REST API LiveChat API Real-time API Migration from other team chat tools using Rocket.Chat data importers Atlassian, Webhooks, Chatbots, Extensions   Verdict on onboarding: It’s a tie, you guys. In terms of integration, both these applications are great. They allow feature extension with many applications, which enhances functionalities.   7. Search  For office chat, search features make a great deal. You never know which file or a specific text you need for reference, or for forwarding to your co-workers. At times like these, the search features come to the rescue. I. Mattermost Mattermost offers enhanced search features on both the desktop and mobile versions, which will help your team get more in less time. Let’s see some of the search features Mattermost has to offer: Search date filters Search by keyword Search by quotations marks - to search for phrases Search by from - to find the post from specific users Search by in - to find the post in specific channels   II. Rocket.Chat With Rocket.Chat, you can search for messages in the channels with specific keywords. It supports basic search commands like Gmail. Some of the search commands at Rocket.Chat is: from: me searches for messages only sent by the user. has: URL returns messages with a link from: user. name searches messages sent by a specific user. has: star returns messages starred by the user. is: pinned returns messages pinned in a channel. Verdict on Search Features: Here’s your trophy,  Rocket.Chat   Rocket.Chat outdoes Rocket.Chat with enhanced search features. Apart from the above-listed commands, there are over 10 more commands you can learn to narrow your message search when you are using Rocket.Chat.   Takeaways Okay, let’s cut the homework short for you all. As you all know both these tools are open-source team chats available for companies to deploy in their own cloud environment. If you are a company wanting to avail feature-competent solution, but not willing to pay-per-user fees, Rocket.Chat should be the answer. Most of the features that the Mattermost paid edition is offering are already available in the free Rocket.Chat version. But, here’s a thing, Mattermost wins over Rocket.Chat in terms of product performance. If you are a large enterprise with an extensive list of users, Mattermost is a good choice, but it can get expensive because of the per-user plan. And Hey, if you are still not sure which application to pick out of these two geniuses, give Troop Messenger a try! It’s the cheapest, simple, has performance effects, and designed with exclusive features to meet all your office communication and collaboration needs. With Troop Messenger not only do we guarantee a secured chat server, but also features like unlimited message history, high-quality audio and video calls, text search, unlimited groups, splashboard, live location tracking, sharing, storage, and data recording. Learn what benefits your business can get from Troop Messenger by scheduling a demo call with our team.

WhatsApp!   The most popular and highly used personal communication platform unlike any other applications with Image Source   1bn daily active users, 1.5bn monthly active users, and 60bn message exchanges per day. Across the globe have taken a back seat serving enterprise-level communication.   Despite being simple to understand, easy to use, fun-loving, and free, the security issues that have plagued WhatsApp have made it less favored in professional workspaces. Users are now questioning the safety of the platform, including its business-oriented version. If you're wondering 'Is WhatsApp Business safe?', it's important to note that while WhatsApp has made efforts to address privacy concerns and updated its policies, some doubts persist. It's advisable to carefully evaluate the security measures and consider alternative platforms for secure communication in professional settings.   Many small retailers of FMCG and consumer durables think WhatsApp Communication is their best channel to be in touch with customers for promoting the products, taking orders, answering customer queries, etc., to increase their product sales. They find WhatsApp's ease of use and wide user adoption as beneficial factors in reaching their target audience and building customer relationships. However, it is important for businesses to be aware of WhatsApp's policies and terms of service to ensure compliance and avoid any potential issues related to unauthorized usage or policy violations.   But how safe are your business data and its processes, considering WhatsApp security issues?    The Potential Risks of using WhatsApp for business include; Security issues, Compliance, Workflows mismanagement, Tracking, Data Administration, and finally the business productivity?   Though the enterprise version of the same, WhatsApp for business communication is doing rounds since 2017. Why the end-users are limited only to personal communication? What potential risks of using WhatsApp for business are involved in using the personal messenger application WhatApp, for business communication? Take a closer look at the insights below:   10+ Reasons Why You Shouldn't Use WhatsApp   1. GDPR compliance 2. Limited Admin Controls 3. Restricted members in groups 4. Unauthorized Communications 5. A mix of personal and business conversations 6. Restricted File Sharing Limits 7. Loss of Official Data 8. No third-party app integrations 9. Decreased Productivity 10.  Policy Violation 11. Data Ownership 12. Advanced Search Features 1. GDPR compliance Whatsapp uses user information (subject to the choices they make) to operate, provide, improve, understand, customize, and support. Refer here for more info.   According to the latest regulations, business firms are required to comply with their home country's data protection laws to ensure the security of their business partners' and customers' data. However, this has led to a significant conflict when it comes to using WhatsApp for business purposes. This is because WhatsApp accesses your address book and metadata to facilitate message exchanges with your contact list. It is important to note that data security is of utmost importance in certain sectors such as government organizations, industries, large enterprises, and business sectors that handle sensitive and confidential information.   If you are considering using WhatsApp for business use, it is crucial to carefully evaluate the platform's data handling practices and how they align with your specific industry's data protection requirements. Alternative communication tools that offer enhanced security measures and compliance with data protection laws may be more suitable for businesses operating in these sensitive sectors.   Check out here for what you can get with the Troop Messenger GDPR Compliance. 2. Limited Admin Controls WhatsApp has few admin control features that only control Groups. Being a personal messenger, it does not support an extensive range of corporate admin control features to limit user access to the organization’s data. Corporate business collaboration applications like Troop Messenger, have well-defined admin-level privileges to monitor and track employees' access controls.   The moment you start using WhatsApp for official communication routines, then there is a possible risk of misusing your sensitive data when employees leave the company. To avoid such scenarios, use business collaboration applications to strictly restrict the terminated users to have access to the organization's data. We can’t find this advantage in WhatsApp. How unique the admin controls of Troop Messenger are? The admin dashboard is distinctively designed from other chat applications. The simple and clean dashboard is made up of full-level admin controls, for efficaciously implementing them over the users of the application. Right from adding employees with their corporate details, setting limitations on feature access controls, and eventually deactivating the terminated employees of the organization to restrict them from having access to the organization’s data. 3. Restricted members in groups  Maybe the limit of creating 256 groups in WhatsApp per user is Welcome for gathering family and friends. But, how this number can be considered sufficient enough for an organization where it has an unlimited number of teams and departments? A product development team, an agile team of dedicated professionals, a sales team, a team of board members, etc., might have a different work orientation defined for each group.   Switch to the credible office chat application within no time, and create unlimited groups to experience uninterrupted group conversations. How different are Troop Messenger-Group Conversations?  They are a way different from other business chat applications. The biggest advantage of Troop Messenger Groups is, the admin of the group can add unlimited group members, unlike Whatsapp. Orange Members can also be a part of group conversations but with the limitations set by the admin of the application. He/she can allow Orange Members to chat with only members of the organization or groups that they decide. 4. Unauthorized Communications As there is no defined set of admin controls to regulate the users in WhatsApp for business use, there is a potential risk of personal and unauthorized communications taking place within the app. Since you cannot monitor communications happening across the application, anyone can create unauthorized groups and communicate privately. In a case where a non-employee has to communicate with in-house employees, corporate applications can restrict them to use only certain features to stay connected with people the admin decides. How simplified is Troop Messenger authorized communications? Everything and Anything that happens across Troop Messenger is authorized. But how?   Here are the simple answers; only admin can add users to the application( no other user has the control to add or invite others into the application); the admin can impose the enriched permission settings on each user to control them in using the features. these authorized users create groups with unlimited members in it; Once when an employee is terminated, thereby his/her access to the application is completely taken away by the admin.   Hence, all forms of conversations, including direct messages, group conversations, file sharing, screen sharing, etcetera. All happens within authorized users. 5. A mix of personal and business conversations The moment we think of WhatsApp, we feel it has been made to personalize communications. With a strong conviction, one can say it has completely replaced SMS with its ease of use and with the concept of a single conversation window for multiple message sharing. Usually, we receive messages as diverse packets through SMS, but here in WhatsApp, the conversation history is available within a single window. A mix of personal and business conversations strictly should not take place within a single interface, as it creates confusion and a lack of motivation for work.   WhatsApp for business communication may not be suitable for big companies since it doesn’t offer as many features as an office chat app does. But few small businesses are using WhatsApp business communication to their advantage.   One must essentially feel professional while exchanging office information, and it happens only with professional business messenger applications. A wholesome bunch of collaboration features such as screen sharing, advanced search controls, guest-collaboration features, dashboard, analytics, user permission, and settings, etc., have been specially designed in the office chat app to make office work productive. Why Troop Messenger stands best for Business? As a team, we strongly believe that in any case, the personal messengers don’t fit the bill for office work routines. The transactions that take place in the business world are a way different from those of personal interactions. To fill the need gap of corporate message-exchanging, it underwent a good number of iterations to bring the best business value to its users from thoughtfully designed features. Explore the tool to understand how you can benefit from using it. 6. Restricted File Sharing Limits  Though the maximum file sharing limit of WhatsApp is 100MB, so WhatsApp communication doesn’t work well for corporate data transactions, as the file sizes they share such as text files, images, videos, wireframe designs, etc., might exceed the 100MB limit.To have a seamless file-sharing experience, opt for the best business collaboration application in a town like Troop Messenger which offers limitless file-sharing options to its users. Does Troop Messenger allow unlimited file sharing? Yes, it says that “Eventually files are the ones where we store our work and share them across our teams. So, choose the best communication application that supports high file size limits like Troop Messenger. 7. Loss of Official Data When you use WhatsApp for office work, and in case, if your mobile device is lost or stolen, then assume all official data along with the device has also been lost. This kind of issue arises because WhatsApp does not provide a security layer to prevent data loss or theft. But, whereas the applications that are specially designed for corporate communications, ensure data backup in their servers for future retrieval. As there is no data access control defined on the user accounts of WhatsApp, confidential enterprise data may be accessed by others in case of mobile theft. How robust is Troop Messenger’s data backup? Worried about the official data that’s been lost from your personal messenger? Yes, it often happens with Whatsapp! But not in the case of Troop Messenger, as data backup takes place by default. You need not set any preferences to happen so. Contrary to this, WhatsApp asks you to manually set the preferences to back up your chat conversations daily, weekly, and monthly. 8. No third-party app integrations Unlike the core business collaboration applications like Slack, Flock, Microsoft Teams, Ryver, etc., WhatsApp doesn’t support any third-party app integrations. Usually, I don’t see any need for integrations when we use them for personal communications. But, the scenario completely differs from corporate work routines. For instance, integrating a full-scale project management application like Asana into your office collaboration tool allows you to divide your project flows into tasks and, besides you can allocate tasks to cross-functional teams for the quick completion of the projects. What Add-Ons does Troop Messenger Support? Troop Messenger supports a good number of in-house built add-ons for increasing users' work productivity. Applications such as Click2Magic, To-Do targets, Audio-Video Conferencing, TM Monitor etcetera can be successfully integrated for enhanced user experience. 9. Decreased Productivity  As WhatsApp is not made for end-to-end office work routines, adopting it at your workplace may damage your productivity. The essence of professionalism is never noticed in the mindsets of employees, as the interface reminds them of personal messaging. Many large enterprises across the globe don’t prefer to use a personal messenger to perform office work. Instead, they can rely on commercial applications that were uniquely built to run effective work schedules. Does Troop Messenger increase your work productivity? Of course Yes. It’s been precisely made to ease work communications. The rich-feature stack allows you to talk about work, share files, exchange live conversations, track your tasks, preview files, get project updates from individuals and groups, share your screen to discuss work, live track your remote work teams etcetera make efficient productive outcomes. 10. Policy Violation  Last, but the most important aspect besides all the above is a policy violation. WhatsApp clearly states in its policy terms that it has to be strictly used for personal messaging only. Being an enterprise, if you breach their policy and encourage your employees to use it for office purposes, you have to be ready to pay a hefty fine as per the civil laws stated in the terms and conditions policy. Furthermore, it's important to consider the security implications when using WhatsApp for business purposes. While WhatsApp offers end-to-end encryption for messages, there have been concerns raised about potential vulnerabilities in the app's security. Therefore, it is crucial to assess whether WhatsApp is secure enough for business communications and whether alternative secure messaging platforms may be more suitable for enterprise use. 11. Data Ownership Do you want to be the data owner of your organization’s data or not? The choice is yours!   Unauthorized, unorganized, non-channelized message exchanges happen across WhatsApp! It is a tough task to keep track of chat conversations of all employees, as you don’t have the right to check their personal messenger applications to figure out any unauthorized information transfer between them and their peers. Hold your data in your hands with Troop Messenger Be the admin of Troop Messenger and become the data owner with full-level control over all your corporate employee chat conversations. In a case where an employee is terminated, left the company, or suspended, or when their phone is being lost or escaped from the Organization, etc, Troop Messenger securely holds your data in its cloud or local servers. Being an admin, you can immediately deactivate the employee access with the application. 12. Advanced Search Features  How can you filter out text files, images, videos, audio messages, and more, when you don’t have an itemized search functionality as in WhatsApp?! We know that contacts and text can be filtered out effectively in WhatsApp. But, I don’t see any need for extensive search filters for personal messaging. But, yes they do bring and make a noticeable change for corporate business chat applications. You hardly see any such applications' search functionality missed in them. How about them in Troop Messenger? There are a distinct variety of search filters present in Troop Messenger. To name them, the list goes like this; Global Search, Date-Time filters, Advanced filter group, Unread message filters, favorite users filter, smiley search filters, and message-text filters.   The functionalities of a well-designed search are defined below:    users, orange members, and deactivated/terminated employees, with Global Search. data by applying a date-time range. images, videos, files, contacts, URLs, and Locations using the advanced filter group. unread messages. favorite users. text from chat conversations.   I understand that you may have concerns about the safety of WhatsApp, including WhatsApp Business. While I cannot provide a definitive answer to the question 'Is WhatsApp Business safe?', it is worth noting that WhatsApp recently updated its privacy policy, explicitly stating that it will not utilize users' data for their own benefit. However, they do mention that they will collect data from select businesses. Therefore, this information may help address your query regarding the safety of WhatsApp Business.   Choose a tool for business messaging that has good search functionality. Conclusion In a nutshell, Rather than relying on various communication channels like emails and personal messengers to exchange work communications, simply collaborate on one official platform for great work outcomes. Authorize all your business communications and data with a better-designed commercial chat application like Troop Messenger! If you're concerned about the security of your business communications, you might wonder, "Is your WhatsApp Business account safe?" It's important to evaluate the security features and encryption protocols of any chat application you choose for your business.

Business communication and collaboration software Troop Messenger has helped thousands of project teams provide excellent results and achieve their business goals.   Our communication platform centralizes their communication, enabling them to discuss ideas and concepts as well as collaborate on tasks efficiently.   Useful features like real-time communication allow users to quickly discuss the current status of their tasks and evaluate their performance on the spot. Troop Messenger is optimized for mobile devices, enabling users to connect seamlessly with other members of the team from their smartphone or tablet.   By unifying their communication and improving their collaboration capabilities, Troop Messenger has allowed our users to deliver results on time, within budget, and according to their clients’ expectations.   We are proud to announce that Troop Messenger has hit a major milestone. We have received a couple of awards from CompareCamp - the 2019 Rising Star and Great User Experience Awards. CompareCamp is a reliable resource for in-depth SaaS reviews for B2B and B2C software and other products, helping businesses and organizations make smart, information-driven software investments.   Earning two different distinctions from such an esteemed body is a huge win for us. We assure our users that these awards will further fuel our goal to provide them with better software as we roll out new versions in the future.

The technology-driven world has built the current era of convenience by giving simple solutions to complex problems. It has brought many super flexible and diverse forms of applications to integrate displaced things or people on a unified platform to make things happen better. Having said that, I suggest you try to improve work quality and increase productivity at your workplace by adopting smart solutions.   Make conversations real-time and dynamic with the help of instant messaging apps, instead of static and long threaded confusing emails!   Don’t just let your productive morning hours go in checking and replying to those lengthy transactional emails. instead, switch to simple and easy-to-use team collaboration applications like Slack or Flock for a swift understanding of your work and its updates.   The blog article of PGi says emails don’t provide collaboration features to coordinate work.   Though there are so many chat applications out there, now team conversations are more seamless and organized with Troop Messenger. We had performed various in-depth analyses of our competitor’s tools to give you better insights into their pros and cons with our previous comparison blogs of  Slack Alternatives, Ryver vs slack, and Microsoft Teams vs slack. However, this time we made our best efforts to make you know the highs and lows of two rivals: the most popular Flock and Slack.   Flock, a simple team messaging software, founded by tech entrepreneur Bhavin Turakhia in the year 2014 has a notable client list from across the globe including; MERU, Policy bazaar, Crisil, Avendus, Ricoh, Gini & Jony, McDonald’s, Sodexo, etc, Flock is available across all devices, so you will never miss a thing.   On the other side, the initial release of Slack happened in the year 2013, by its founder Stewart Butterfield and now the non-engineers built application has reached the top of silicon valley with its stock market debut of $20bn.    However, this time we made our best efforts to make you know the highs and lows of two rivals: the most popular Flock and Slack. Table of Contents Quick Infographic Comparison between Flock and Slack  1. Flock vs Slack: Communication 2. Flock vs Slack: Notifications 3. Flock vs Slack: Pricing 4. Flock vs Slack: Integration 5. Flock vs Slack: Search (all) 6. Flock vs Slack: Storage with file sharing+ 7. Flock vs Slack: Support Conclusion Quick Infographic Comparison between Flock and Slack    1. Flock vs Slack: Communication   Flock says it is faster, slicker, and way richer than Slack for its communication and collaboration across teams. With its simplest communication, the users and teams of the application can push the boundaries of team productivity to the next level.   The loading time of the Flock home screen is quick as gazelle, and it loads 2.5 times faster on desktop and mobile than on Slack. Connect across various devices and never miss any updates, as Flock is available on desktop, web, and mobile. Work happens only when people communicate! Flock allows you to message yourself to quickly save messages, files, links, videos, audio files, etc., to refer to later. Simply select from “All Contacts” or “Teams” to start communicating with them, and also, you can quickly add others to the current conversation. It allows you to create groups within teams and enables you to continue discussions on projects and their deadlines. When you no longer wish to receive noisy notifications from a particular group or team, you can mute all those conversations to not get disturbed. Despite you mute a particular group's conversations, you can re-chat with any of them with the help of @ mentions features as they get notified of your message.   Besides the above-explained features, you can start an audio conference for a clear understanding of your work updates. Going further, you can start or join a video conference to have a face-to-face conversation to exchange great ideas and opinions.   Our Verdict: Flock loads faster than Slack. As far as audio/video conferencing is concerned, Flock allows it to have individual participants and channels in its free plan. Whereas, Slack only allows the calling facility with single users, but not in channels in its free plan.     Communication across Slack takes place through direct messages, channels, and threads.   Create unlimited channels for distinct projects and work along with all the project members thereby meeting timely project deliveries. The user onboarding process seems to be great with Slack, as a Slackbot welcomes you to assist you with the tool. Moving forward, for all kinds of advanced queries and tool information, it will search for the help center to answer you better. And as far as communication via video and audio calling is concerned, now Slack supports audio-video calling in its free plan for one-on-one user chat but restricts audio calling in channels in its free plan.   Besides, the user will not be able to share their desktop screen during a video call in its free plan. On the contrary, you can find Troop Messenger allowing users to share their screens for free while they are using video calls.   Our Verdict: Flock loads faster than Slack. As far as audio/video conferencing is concerned, Flock allows it to have individual participants and channels in its free plan. Whereas, Slack only allows the calling facility with single users, but not in channels in its free plan.   2. Flock vs Slack: Notifications     Flock allows you to stop receiving the notifications by enabling them, the “Do not disturb” notification preference. You can keep it active for 1 hour, 8 hours, 12 hours, or until you resume it.   Then another set of notification preferences that you can enable/disable would be;   pop-up notifications, user online notifications, video call ringer and audio alerts.     Slack never allows you to miss out on any important information to keep you upgraded and updated through its notifications.   Being an active member of many channels, you often find it distracting to receive a large number of messages every hour. Worry not! Slack enables you to pause notifications with a wide set of timer options, available for desktop and mobile. Simply click on the bell icon seen right after your workspace name to view an entire range of notifications designed by Slack. Moving further you can customize notifications as you require them. This includes; You can set them for your entire workspace, or any specific channel. 3. Flock vs Slack: Pricing   Flock has made simple plans for everyone! Being a freemium pricing model application, it has come with plans Free for small teams, and a Pro plan for mid-size teams and companies. Enterprise for large enterprises and organizations.   Let’s have a quick look at, what all facilities Flock allows in its three pricing variants;   It facilitates to create of unlimited private and public channels Can send unlimited direct messages Users can search for unlimited message history in its Pro Plan and Enterprise. Whereas they are only restricted to searching and viewing the most recent 10k messages in its Free plan.  As far as the apps and integrations are concerned; it allows the integration of unlimited third-party applications from all three pricing plans. The screen sharing feature is available in both Pro and Enterprise plans, where it doesn’t extend the same in its free version. Up to 20 users can join for an unlimited time duration in Group video calling. Whereas in the free plan, though it allows the same number of users to the group call, it restricts them to 20 mins/per call.       Slack as a freemium application has pricing plans to accommodate everyone’s needs. It offers a limited number of features for free for an unlimited amount of time. To Experience the full-level feature stack, one needs to opt for paid plans. Slack comes with three different pricing plans Standard, Plus, and Enterprise Grid with features segregated according to each.   Taking a closer look at each plan;   The Standard Plan is meant for small and medium-sized businesses at US$2.67 per user/per month when billed yearly, and the same has been structured at US$ 3.20 per person/per month when billed monthly. With this, you can access the entire message history unlike its free plan, create guest accounts, supports unlimited apps and third-party app integrations, screen sharing, can make group video calls with up to 15 people, channel recommendations, priority support, and many more. The Plus plan has been made for larger businesses that are looking for advanced administration tools. This plan is priced at US$ 5 per user/per month when billed annually and at US$6 per user/per month when billed monthly. With all the benefits of Standard, this plan provides; 20 GB storage per user, SAML-based single sign-on(SSO), Corporate exports for all messages, user provisioning and de-provisioning, and 99% guaranteed uptime SLA with a few more additional features. The Enterprise Grid Plan is specially designed for very large businesses. As it can be customized to suit diverse industry needs, the users who would want to opt for it needs are asked to contact sales on their pricing page. With all the goodness of the Plus plan, these plans allow the users to create unlimited workspaces along with enterprise-grade security and compliance, a dedicated customer support team, a huge 1TB storage per member, organization-wide search, Audit Log API, Enterprise Mobility Management( EMM), etc.,   4. Flock vs Slack: Integration     Flock allows you to integrate a wide range of third-party apps such as apps for productivity, project management, file management, customer support, marketing, and others for performing tasks better and thereby bringing great results. It supports 60+ apps to be a part of the application, or it lets you build apps with the help of Flock’s APIs to integrate them into the application. Apps like Google Drive are deeply integrated into Flock, where-in it can be accessed within the application only. But in my observation, what I could notice was, there is a Video Conference Bot available to join calls with other team members right within the application. The users of Flock can go to Flock’s App Store right within the application to explore a wholesome number of apps to start integrating them.       As far as the integrations of Slack are concerned, it is more fun to work with it, as it supports more than 1500 app integrations into it. Slack users can directly peep into the world of apps to start using them right from Slack’s home page itself. Slack is well-known for its huge list of integrations. These bot applications such as Polly, Doodle Bot, Geekbot, Kyber, Statsbot, Timebot, Attendance bot, and Leevbot, help users like virtual team members to manage tasks seamlessly. Go to “View App Directory” to find a wide range of app categories and collections.   Our Verdict: Slack supports more integrations than Flock.   5. Flock vs Slack: Search (all)     The search functionality of Flock allows the user to search messages from, “Anyone” and “All Conversations” posted across the tool. Flock users can also search for other team members and channels to start conversations.        Search messages, files, and messages from Slack’s search functionality. Simplify your file search from the search facility of your files and all files. Also, search by name or category to choose your favorite apps while integrating them.   Our Verdict: The search functionality looks to be more well-designed in Slack.   6. Flock vs Slack: Storage with file sharing+     Flock’s storage differs according to its pricing plans. The freemium application provides file storage of 10 GB/team in its free plan. 100 MB is the maximum file storage allowed here in Flock.   The file storage that is accommodated for the Pro plan and Enterprise includes; 10GB/per team member and 20 GB/per team member respectively.   Share your presentations, text files, and code snippets across direct messages and channels with, ‘Attach’ from the message editor. As far as cloud storage is concerned, Google Drive is integrated within Flock for easy access to file sharing and retrieval from the cloud.     Slack offers 5GB total in its free plan, 10 GB storage per member in the Standard plan, 20GB storage per member in the Standard Plus plan, and finally 1TB storage per member in its Enterprise grid plan.   It supports a wide range of file management tools such as DropBox, Google Drive, Microsoft One Drive, Quip, Adobe Creative Cloud, box, and many more. Simply integrate them and share your files across the cloud.   Our Verdict: Flock offers more storage limits in its free plan when compared to Slack.  7. Flock vs Slack: Support   Flock allows you to get in touch with their support team, just right within the application itself. The users can directly chat with the customer support executives by leaving a message them.   It will help users to understand anything on the Flock. Watch a 2-minute video to get to know how the application works.   The slack team extends a well co-ordinated and collaborative customer support to all its users.   The support teams resolve issues and share knowledge of the product. It allows users to collaborate with more powerful integrations to achieve faster customer query resolutions.   It lets you post support tickets in channels themselves only, thereby not letting you leave it to track their status on them.   Our Verdict: As far as customer support is concerned, both offer great services.  Conclusion Small or large, every organization needs a business collaboration tool for successful and uninterrupted team communications. While you choose, ensure the tool must have an easy and smooth learning curve for understanding it better. The latest entrant in the block, the Troop Messenger is no less competitor to any other business chat application. Give a sure shot for it to attain reliable, secure, and seamless team communication!   Disclaimer The aim of the article is to be informative. We intend for users to take an informed decision for an effective and productive experience. The comparison shown between Flock and slack in the blog is only towards that end and has no intention of pitting one against the other team collaboration app brands. The images, logos, any concepts, etc., used in this blog, purely belong to their respective companies or applications (Flock and Slack).   Readers are advised to consult and confirm with the respective service providers regarding details of features, the latest updates, prices, and policies before utilizing any of their services. This further informs the reader that the views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this blog solely belong to the author’s perception, and not necessarily to the author’s employer, organization, committee, or other group or individual.

The current business infrastructure highlights the progress of mankind. We no longer need to be in the same room with other people to collaborate.   People can work from anywhere in the world, given that that place has internet and electricity. Incidentally, nearly four million Americans found their favorite workplace — their own homes.   At the very core of this phenomenon are the gig economy and technological progress. This allows to considerably improve the quality of life for many people, by cutting down the time they spend commuting to work, increasing their productivity, and offering impressive freedom to travel while working.   What’s more interesting is that it has motivated people to collaborate more often and much more efficiently via methodologies, frameworks, and most importantly, collaboration software.    In this article, we’ll look into a list of mind-blowing collaboration statistics. Let’s dive right in, shall we?   1. Collaboration is More Than Lip Service   While many professionals recognize the immense importance that cooperation has to offer, businesses, unfortunately, don’t do enough to stimulate their employees to collaborate.   As a study published by Queens University suggests, the problem with this extensive lack of collaboration is by no means technological, since we have so much cutting-edge software like Troop Messenger that allows organizations to communicate effortlessly.   Employees all too often lack the soft skills needed to bridge the personal and cultural divides between them and their colleagues. Simple things like greeting one another as you go about the working day help to open everyone up and make them more approachable.   Communal breakout spaces allow team members to talk about ideas and proposals in a more inviting environment than the boardroom and are essential for allowing junior members to have a voice.   It’s all about creating an environment in which everyone feels empowered and encouraged to make a difference, provide feedback, and put forward a new idea.   But it’s not just the employee’s fault.   When asked on the importance of collaboration in the workplace, three-quarters of surveyed employers suggested that it’s essential to their company’s output.   However, ironically, under 20% of employers discuss factors like “communication,” when performing regular performance reviews.    “It’s most definitely the case that businesses will benefit greatly from having a dedicated strategy to stimulate collaboration within their organization.”  — Jenna Langley, a Head of HR at Trust My Paper.     The same study also suggests that 39% of employees find that they don’t collaborate enough. 2. Lack of Collaboration Can Fail Projects A recent study published by Salesforce indicates that little over 85% of respondents consider that the primary reason for failed projects and workplace failures, in general, is an overall lack of collaboration and poor communication.   The same study suggests that a whopping 97% of surveyed workers indicate that the factor that has the most adverse effect on the outcome of work-related projects or tasks is a lack of alignment within teams or coworkers.   This should be another red flag for business owners and executives to start implementing the right strategies and the right software in their company’s workflow, which will allow to considerably optimize the success rate of their projects.   3. A Strong Sense of Community Besides allowing to considerably improve an organization’s KPIs, the collaboration will enable us to feel like we’re part of something greater than ourselves. Teamwork allows us to have a strong sense of community and belonging.   A report published by Gusto indicates that efficiently working in teams is one of their central motivators of remaining loyal to the business they work for.   More importantly, it’s now very common for people to consider leaving their workplace, because they didn’t feel like they had a strong connection to the collective and that they didn’t collaborate very well.   When surveyed, 52% of respondents said that they did consider leaving a job, because they didn’t have a strong sense of community at their workplace.   Furthermore, the same study indicates that nearly 55% of employees have stayed on a job longer than they intended due to a powerful sentiment of belonging and a strong bond to the community.   When asked what the most important reason for staying at their current company is,     nearly 40% of respondents indicated that it’s due to working with a great team.    4. A Considerable Boost in Performance A paper published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology back in 2014, found that even the illusion of working on a task with a group of people considerably increased the output of the subjects.   The participants were told that they are to work on a task that was a collaborative effort and that many other people are working on a common goal, others were told that they are to work on a task on their own.    The experiment concluded that the participants that were working on a “team project” lasted nearly 65% longer than their solo counterparts. More importantly, they appeared to be less tired and were able to achieve higher success rates.   The researchers that conducted the study suggest that by merely feeling that you are a part of a collective that is working for the common good stimulates people to take on challenges. A similar study was published by the Institute for Corporate Productivity indicates that organizations that stimulate collaboration among their employees are five times more likely to have a considerable performance edge over businesses that do not.   The authors examined a broad set of companies (over a thousand) that identify as businesses with collaborative cultures.   The same study has highlighted another significant finding — companies that worked for a higher goal, that had a purpose, so to speak, were even more high performing than the companies that just identified as companies with collaborative cultures.   5. Low Morale is Detrimental   The truth is that improper communication won’t just stop your organization from enjoying the benefits of high-quality teamwork — it can considerably decrease employee morale, which, as a result, will dramatically reduce your employee happiness and retention.   In a study published by Accountemps, nearly a third (33%) of human resources officers indicated that improper collaboration and communication are what define low employee morale. The second most common factor that determined the employees’ discontent with their job was excessive micromanagement.   The authors have identified the most important solutions to low employee morale:   Gossip due to insufficient information. Humans are evolutionarily driven to understand their surroundings. When we lack clear information, our brains need to complement reality with assumptions, rather than facts. Don’t hide important information from the team.   No initiative. Employees that lack purpose and don’t feel that they are part of a team will often avoid taking the initiative in their hands. Always ensure that your teammates understand the value of their impact on the project.   Lack of rewards and appreciation. Besides simply indicating how important their input is, employees need to be occasionally rewarded for their hard work.   Being able to identify the above red flags will allow you to address these issues and alleviate the adverse effects in a timely manner before they can escalate. Furthermore, this will enable you to improve your team’s productivity.    Conclusion: Businesses often forget how much work has to be done after they’ve recruited their personnel. As research suggests, organizations need to invest a lot of time and effort into motivating their workers to collaborate and also create an environment that is conducive and suitable for a fruitful collaboration between employees.   Author Bio  Diana Nadim is a writer and editor who has a Master degree in Marketing. She combines her passion for writing with her interest in research and creates thought-provoking content in various fields. Besides working as a contributor writer for Studicus, Diana also runs her own 3to5Marketing blog. What inspires her the most in her writing is travelling and meeting new people. Follow her on Twitter