Facebook is the new owner of Whatsapp; but that didn’t stop them from launching the standalone Facebook Messenger app.
Any user who already has a username in the social media website can login to the messenger and talk to their friends. They can send smileys, enjoy uninterrupted conversations on this dedicated app and also make voice calls. Later, the company also launched a desktop version of the app. Instead of distracting you with posts, friend requests and feed content, it allowed you to purely focus on the conversation and acted like any other messenger service. Now, it has taken a step further and might even compete with Whatsapp on a different scale.
The New Whatsapp
You could now easily call Facebook Messenger the new Whatsapp because you no longer need a Facebook account to use this service. Instead, all you need to do is download the app on your iOS or Android device after which you should register using your name and phone number. It’s as simple as that!
At the moment, the amazing service is available only in select countries. Users in the US, Canada, Venezuela and Peru are able to access the service using their phone number. The app will automatically find everyone in their contact list, who already have Messenger installed and bring them into the friends group. This is a feature that is being used by Whatsapp for a long time and the same has now been integrated into Facebook’s own app as well.
Attracting more Users
The obvious idea behind this new feature is to attract more users to join the Facebook Messenger group. WhatsApp already has over 700 million users while Facebook website has over a billion. As both of them are being owned by the same company, soon users will start communicating using either one of the apps, thus becoming their subscribers one way or the other. It looks like a strong marketing strategy that Facebook has deployed to overtake strong contenders like Viber and Skype, which is owned by the technology giant Microsoft.
More services including restricting location settings and even hiring Uber cabs are heading to the Messenger app.
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