After several years in private beta, the company slack and Yammer competitor is now known simply as Workplace, and is available to companies, non-profits and educational institutions of any size. According to Facebook’s announcement, more than 1000 organizations around the world are already using workplace. With the public release, the company hopes features like messenger chat, Facebook live and groups will become absolutely necessary to companies, rather than just a daily distraction.
Aside from the familiar elements, workplace has a few new corporate tricks like dashboard analytics, single sign-on and better IT integration to make it even more office-friendly. There is also separate work chat app for iOS and Android so employees can keep in touch while they are out of the office. The platform will be sold to business on a per-user basis. According to the company, after a 3 month trial period, Facebook will charge $3 a piece per employee per month up to 1000 employees, $2 for every employee beyond up to 10,000 users, and $1 for every employee over that.
Workplace links together personal profiles separate from user’s normal Facebook accounts and is invisible to anyone outside the office. For joint ventures, accounts can be linked across businesses so that groups of employees from both companies can collaborate. The launch will come just as Microsoft scraps the Yammer Enterprise tier many companies reply on, who might be looking for a new way to keep the whole team on the same page. Diversifying its revenue streams beyond advertising could help Facebook boost its bottom line without drowning its consumer users in marketing.