Discord

Finding the ideal communication and collaboration platform for small businesses can be challenging. With numerous tools available in the market, it becomes difficult to select the one that best meets the specific needs of your organization.

Discord, a communication and collaboration tool, bridges the gap between social platforms and text, voice, and video conversations. It uses public and private servers to offer different levels of communication access for users. Within these servers, users can engage in messaging or voice and video chats, depending on their access levels.

Before diving into how Discord can benefit your business, let’s explore its key use cases:

Customized Communication

One of Discord’s main strengths is its ability to channel communication between different types of users. For instance, a business can set up a private server or channel to communicate with premium members, while a public server can be created for free users to interact and build a thriving community on Discord.

Collecting User Feedback and Insights

Customer feedback is vital for small businesses, and Discord servers can be a valuable tool for gathering insights. Businesses can create both private and public servers to collect user experiences, troubleshoot issues, and discuss product enhancements. This provides essential feedback for development and marketing teams to improve products and services.

Role-Based Control

Discord's role and permission-based system allow businesses to create secure, exclusive spaces for communication. By assigning special roles, such as administrator or moderator, businesses can control the content shared within the server and ensure that employees have access only to the information relevant to their roles.

There may be instances where Discord isn't the best fit for your business’s communication and collaboration needs. To address those situations, here are some alternatives that can serve as effective substitutes for Discord:

For Workspace Communication: Slack

Slack is a preferred communication tool for businesses, especially for businesses with remote teams. While Discord is ideal for community building, Slack is widely used by businesses to facilitate real-time collaboration.

With integrations to hundreds of platforms including GitHub, Trello, and Mailchimp, Slack streamlines communication and project management, offering a more organized workflow as compared to Discord.

For Calls and Messaging: Skype

Although Skype lacks some of the advanced collaboration features available in Discord, it is a simple and reliable option for businesses seeking an app for messaging and video calls.

Skype's features include screen sharing and group video calls, and it is accessible via both an app and the web.

For Seamless Microsoft Integration: Microsoft Teams

Both Discord and Microsoft Teams are designed for collaboration, offering features like chat, file sharing, and connection tools. However, if your business relies heavily on Microsoft Office products, Microsoft Teams is the better choice for seamless integration and enhanced productivity.

Here are the instructions for getting started with Discord:

You can access Discord through the Android and iOS apps, or on your PC/Mac via a desktop client or web browser. It’s free to use.

1. Sign up for Discord by creating an account, and choosing a username and avatar for your profile.
2. Once you're logged in, Discord will prompt you to join a server or suggest servers based on your interests.
3. You can join a server either by invitation (for private servers) or by sending a request (for public servers). After joining, a list of channels will appear to the right of the server list.
4. Each channel represents a specific topic within that server.
5. Tap on any channel to view the conversations and see who’s online to chat about that topic.
6. There are two main ways to communicate within a channel: via voice or text.

While tools like Slack and Microsoft Teams offer streamlined communication and collaboration, switching to Discord comes with both advantages and disadvantages. One major drawback is the lack of native tools for migrating chat history and data from platforms like Slack or Microsoft Teams to Discord. However, you can export data from these tools and store it for future use.

Discord webhooks provide a simple way to exchange data between platforms. Below are a few examples of how they can be used:

• GitHub: With a Discord webhook, you can receive notifications in a Discord channel whenever code is pushed to the GitHub repository.
• Trello: Trello, a task management tool, can use Discord webhooks to send updates to a Discord channel when tasks are created, updated, or deleted.
• Google Forms: Google Forms can be integrated with Discord webhooks to send notifications to a Discord channel when a customer submits a form.

This setup ensures you stay updated across multiple platforms within Discord.

Discord is directly compatible with a variety of tools available in its app directory. Some popular tools that integrate seamlessly with Discord include:

• Twitch: Twitch, a game streaming platform, uses Discord to offer exclusive rewards to its members. By integrating Twitch with Discord, users can chat with game streamers, access exclusive content, and receive rewards for specific in-game achievements.
• YouTube: YouTube creators can integrate with Discord to build a strong community and offer exclusive content, including one-on-one discussions, to YouTube Premium members. This process is automated through Discord Roles, which grants special access to paying members.
• Patreon: Creators on Patreon can automate access to exclusive content, discussions, and events based on membership tiers by integrating their Patreon page with Discord. Subscribers can easily access all premium content through dedicated Discord channels.

Some tools do not integrate directly with Discord. Below are some popular tools that do not have a direct integration with Discord:

• Asana: Asana, a popular project management tool, does not have a direct integration with Discord. If your business relies on Asana for managing projects, you will need to use webhooks to achieve seamless integration.
• Salesforce: Discord does not natively support Salesforce integration. If your business uses Salesforce for customer relationship management (CRM) tasks, you'll need to rely on third-party CRM extensions that integrate with Discord.
• Zoom: For businesses using Zoom for video calls and messaging, the only option is to share Zoom links for meetings in Discord. There is no direct integration for scheduling Zoom meetings within Discord.