Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp are all integrating their messenger services, potentially giving real estate agents new ways to communicate with potential clients.
The merger of the three messenger services, all of which are owned by Facebook, has been a longtime project of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, according to BBC. The process of integrating the services is expected to be completed by the end of 2019 or early next year, according to the report.
What’s App and Instagram are both owned by the social media giant and up until now, users could contact other users on each app. With the change, a Facebook user could contact someone who just has Instagram or someone who just has WhatsApp, or vice-versa.
Many agents maintain business Facebook pages and some have Instagram accounts, but this will allow agents to communicate with consumers that only have one of the three services.
In a statement to the New York Times, Facebook said it wanted to “build the best messaging experiences we can; and people want messaging to be fast, simple, reliable and private.”
“We’re working on making more of our messaging products end-to-end encrypted and considering ways to make it easier to reach friends and family across networks,” the company added.