Blink and Workvivo have a lot of similar features. So how do these employee communication platforms stack up against each other? And which is the best choice for your organization?
With so many employee communications platforms out there, finding the right fit for your team can be a daunting task.
Today, we’ll take a closer look at two industry frontrunners: Blink and Workvivo. Both of these platforms are designed to enhance collaboration, streamline communication, and foster a sense of community within organizations. They also act as a digital hub, giving employees access to all of the tools and resources they need to do their jobs well.
But which of these modern intranet solutions best supports your business to meet its needs and goals? Let’s take a closer look at key features, functionalities, and more to help you make an informed decision.
What is Blink?
Blink is the leading mobile-first employee experience platform, designed for frontline organizations. It’s a modern intranet, where employees can access company comms and essential workplace resources from their smartphones.
Chatting with colleagues. Signing up for shifts. Responding to the latest poll. Viewing pay stubs. Celebrating a coworker’s company anniversary. Employees can do all this and more with Blink’s comprehensive employee app.
With a range of communication, recognition, engagement, and social features — all available via a user-friendly interface — Blink helps employees feel closer to company culture and one another.
What is Workvivo?
Like Blink, Workvivo is an employee communications app. The company was established in 2017 and was acquired by Zoom in 2023.
Workvivo is an all-in-one tool for workplace communication and collaboration. Social media-style functionalities, such as podcasting, keeps employees engaged.
Blink vs. Workvivo: What are the similarities?
Internal communications
Communication channels
Both Blink and Workvivo help to streamline company communications. Messages from management. Co-worker conversations. Leadership updates. All types of communication are supported thanks to a variety of channels, including a newsfeed, mobile notifications, videos, and livestreams. Workvivo customers can also create articles, newsletters, and podcasts from within the platform.
News feed
A news feed is another thing these platforms have in common. Admins can personalize Blink’s News Feed, which serves as users’ homepage, based on each employee’s team, interests, and role. This ensures employees only see relevant comms. Because employees can also filter the news feed, it’s easy for them to find the information they’re looking for.
Chat functions
Both platforms have similar chat features that are useful for teamwork and project management. Employees can chat and share files, GIFs, images, and videos. In Blink, chat functions are a core pillar of the platform. Workvivo, on the other hand, relies on integrations with Microsoft Teams and Slack. A chat add-on is available but this comes at an additional cost.
Video conferencing
When only face-to-face communication will do, Blink and Workvivo both provide useful video conferencing tools. Teams working on either platform can start a video call right from their chat group. Workvivo does this through its Zoom video app. Blink integrates with Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams, giving customers the option to use their preferred video conferencing software.
AI comms support
With Blink Assist, users get AI support when creating and sharing content. Your AI assistant can automatically generate and improve posts, helping you to better connect with your audience. Users can also use AI to summarize posts that have appeared in the news feed. This means you can stay up to date without having to read every single post. Workvivo, working with Zoom, is beginning to introduce generative AI features.
Read more: 10 best internal communication tools for 2024
Employee engagement
Blink and Workvivo both support employee engagement. They provide two-way communication tools and support employee recognition with milestone celebrations and appreciation shout-outs. Both platforms also aid the onboarding process, with employee directories, a resource hub, and new starter video introductions.
These solutions provide tools for feedback collection, like pulse survey check-ins and employee NPS (net promoter score) surveys. Blink, in particular, provides rich survey functionality. Compared to Workvivo, Blink provides a greater variety of surveys and question types. This allows you to collect in-depth data and then use feedback analysis tools to examine that data on a granular level.
When it comes to encouraging employee engagement on the Blink platform, Blink’s customer success managers (CSMs) are on hand. Clients work with a dedicated CSM to optimize adoption and engagement.
A digital hub
Workvivo serves as a digital hub where companies can store and share documents and resources. This hub integrates with other tools in an organization’s tech stack. It’s possible to create wiki pages for collaboration and to launch other apps from within the platform.
Similarly, Blink offers a modern intranet, accessible on both desktop and mobile. Users can access important tools, documents, forms, and information, directly from the app. They can also launch other apps from within the platform thanks to a secure single sign-on. This encourages user adoption of existing software and streamlines the employee experience (EX).
Read more: Alternatives to Workplace from Meta
Blink vs. Workvivo: A closer look at key features
Blink vs. Workvivo: What are the differences?
Core product offering
Blink was purpose-built from the ground up to enhance internal communications and improve the employee experience, and that has always been our sole mission.
For companies impacted by Meta’s recent decision to sunset Workplace, this is a crucial distinction. Meta’s shift in focus away from Workplace to other business areas highlights the risk of relying on platforms that are not core to a company’s strategic direction.
Organizations partnering with Blink are choosing a vendor whose entire focus is dedicated to success in employee engagement and communication. We continuously invest in our platform, ensuring that it remains a leading solution for internal comms and employee experience.
Unlike Workvivo, which — like Workplace — is just one part of a much larger parent company’s diverse offerings, Blink’s platform isn’t just a feature among many — it’s the heartbeat of our business.
Frontline-first
Both Blink and Workvivo have a mobile app that employees can access from their smartphones. These are user-friendly spaces that employees find easy to navigate. And these apps are comprehensive, offering many of the same features on desktop and mobile versions of the platform.
However, Blink offers some features and services that particularly benefit a frontline workforce. These frontline-focused features and services include the following:
- Feeds and chats are cached for offline reading so a poor or non-existent internet connection doesn’t prevent employees from engaging with the app
- Workers can select a “do not disturb” setting so they’re not bothered by notifications when they’re at home or trying to rest after a night shift
- Blink’s Open Shifts micro-app allows managers to advertise empty shifts and employees to volunteer for them
- Blink’s rollout team offers unparalleled support during the launch period, providing branded materials and visiting sites to help people gain access to the app
While Workvivo may be a better fit for a desk-based organization, Blink’s deep understanding of frontline teams and their needs makes this platform an excellent choice for frontline businesses.
Analytics
Workvivo offers robust analytics capabilities to track and measure employee usage data. Organizations can gain insight into platform usage and then make data-driven decisions to manage platform performance. This functionality is available for an additional fee.
Like Workvivo, Blink’s enhanced workforce analytics feature provides comprehensive usage data. But Blink goes beyond usage.
Blink analytics collate and correlate from multiple data points to provide a breadth of insight into your workforce. You can drill down into the data, examining results by department, manager, and location to get deeper, actionable insight.
Your dedicated CSM can then help you turn actionable insights into action plans. These can be distributed automatically via Blink comms channels, helping you to implement your plan and track results.
Customization
Both Blink and Workvivo allow you to add your own branding to the platform. But Blink offers more in terms of customization.
Blink provides a white-label app for full brand personalization. For larger, multinational organizations, you can also create a federated platform, with personalized branding for each region. You can compartmentalize other features, like the news feed and user directory, too. In Workvivo, colors, icons, and logos are set globally.
While the offering of out-of-the-box integrations is comparable across both products, Blink also provides deeper integrations through customized micro-apps scoped and built for each customer.
These micro-apps allow you to add functionality to the platform as you need it. You can use Blink’s pre-built digital forms to digitize and streamline processes for employees. For example, employees can use the app to request leave, view their pay stubs, or report an incident. And if you don’t see a form that quite fits your needs, you can count on the Blink team to custom-make one.
Content management
Both Workvivo and Blink offer useful content management features. It’s easy for admins to set permissions and for content creators to create and publish new content. On Blink’s app, creators can protect sensitive content so readers have to authenticate before accessing it. Blink can also integrate with design tools like Canva, which helps users create effective page layouts.
In comparison, Workvivo offers a variety of content management tools. For example, users can auto-archive content by setting an expiration date for each type of content. Publishers can also opt to receive notifications when content has expired.
Translation capabilities are also a little more robust on Workvivo. In Blink, users can set their language and choose to auto-translate comments, posts, and pages so that other users can read them in their native language. In Workvivo, content creators can take this a step further by writing content in their own language and then select the languages it should be automatically translated into. This can come in particularly handy for large, multilingual teams.
Read more: Choosing the right technology for frontline employees
Blink vs. Workvivo: Our final thoughts
Blink and Workvivo both support organizations in their internal communication and employee engagement efforts. They act as a modern intranet, with both desktop and mobile app versions that help companies reach all members of the workforce, no matter where they’re based.
Workvivo has the edge when it comes to certain capabilities, like translation. But Blink makes a great Workvivo alternative, particularly when it comes to personalization, analytics, and custom functionality.
Blink is also the go-to platform for frontline organizations. Built specifically to improve the work lives of deskless employees, Blink makes it easy for companies to encourage app adoption and engagement. It helps frontline workers feel more connected to their coworkers and company culture. It also puts all essential tools at their fingertips, improving efficiency and safety.
