Your own chat or WhatsApp: what is better for your club?

Almost every club, church or volunteer group has one: the WhatsApp group. Everyone already has the app, and a group is set up in seconds. Still, it often goes wrong. This article explains where the problems are and when your own chat is a better fit.

In short: WhatsApp is fine for family and friends. For an organisation, your own chat has three advantages: members don’t see each other’s phone numbers, the organisation decides who is in it, and the conversations are not with Meta but on a server in Germany.

Where WhatsApp groups fall short

Everyone sees each other’s phone number

In a WhatsApp group, all members see each other’s number. Anyone joining a choir or sports club therefore shares their number with dozens of people they barely know. For young members, volunteers and people who like some distance, that is unpleasant.

The group belongs to a person, not to the club

A WhatsApp group depends on the phones of its admins. If the secretary steps down, or gets a new phone without a backup, the group loses its admin. Often nobody knows who can still change the group.

Former members stay in

People who leave the club often stay in the groups for months. Nobody removes them, and they simply keep reading. That is not the intention, especially when members or finances are discussed.

Everything sits with Meta

WhatsApp belongs to Meta, the American company behind Facebook and Instagram. The messages themselves are encrypted. But Meta does know who is in a group with whom, when messages are sent and which phone numbers belong to them. For a club that takes its members’ privacy seriously, that is not a comfortable idea.

What your own chat does differently

• On your own domain, for example chat.yourclub.nl. The chat belongs to the organisation.
• Names instead of numbers. Members see each other’s name, not each other’s phone number.
• The club decides who is in it. New members get an invitation link. Whoever leaves is removed and can no longer read along.
• Groups per topic, such as the committee, volunteers or the whole team.
• Encrypted and in Europe. The messages are stored on a server in Germany, not with an American company.
• Open standard. The chat uses an open standard, so you are not tied to one company. If you want to leave later, you take your data with you.

Honestly: what are the downsides?

• Everyone installs an extra app. That is the biggest hurdle. An invitation link makes it easy, and if you like I visit to do it together.
• It doesn’t replace everything. For family and friends, WhatsApp stays handy. Your own chat is for communication within the organisation.
• Not for sensitive data. Your own chat is not meant for medical data or other special categories of personal data. It is for the everyday communication of a club or team.
• It costs something. WhatsApp is free; your own chat is not. In return, the club is in charge.

Who is it for?

Your own chat suits a club, church, choir, neighbourhood group or volunteer organisation with a regular group of members, where people come and go. That is exactly where visible phone numbers and former members in the group become a problem.

Want to know whether it suits your organisation? Read more about your own chat for your organisation, or request a call back. I am happy to visit your committee, anywhere in the province of Utrecht.