Introducing: Instant Slack notifications for business customers

If the response to the coronavirus has proved anything, it’s that communication is key, especially when running a business. As a cloud-based, digital bank with four offices plus remote workers, Starling has always benefited from communication through Slack, the secure, cloud-based instant messaging platform. Many of our business customers would say the same.

Some of you will have signed up to Slack recently, since working from home. Others may have been using Slack for years, like us. Whether you’re new to Slack or an old hand, we’ve built something to make it even better for Starling customers.

Our new Marketplace integration gives you the ability to connect your Starling business account into your Slack workspace. This means Starling’s real-time notifications for money moving in or out of your business account can be posted to a private Slack channel, both on your smartphone and your laptop.

Benefits of our integration with Slack include:

• Real-time transparency on business finances for key team members (for example finance or account management teams without direct access to the Starling business account).
• Control over who sees Starling notifications in Slack - only the bank account owner (who authorised the integration) will be included in the private Slack channel when it is first set up. They can then choose who to invite to the private Slack channel.
• Deep links - if you have access to the connected Starling business account, you can click on the notification and find out more about the transaction in your Starling app.
• Ability to suspend the integration at any time directly from your Starling business account.
• Privacy for multiple Starling bank accounts - each account and integration can be kept separate through private Slack channels.

Setting up your Slack integration

To set up instant Slack notifications, head to the Marketplace in the Starling app and select Slack from the menu. You’ll be asked to confirm that you’re happy to share your transaction data with Slack and then you can select the workspace you want to connect to your Starling business account. This will create a secure private channel in Slack.

Unless you choose to invite others to this private channel, only you as the bank account owner setting up the integration will be able to see the Starling notifications. A bot for Slack will start to post a notification to the private channel anytime a transaction takes place. The account owner can find out more about a notification by clicking the deep link to view the transaction in the Starling app.

Keeping key team members in the loop

"All our work happens on Slack,” says Jaron Soh, who uses both Starling and Slack for his two businesses. “It makes sense to have everything in one place."

Jaron, 26, founded ethical marketplace Artisan & Fox in 2015 while he was still at university. The team now works remotely and independently, made up of one person in the UK, three in Singapore and artisans from around the world. Recently, he’s been focusing on his new startup, Traktion, co-founded in 2019 with Saher Shodhan. Their aim is to help freelance digital marketers find businesses and startups that match their experience and expectations. Each marketer has a profile on Traktion that proves their abilities through data analysis of previous advertisements that they’ve worked on.

“Some digital marketers might not have so much charisma to sell themselves but their results will speak for themselves,” he says. There are two others on the Traktion team, plus additional freelancers and occasionally interns.

Both Saher and Jaron have access to the Starling business account for Traktion on their phones but there are other core people who will also benefit from being notified. “I opened a Starling business account for Traktion after I saw how easy it was with Artisan & Fox,” says Jaron. “The in-app notifications are very useful and it will be really good to have that on Slack as well. We do quite a few small payments independently and usually don’t ask for approval but now we’ll all be able to see what’s being spent rather than asking each other.”

Seeing Starling notifications on your laptop

A further benefit of connecting Starling to Slack is that your real-time notifications will come through both on your phone through the Starling app and your laptop through the app for Slack.

Khalia Ismain, 26, runs Jamii, a discount card for Black-owned businesses. It costs £14.95 per year and opens up a range of discounts for online and shop-based businesses. “A lot of the products can be used by anyone, such as shea butter or clothing, but they’re made with Black people in mind,” she explains. “I didn’t want it to be an exclusive platform but I wanted to find a way to support and build up the businesses in our community.”

She switched to a Starling business account last year. “It’s helped a lot with revenue, being able to organise funds into separate goals and see how much I’ve got coming in."

Khalia and her younger sister Courtney, a full-time employee, use Slack to communicate. Thanks to the Starling integration for Slack, Courtney can also be kept up to date on the business finances. “Her role isn’t so connected to the basic numbers but I like to keep her informed on everything that goes on with Jamii and my goal is to train her to take on more senior-level responsibilities as time goes on.”

For more information on other integrations available with your Starling app see Starling Marketplace.