Microsoft Teams vs. Slack
Updated on
Ayman Al-Abdullah 🧱
@aymanalabdul·Nov 14
Replying to @aymanalabdul
3/ Distribution eats product
Slack was founded almost a decade before Microsoft Teams. Yet Teams is 15x larger than Slack.
How? Microsoft delivered it instantly to millions of their enterprise users.
Microsoft is not a product company, it’s a distribution company.
This chart says it all: Microsoft Teams rocketed to 75 million daily users by 2020, while Slack crawled to around 12 million. Slack had a head start and a killer product. But Microsoft had something stronger: built-in distribution.
Marketing analysis
Teams didn’t win because it was better. It won because it came pre-loaded with Office 365, instantly available to millions of enterprise users. Slack had to convince every new team to switch. Microsoft just flipped a switch.
Why it works
- Leveraged distribution beats product quality.
- Frictionless adoption = instant growth.
- Integrates into existing user behavior.
- Microsoft treated “reach” as a core feature.
Examples
- Apple Music grew fast through iPhone installs.
- Google Chrome gained share by bundling with search.
- Zoom took off when it made joining calls one-click simple.
- Netflix dominated by being built into smart TVs.
Analyzed by Swipebot
Loading analysis...