Telegram has solved the communications problem for me mostly. Before telegram, I had, all of the legacy messenger services (AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Skype, etc), plus Slack, IRC and whatever I used at work - now I have Telegram, and no longer sign into those legacy services anymore.
What makes telegram a winner for me is that the desktop is a first class citizen, I'm in front of a computer like 18 hours a day - I don't want to have to stop what I'm going and respond on my phone. Yes, perhaps Signal is more secure, and I may try it someday.. but for now.. Telegram has largely solved my 'communications' problem.