Uncategorized – Zappable https://zappable.co WhatsApp Advertising Agency Tue, 10 Mar 2020 03:06:37 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.5.3 194771409 WhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: How Marketers Can Use WhatsApp https://zappable.co/whatsapp-marketing-agency-101-1/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=whatsapp-marketing-agency-101-1 Mon, 09 Mar 2020 00:56:00 +0000 http://codeln.com/?p=1771 Continue ReadingWhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: How Marketers Can Use WhatsApp]]> How Marketers Can Use WhatsApp

Every day, WhatsApp gets a little bit closer to having 1 billion worldwide users.

That’s a lot of potential customers for any business, regardless of your niche. Almost any business could appeal to at least a handful of new customers when there are a billion in its audience. But how do you use WhatsApp for marketing in the first place? After all, it’s famously branded as “no ads, no games, no gimmicks.” So how do you, as a marketer, break into that network of millions?

The answer is surprisingly similar to text message (or “SMS”) marketing. You simply sign up, add a phone number, verify it, and start collecting opt-in users.

That means if you want to use WhatsApp for marketing, you have to set up a campaign that collects phone numbers specific to WhatsApp. Fortunately, all that requires is a checkbox or a form field, and you can organize a WhatsApp recipient list in no time.

What companies benefit from WhatsApp?

WhatsApp has the potential to benefit any business, but it works exceptionally well for businesses that frequently sell internationally. So if you have an international base of clients, you could potentially grow that niche by interacting with them via WhatsApp.

As of 2019, WhatsApp’s biggest markets include India, Mexico, Russia, and Brazil. India alone has roughly 200 million users!

No matter how you slice it, WhatsApp is a goldmine for international sales. So now that you know if WhatsApp is for you, how do you start using it?

Getting started on WhatsApp

WhatsApp uses cell data to send messages among its users, so international charges don’t apply like they would for phone calls or text messages. Instead, you just use an incredibly small amount of cell data to communicate with potential customers.

screenshot of whatsapp homepage
In other words, if your company has a Wi-Fi connection, you can start using WhatsApp to market to international clients directly. Plus, if you already have an SMS marketing plan, you can take practically everything you’ve created and apply it to WhatsApp.

The big difference between SMS marketing and WhatsApp marketing is that WhatsApp isn’t automated. That means it takes a real marketer a real amount of time to send out a marketing blast.

But, if you already have the messages written, the most time-consuming process is adding all of the recipients to your messages.

Now that you have an account set up, you need to build a list specifically for WhatsApp.

Building your WhatsApp marketing list

If you already have email or SMS marketing campaigns, then you already know how to build a subscriber list.

Basically, offer some high-quality piece of information or content for free and require users to submit their contact information to get it. Except in this case, you want to know more than their phone number and email address — you want to know if they use WhatsApp.

If they do, you can modify your contact form to have a checkbox that says “Contact me on WhatsApp instead of SMS” (or something similar) so you can know for sure that you have willing WhatsApp participants in your marketing funnel.

Then, you can proceed with a typical SMS marketing strategy, using pretty much identical messages to engage users and get new customers.

But WhatsApp marketing isn’t exactly the same as SMS.

Sending your marketing messages

Before you use WhatsApp for marketing, you need to set up the logistics of how you’ll proceed. Unfortunately, you can’t use an MMS to send a blast to multiple people. However, you can use WhatsApp’s Broadcast feature. This feature lets you send an identical message to 100 or fewer people at a time, and you don’t reveal the recipients to one another.

That means you can send the same message to lots of recipients without revealing their contact information. That’s a major advantage in terms of privacy, and since it’s the default setting for WhatsApp, you can be sure you’ll never accidentally show someone’s phone number to somebody else.

Another big benefit of WhatsApp is that you know someone getting your message has a smartphone. That means if you want to include a link to supplemental material, you can be sure your subscribers will be able to access it. So if you wanted to, you could use the same messages from you SMS strategy and include links that could better engage your recipients. It also gives you the opportunity to send recipients links to your conversion pages so people can convert right on their phones.

In a nutshell, that all means you can instantly contact potential customers around the world with the potential that they can immediately convert.

That’s an amazing opportunity for any company. But does it work?

Associated costs

The bottom line of any marketing initiative is cost. But with WhatsApp, you don’t actually have to worry about that. It’s free for all users for their first year, and then it costs 99 cents for every year after that.

Every company in the world can afford to spend a dollar for a marketing channel on an annual basis. In fact, it’s almost certain that you pay thousands every year for others.

With such a low cost (and high potential), there’s no reason not to try WhatsApp for marketing. And if you don’t like it after your year of free use, don’t pay the 99 cents and go back to what you were doing before.

Zappable can help you get started with WhatsApp marketing

At Zappable, we’re constantly innovating and moving forward in the marketing world. WhatsApp is still a new marketing avenue, but many companies could benefit from using it. That’s why our marketing experts have worked hard, run tests, and determined the best ways to get new customers from the world’s most popular messaging app.

Contact us today to lay out a WhatsApp marketing strategy that can help your company grow!

]]>
1771
WhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: 5 Ways To Use WhatsApp To Engage Customers https://zappable.co/whatsapp-agency-101/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=whatsapp-agency-101 Thu, 20 Feb 2020 06:26:00 +0000 http://catchthemes.com/demo/catch-mag-pro/?p=5912 Continue ReadingWhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: 5 Ways To Use WhatsApp To Engage Customers]]>

WhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: 5 Ways To Use WhatsApp To Engage Customers

Move over Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Linkedin. Whatsapp, the mobile app created only 5 years ago, already has 1.2bn active users is now the most widely used social network in many markets, officially overtaking Facebook Messenger. As a private chat messenger WhatsApp allows users to share unlimited text, video, audio messages for free. The cost – free and the best part – the promise of an advertising free experience.

For marketers, Whatsapp has been a tough opportunity to crack. No ads, no media to buy and users not liking intrusive spam like messages means you need to work harder to generate consumer engagement. The most critical thing about Whatsapp is that you CANNOT push messages to consumers you do not know. You need to get invited by consumers to become their contact. With 70% engagement daily, every marketer needs to learn the 5 proven Whatsapp marketing strategies that can help you grow your user base and sales.


1. Create an Engaging Brand Persona for Whatsapp

Whatsapp is a personal and intimate messaging platform where people talk to family members, connect with friends and sometimes flirt as well. Any brand that seeks to get invited into my Whatsapp phone list needs to feel like a friend. So the first step is to create an engaging brand persona or character that represents your brand with its Whatsapp number. People don’t like to chat with impersonal company names.

This can be a real person for instance the brand Rare Pink has a Whatsapp number managed by it’s customer service managers who are available at all times to engage with customers. Often busy business people find it easy to engage with this person on Whatsapp, exchanging pictures of products they are interested in, asking questions and even agreeing payment and delivery terms. The brand has been selling a significant proportion of it’s online sales via whatsapp after it started sharing it’s number with customers.

The persona can also be a fictional character designed to create interest and engagement. Absolut Vodka wanted to engage young consumers with the brand for it’s limited edition Absolut Unique in Argentina. So they decided to throw an exclusive launch party but to get in you had to contact the “fictional “ doorman Sven, a guy notoriously hard to please. The Whatsapp number was released in all the Absolut media and advertising and users started sending messages, songs and even indecent proposals to Sven in order to get in. Once the persona is created, he can be used again and again for different events to bring consumers in. Watch the entire case study here.

Tip – Ensure your whatsapp number and persona is crystal clear in all media where your brand is present – TV, Print, Email, Web, Social, Search.

2. Offer Great Value to build a phone database

Whatsapp will remain ad free and hence in order to build a base of users, you need to offer them something of value in exchange for their phone number. This can be a promotion, a freebie, a free service or valuable information.

A great example of this is Delhi Police. Realising the ease and popularity of Whatsapp, they decided to create  anti corruption whatsapp number and placed it on all their traditional print and outdoor messaging. All users had to do was to send in images or videos of policemen not doing their duty or taking bribes. On the launch day 23000 whatsapp messages came in, taking the police by surprise and lead to the booking of 6 policemen on charges. As a bonus the police got a database of thousands of citizens’ phones for free. 

Another example comes from Unilever’s Mayonnaise brand Hellman’s which wanted to grow the usage of it’s products in new dishes in Brazil. So it offered consumers a Whatsapp line called WhatsCook  where they could ask professional chefs questions, get recipes, share videos of cooking, all the time building a database of mobile numbers.

Tip – Design an attractive promotion to get users to share their number with you. Once you add them on whatsapp, send them the promo / offer which they can then redeem and begin their relationship with you.

3. Offer Always On Relevant Content for Free

What do you do once you have started building a phone list ? Whatsapp has a 70% engagement rate, higher than facebook. That means you need to offer users, great content on relevant topics to ensure that they are engaged with you.

A great example of this is Dr Amrik Singh, Agriculture scientist in India, who has created a WhatsApp group called Young Progressive Farmers to educate farmers on modern methods of farming for rice which use less water and get higher yield like the information below on weeding. This method allows at very low cost, a way to reach all the farmers via a whatsapp group. Note that the limit of a group is 50 members and you can create upto 5 groups for a personal number so as the numbers grow, one has to think of how to resource for managing a large database of whatsapp users.

Radio Interconomia, a business radio and tv channel, created a whatsapp number to offer users free business news, interesting interviews and stock analysis by top analysts on the channel. The cost of the channel – just 1$ for brilliant mass scale 2 way engagement.

4. Deliver Speedy Customer Service

Whatsapp has a 70% opening rate, which means you are almost guaranteed exposure of your message if you customer is on whatsapp with you.

Leveraging this, Banco Santander Bank has created Open Bank, a whatsapp customer service number where you can chat with the bank, post queries, solve issues. In a test pilot done with 17000 customers, 99% of consumers found the service very useful and 98% said they would continue to use it.

Reliance Brands, which handles luxury brands like Diesel, Kenneth Cole and Zegna in India, offered customers the choice of remaining engaged with the brand via Whatsapp. Consumers lapped it up, finding out about promotions, new launches and getting brand information like pictures and video. In some cases the conversion rate of consumers who were on the brands’ whatsapp list was as high as 80%.

Tip – Ensure you are adequately resourced to handle customer queries. The worst thing you can do is to get a Whatsapp but not respond for hours. Ensure a dedicated person(s) depending on the traffic and ensure his/her performance is measured.

5. Consumer Research

Whatsapp has so far not been used extensively for research but offers an easy to use, inexpensive and quick platform to run some quick research. You can ask consumers about flavours they like, ask them to choose between options the brand is proposing to launch among other things. Also whatsapp is highly relevant for conducting some quick discussion internally within your company.

For instance Delhi Police with their database of  numbers can now start asking people questions about the specific areas in Delhi which they find unsafe or a college campus can conduct a quick snap poll on what new courses need to be introduced. Teachers in many colleges already share notes and quizzes on whatsapp and answer FAQs. The cost again – minimal. The time – minutes, instead of months. Whatsapp is unbeatable once you know how to leverage it well.

Just keep in mind, that spamming unknown people on Whatsapp is unacceptable, unethical and not effective. Instead use the framework of a persona, a great value exchange, content and customer service to generate leads and sales using WhatsApp.

]]>
5912
WhatsApp Marketing 101: How to do WhatsApp Marketing yourself https://zappable.co/whatsapp-marketing-agency-post/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=whatsapp-marketing-agency-post Fri, 24 Jan 2020 06:12:00 +0000 http://catchthemes.com/demo/clean-enterprise-pro/?p=6262 Continue ReadingWhatsApp Marketing 101: How to do WhatsApp Marketing yourself]]>

WhatsApp marketing: how to set it up for your company

Each month, there are around 1.5 billion active users on WhatsApp. Around 65 billion text messages are sent via the messenger service every single day. Image content is also pretty popular: 4.5 billion photos and 1 billion videos are shared between users daily.

The general terms and conditions of WhatsApp prohibit companies from using the app commercially. This can be avoided only if the customer makes contact first. For this to happen, their interest has to be piqued to include the company’s number in their contact list and write to it via the messenger. The contact exchange then counts as communication under the WhatsApp guidelines.

Companies that are already using WhatsApp advertising for their company communication are considered a “social media first mover.” But it hasn’t been tried or tested much yet, and has been even less professionalised. WhatsApp Business, however, is a special app for companies that is already available. It helps simplify communication with customers, separates private from customer contacts and helps you make an official company presence. In some countries, the business app has been available since mid-January 2018. It will continue to be released worldwide, step by step.

An app on course for success

Few people think about this as they write their daily texts to friends, family, and colleagues, but WhatsApp was and is the trigger of a worldwide communication revolution. Founded at the start of 2009 by the former Yahoo! employees Jan Koum and Brian Acton, the messenger app developed within a couple of years into the communication tool of choice for smartphones. 500 million users were already registered when WhatsApp was acquired by Facebook in 2014 for $19 billion (£15 billion) – the second largest acquisition in history.

The story of the app began rather modestly. In 2009, the founder, Koum, saw possibilities for a promising business model in the still-young Apple App Store. His idea encompassed not only the sending of short messages, but also user status messages. He was of the belief that it’s practical to know what individual contacts are up to.

The development progressed rather slowly at first. Frequent app crashes and problems with the synchronisation of phone numbers almost convinced Koum to throw in the towel. But Acton persisted. At that same time and by coincidence, Apple involuntarily gave the app the boost that it needed: Starting in June 2009, it was possible for app developers to use push notifications. WhatsApp users could then see right away when somebody changed their status.

The app eventually developed into an instant messaging service. It also played into the company’s hands that they had almost no competition. Next to Skype, there was no noteworthy competition except for Blackberry Messenger, which only functioned on Blackberry smartphones. With WhatsApp, on the other hand, one could not only reach people via text message at any time and from anywhere in the world, but could also send photos or voicemails.

For a long time, it’s not only been young people using WhatsApp. The ease of use that Koum aspired to has made the messenger service as attractive to all age groups as the developer had hoped. So it seems the actual goal was achieved: To develop an app that even people who didn’t grow up with computers or are unfamiliar with technology can use.

Why use WhatsApp for marketing?

With over one billion daily users, the messenger app offers companies a unique chance to make their customer communication more personal. It should focus less on advertising, and more on consulting. The majority of WhatsApp users are looking for individual and direct contact.

What they don’t usually imagine is the WhatsApp newsletter, which functions as a replacement for the classic e-mail newsletter. Customers prefer uncomplicated customer service and consulting from the company via WhatsApp. Marketers also see great potential in using the app for community management and personal marketing. In this way, WhatsApp offers new possibilities for company communication – and not only externally. The app is also a suitable alternative to team messengers such as Slack, Twist, and others.

Companies should focus primarily on exclusivity and authenticity when using WhatsApp. The goals are long-term customer loyalty and more sales. And the chances for this aren’t bad: Those who trust companies with their phone number over WhatsApp are usually happy with the product or service and also trust the company in general. Whether the investment is really worth if for companies is hard to say, though. WhatsApp marketing hasn’t yet been tested enough, and the ways of measuring it are still too immature. But companies can get more attention for their offer using the first mover advantage. Since the app is mainly used on smartphones (and the browser application also requires a phone number), WhatsApp marketing is the most useful for mobile target groups.

Preparation: invite customers to interact

Before getting started, companies should develop a strategy for how they want to use WhatsApp to market their products or services. As opposed to other social media channels, speed and engagement aren’t sufficient with WhatsApp. What really counts here is relevance and a feel for the correct tone. WhatsApp advertising should offer customers consistent value to draw them in and encourage interaction.

Before setting the WhatsApp wheel in motion, companies first need to get users to sign up for their service or newsletter. Some exciting incentives could include:

  • Exclusive content
  • Free giveaways as a thank you for signing up
  • White papers
  • E-books
  • Product samples
  • Competitions
  • Gift cards
  • Discounts

How does WhatsApp marketing work?

Once the strategy is set, the implementation can begin. Things that go on in everyday life can become time-consuming with marketing for a company using WhatsApp. The large number of recipients has to be managed well. This can be done using broadcast lists in Android or iOS.

Broadcasting with WhatsApp web

Longer messages can be sent more easily using the WhatsApp web service on the PC. WhatsApp Web runs on all popular browsers such as Safari, Firefox, and Chrome. But the web version only functions if the app is also installed on your smartphone. After an initial login, WhatsApp synchronises all messages. Users can read and write messages from all end devices. But recipients can only be added or removed from broadcast lists using the smartphone app. The number of participants is limited to 256.

Observe the legal limitations

WhatsApp’s terms and conditions present a legal uncertainty for companies, because there are no concrete regulations governing the use of messaging services commercially. It was previously unknown, however, that WhatsApp would have punished a company for using the app for customer communications. Instead, the desire for companies to use the messaging service as a marketing channel has been increasingly pursued by the time and energy invested in the development of WhatsApp Business. Whether it’s possible to efficiently use this WhatsApp variant for advertising, though, is still questionable.

In any case, companies that want to use WhatsApp for marketing need to pay attention to telecommunication and online privacy laws. Sending advertising messages requires the consent of the recipient, so marketing with WhatsApp uses the double opt-in procedure. To register for a WhatsApp newsletter, you’ll be asked to explicitly confirm your subscription. This can be done, for example, using a pre-defined word such as “Start.”

Using WhatsApp to contact customers without their consent is unadvisable, especially because of the new General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) that came into effect in May. The law states that companies who want to engage in WhatsApp marketing have a duty to provide information and a duty to document. According to this, the company must not only inform its customers when personal data is being processed, but must also carefully document these processing steps.

 Note

A data protection problem that WhatsApp was already dealing with before the GDPR came into effect was the automatic synchronisation of all contact data. This is because using WhatsApp requires access to the user’s address book and contact numbers that are not registered with WhatsApp may also be forwarded to WhatsApp. As a result, any company looking to engage in WhatsApp marketing should be sure to only store the phone numbers belonging to customers who have directly contacted them through WhatsApp or who have given their consent in advance.

How registering for a WhatsApp newsletter works

If the customer is convinced, then they just have to register with the double opt-in. This is a small hurdle that every company who uses WhatsApp marketing has to face.

  1. As a provider, first select a mobile device and a phone number via which you’d like to send the WhatsApp messages
  2. The customer obtains that phone number from your website (first opt-in)
  3. Then they add you as a contact in their phone book
  4. The customer writes the company a message with the word “Start” to activate the WhatsApp newsletter (second opt-in)
  5. The newsletter can be disabled with the word “Stop”

Support using subscription services

WhatsApp advertising becomes more professional with the use of broadcast services such as WhatsBroadcast, instantKOM, or WhatsATool. These allow you to send messages quickly and easily through a browser. You don’t need a separate phone number. Instead, just integrate the service into your website using a widget, for example. The messages can be supplemented with images, videos, graphics, or links, and then sent with one click to all of your recipients. How well this WhatsApp marketing is received by customers can be tracked with hourly statistics.

Depending on the chosen price category, the company can also offer additional functions such as interfaces (e.g. to Facebook Messenger), URL shorteners, or an increased dispatch speed. You can usually test these services first.

Creativity is sought after

Creating added value and attracting attention are key when it comes to marketing with WhatsApp. How to do this, though, is still mostly up to experimentation. At this point there are only a few best practices for the channel. What works also depends on the target group and the product.

Use a step-by-step method to determine what will be successful for a company on WhatsApp. At the beginning of a WhatsApp marketing campaign, the following factors should be tested:

  • Length of the WhatsApp message
  • Send frequency
  • Send time
  • Number and placement of emojis
  • Attachment of media such as images and videos

The human mind processes images around 60,000 times faster than text – a good argument for why you should work with numerous emojis. If set up appropriately, subscribers to newsletters will receive the message better and will also be more concerned with its content. The combination of image or video and text also draws more attention.

WhatsApp marketing: examples

Though it hasn’t fully caught on yet in the UK, there are already some examples of marketing campaigns over WhatsApp. We’ve gathered together a couple of examples here.

CookingCarnival

This successful cooking blog operates under the motto “Spice up your life!” and has grown into an absolute treasure trove of healthy recipes to make at home. In addition to a fully equipped blog and recipe index, CookingCarnival offers a WhatsApp newsletter to help inspire readers with new recipe ideas. Subscribers receive messages with links to healthy, vegetarian recipes every few days.

Holiday Pirates

The travel deal site Holiday Pirates uses WhatsApp to share the best bargains and travel deals with subscribers. The newsletter can be tailored based on your location and specialized according to your preferred category. Their WhatsApp campaign operates with the goal of generating more sales of the deals offered on their website.

New possibilities with WhatsApp Business

WhatsApp announced plans for its business app already in summer 2017. At the beginning of 2018, WhatsApp Business officially launched. The new version, which is intended primarily for small businesses and currently only runs on Android, is now gradually being introduced worldwide. WhatsApp is designed to enable companies to create an official presence, separate customer messages from private messages, and make quick communication in general easier. At the same time, nothing is meant to change for users. Unwanted company numbers are still able to be blocked.

In order to protect your privacy, the video will not load until you click on it.

A company profile on WhatsApp Business exceeds the range of a normal WhatsApp profile: it can appear with a company description, contact information (e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, websites), and opening hours, therefore fulfilling their legal obligations. The problem with automatic data synchronisation is still present, however. This means that even when using WhatsApp Business, companies may only store the numbers of customers who have given their consent or initiated contact themselves.

You can save quick replies for messages frequently sent to customers, as well as set up absence messages. All contacts and chats can be labelled to help keep track of them.

WhatsApp marketing is especially interesting because the app delivers statistics on sent messages. This lets you trace how many messages were transmitted, and how many of these were read.

Looking to the future: WhatApp for Enterprises and Status Ads

For some time now, companies have been able to sign up for the WhatsApp Business API. This works independently of the Business API and is aimed at medium-sized and large enterprises in particular. Since the interface is still in the test phase, access has so far been restricted. However, it’s fair to assume that the API will be activated for all interested companies in the near future as part of the already announced WhatsApp for Enterprises service. The WhatsApp Business API and the future enterprise service will take enterprise communications over WhatsApp to the next level with features like the following:

  • Customer Support: Connections to CRM tools like SalesForce or FreshDesk, including live chat solutions like ZenDesk
  • Transactions: The ability to make purchases or bookings through WhatsApp and send corresponding invoices through integration with internal APIs.
  • Online payments: Processing online payments by dynamically generated payment links
  • Shipment tracking: automatic updates on the delivery status of shipped goods through WhatsApp
  • Notifications: Real-time notifications of upcoming events, tasks etc. based on the “if-then” function
  • Bots and automated processes: Automate time-consuming tasks like collecting feedback or transferring leads to Excel spreadsheets.

There are already plans for paid advertisement placing to be made available in early 2019, similar to Instagram stories. While it was always in the founders interests not to advertise on WhatsApp, this is the first significant step towards monetizing the Messenger app five years after it’s acquisition by Facebook. However, at least at the start, users should be able to choose whether they want to receive advertising or not.

Alternatives: Business on Messenger and SMS marketing

Competition for WhatsApp comes from within its own house. Since 2016, Facebook has featured Business on Messenger, which basically covers the same scenarios as WhatsApp Business.

Another alternative is SMS marketing. In principle, this functions the same way as e-mail marketing: With minimal effort and comparatively low costs, messages can be sent to a large circle of recipients. But subscribers are responsible for paying the SMS costs required for interaction.

Summary: new marketing channel with a future

For many WhatsApp users, the messenger service has become an important part of their life. This makes it all the more valuable as a location for your service. Communication via private channels allows a particularly close relationship between customers and companies. To what extent WhatsApp marketing will pay off for companies isn’t clear yet. There are still too few meaningful ways of measuring it, and too few case studies on the topic.

WhatsApp Business and the WhatsApp Business API, both of which are currently available, were released in January 2018. In its functionality, it’s specially tailored for companies. In the coming years, the messenger’s monetisation will finally be realised with the launch of the planned advertising strategy, whereby advertisements will be shown on status messages, and the WhatsApp for Enterprise service. It will be exciting to see to what extent these companies can benefit from WhatsApp advertising.

]]>
6262
WhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: How Can B2B Companies Leverage WhatsApp For Business https://zappable.co/whatsapp-agency-b2b/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=whatsapp-agency-b2b Fri, 24 Jan 2020 06:06:00 +0000 http://catchthemes.com/demo/clean-enterprise-pro/?p=6252 Continue ReadingWhatsApp Marketing Agency 101: How Can B2B Companies Leverage WhatsApp For Business]]> WhatsApp launched the WhatsApp for business services in 2018 to help small businesses and large enterprises to serve the customers better, the ad services will be another ammunition for the marketers to engage and retain their customers. From promotional offers, contest alerts to new launches; you can use the rich multimedia options offered by WhatsApp to advertise your offerings.

WhatsApp for Business

What makes WhatsApp a lucrative platform for businesses?

  • Widely used platform: In the last few years, WhatsApp has replaced SMS as the primary channel for messaging. Within a decade of developing this messaging platform, WhatsApp has managed to garner over 1.5 billion users across 180 countries. India is supposed to be its largest market with 200 million users (way more than the US that has 23 million users). As of May 2018, a total of 65 billion WhatsApp messages have been sent by the users daily.
  • Easy to break through the noise: Unlike Facebook, Instagram, and other channels where the algorithm changes frequently, WhatsApp is as of now unaffected by it. It is a non-intrusive platform where a business cannot send messages to the customers unless they are granted explicit permission. This would make it easier for you to break the clutter and send one-to-one messages to the user.
  • Easy to track reminders and payment confirmation to users: Companies like BookMyShow and MakeMyTrip have been using WhatsApp for business to send confirmation messages about the bookings done through their website. Considering that there is very less scope for spam messages to be posted on WhatsApp, it is easier for the users to track the reminders and confirmation updates sent by you. It also enables you to maintain transparency in your interaction with the customers.
  • Better customer support: In the age of customer-centricity, quick resolution to customer queries is not an option. It’s a necessity. In times of need, a user may prefer to directly have a one-to-one chat with the customer support to resolve their problems instead of waiting on the call for the customer support team to connect with you or wait till the team responds to your query. WhatsApp allows your customer to have a one-to-one chat with the customer support and get their issues resolved immediately.

How can B2B Businesses Use WhatsApp for Marketing?


Unlike their B2C counterparts, B2B businesses are infamous for their lack of customer proximity and non-personalized approach to marketing. There are very few B2B companies that do one-to-one marketing with customers. WhatsApp can change the way B2B marketing is done currently. Here are a few recommendations from us on you can try to leverage the strengths of WhatsApp for marketing.

  • Product demos: Considering that your customers might be too busy to schedule an appointment with you for a product demo in office or on Skype, you can offer on-the-go demo using WhatsApp’s multimedia facilities or via video call. This will save your prospect’s time and accelerate the decision-making process.
  • Content distribution: Let’s face it, once your customer purchases your product, it is unlikely that they will return to your website to read your content. It is also unlikely that they will notice your emails or social media postings amidst the clutter in their inbox and news feed. WhatsApp enables you to directly share your content such as blogs and industry news with your customers leading to easy consumption of content. Sometimes, sending direct content can also rekindle the interest of the customer to engage with you more.
  • Send easy invites to webinars, events, and conferences: As with content distribution techniques, there are high chances that your customer might miss the invite that you send them for webinars, events, and conferences. You can send invites directly on WhatsApp to ensure that your customer does not miss the important updates from your company.
  • Easy cross-promotions: Launched a new product or a service that you think will be useful to your existing customer? Instead of sending emails or calling them at an odd time, you can use WhatsApp to inform them about it. You can schedule a call or a product demo or even send introductory videos and document to give them a preview of how it works. This will help in reducing any potential gap in communication.

The challenges in using WhatsApp Ads

  • Ad Fatigue: Your customer might see the same promotional ad that you put up on their Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram feed. This could lead to ad fatigue. Considering that WhatsApp is more personalized than other social media platforms, it’s important to make your WhatsApp promotions more interactive and one-to-one to prompt the users to engage with your business.
  • Non-compliance to GDPR: As WhatsApp cannot adequately protect corporate data, companies such as Deutsche Bank had banned the use of WhatsApp for business communication. However, theoretically, it is compliant as it is a product of Facebook, and Facebook is certified under the US-EU privacy shield. Considering that it is a grey area, we would recommend you to take advice from your legal team before planning a WhatsApp marketing campaign.
  • Risk of being marked as spam: Although WhatsApp is a great way to have one-to-one communication with your customers, it is crucial to be as non-intrusive as possible. Frequent and irrelevant messaging or ads could result in blocking your contact number, and that would prevent you from contacting your customer in the future. The best tactic is to restrict your marketing to one relevant message or ad per day unless there is an important update that you want your customer to know immediately.

What’s next?

To leverage WhatsApp for B2B you should engage a professional WhatsApp advertising agency like Zappable – get in contact with us now to use WhatsApp to drive more leads, prospects and conversions.

]]>
6252