Empowering Businesses with WhatsApp: New Features and Opportunities
The recent business summit organized in India highlighted innovative tools and features designed to empower businesses across all sectors. The aim is to help businesses establish a stronger presence, enhance customer experiences, and facilitate growth. Here’s a comprehensive look at the key announcements from the summit.
Enhancing Payments with WhatsApp Business App
WhatsApp is advancing its capabilities by introducing an integrated payment option within the WhatsApp Business app. This feature allows small businesses to share QR codes for seamless transactions. Customers can now pay directly within WhatsApp using their preferred payment methods, making the sales process more efficient and secure. This development is particularly beneficial for small businesses seeking convenient payment solutions to enhance customer satisfaction and streamline operations.
In-app Calling and Business AI for Enhanced Customer Support
WhatsApp is further enhancing its platform by introducing in-app calling features. Users can now connect with larger businesses directly through the app, making it easier to resolve complex inquiries. This feature is especially useful when customers need to speak to a support executive. Available to all businesses on the WhatsApp Business Platform in India, the feature will soon support voice messages and video calls, catering to services like telehealth appointments.
The platform is also leveraging Business AI to provide scaled customer support. This technology allows customers to have their queries addressed by an AI assistant via voice calls, significantly improving customer service efficiency.
Centralized Campaign Management with Ads Manager
Indian businesses can now streamline their marketing strategies across WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram using the Ads Manager. This centralized approach enables businesses to manage creative content, setup flows, and budgets from a single platform. Once onboarded, businesses can upload their subscriber lists and utilize Meta’s AI-driven Advantage+ to optimize budgets across different placements, maximizing performance and reach.
Expanding Business Visibility on the Status Tab
WhatsApp’s Updates tab, used by 1.5 billion people globally daily, is being optimized to help businesses and creators grow through ads in Status, promoted channels, and channel subscriptions. Major brands like Maruti Suzuki, Air India, and Flipkart are already using ads in Status to enhance their visibility. Moreover, popular channels such as Jio Hotstar are capitalizing on the promoted channels feature. These updates are gradually rolling out, offering businesses new avenues for growth.
Bhuvan Dheer, Executive Director, Marketing at MSIL, remarked on the effectiveness of using WhatsApp for business growth, emphasizing how ads in WhatsApp Status can drive discovery and sales. Similarly, Sunil Suresh, Chief Marketing Officer at Air India Limited, highlighted how these features align with Air India’s vision of digital transformation, facilitating real-time connections and enhancing customer journeys.
Dual Utilization of WhatsApp Business App and Platform
Small businesses can now simultaneously use both the WhatsApp Business App and the WhatsApp Business Platform without changing their phone number. This flexibility allows businesses to manage day-to-day interactions while leveraging the WhatsApp Business Platform for automation and handling a surge in customer messages from marketing campaigns. This dual approach provides significant scalability for businesses experiencing rapid growth.
Facilitating Easy Access to Citizen Services
Messaging has become a crucial part of how people and businesses interact in India, with 91% of online adults in the country engaging with businesses weekly. WhatsApp’s user-friendly interface has made it a preferred choice for not just individuals and businesses but also government agencies.
Arun Srinivas, Managing Director & Country Head of Meta in India, noted the pivotal role WhatsApp plays in daily life, enabling connections, shopping, learning, and accessing essential services. Millions in India already use WhatsApp for tasks such as buying tickets and paying utility bills. The goal is to create an ecosystem where essential services are accessible at everyone’s fingertips, with state governments partnering with WhatsApp to provide public services.
State governments like Odisha, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, and Tamil Nadu are leveraging WhatsApp to offer official citizen service chatbots. The ‘Mana Mitra’ chatbot, launched by the Andhra Pradesh government, exemplifies this initiative, providing over 700 citizen services to 4 million users in multiple regional languages.
In conclusion, WhatsApp continues to innovate and expand its features to empower businesses, enhance customer experiences, and facilitate access to essential services. These developments showcase WhatsApp’s commitment to supporting businesses and communities, fostering growth and connectivity in a digital-first world.
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