With 1.65 billion, 310 million, and 100 million active users, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn have become an integral part of your marketing strategy. And if you are not marketing on a platform with more than one billion users, you are missing out on better marketing, sales, and revenue generation.
We are undoubtedly talking about WhatsApp, the messaging platform with more users than any individual social media network and even more than a combination of Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Pinterest. In 2022 WhatsApp has passed its one billion user mark reaching every corner of the world.
Not only that, WhatsApp has even outranked the ever-living email. Email marketing is inevitable no matter what your business size is or what is your industry vertical. But what is the highest open rate of your emails? 40%? 45%?
The average open rate of WhatsApp messages is more than 98% making WhatsApp the most engaging marketing channel globally. What’s the marketing is taking the world by storm for high engagement, high reach, and more than 450 million monthly active users.
Read more about WhatsApp Business App – Everything You Need to Know!
But not even a tiniest fraction of the total businesses worldwide are using WhatsApp aggressively for marketing, and that is because WhatsApp marketing is still unknown to many businesses.
But suppose you want to win eagerly using a highly underutilized platform. In that case, WhatsApp allows you to build massive traffic to your website, social media handles, and wherever you want.
And in this article, we will show you how you can use WhatsApp marketing best.
What Is WhatsApp Anyway?
WhatsApp is like any other messaging app available on the apple store or Google Play store. And WhatsApp was primarily built to offer messaging solutions eliminating expensive texting fees. Apart from paying for an Internet connection, there is no other cost involved in using WhatsApp to send messages to people worldwide. Better yet, WhatsApp has Internet calling facilities, making it easy to call and video call anyone worldwide without spending a dime.
WhatsApp was first invented to make accessible communication available to all. And WhatsApp has become the first app to have 450 million active monthly users. In 2014 Facebook acquired WhatsApp for $16 billion, the largest acquisition in Silicon Valley and 20 times larger than the Instagram acquisition.
Read more about 100+ Funny WhatsApp Group Links
If we talk about the only voice calls done through WhatsApp every month, more than 100 million voice calls are made using WhatsApp, and the number is even outranking the voice calls on Skype. The combination of WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger accounts for 79% of the global messaging market.
Therefore it is pretty evident that as a business owner WhatsApp gives you endless chances to communicate to a vast audience through images, videos, voice messages, and more.
What Is WhatsApp Marketing?
Simply put, WhatsApp marketing is nothing but promoting your business and engaging with your audience using WhatsApp. Though WhatsApp is widely used for personal communication with friends and family members regularly, thousands of businesses are using this app to promote and market their products and reply to customers’ queries. WhatsApp marketing is highly beneficial as it has proven to be the most personalized form of communication.
Now let us know why WhatsApp marketing is beneficial for your business.
It Keeps Your Business Separate From Your Personal Life:
WhatsApp is none other than a social app where you can put your profile picture and share your cherished memories with your family on your WhatsApp status. But such actions can confuse your potential clients about whether or not it is an excellent decision to buy from you. But with the WhatsApp Business app, you can keep your personal and professional life separate. WhatsApp Business app is also free to use, like the WhatsApp messaging app, and you can easily portray your formal and professional side and make your business more personalized on this app.
Read more about 100+ Funny WhatsApp Group Links
You Can Set Up A Complete Business Profile:
The WhatsApp business app is an additional feature of WhatsApp that allows businesses to create their profiles with the information they want to show to their target audiences, such as their name, profile pictures, business address, category of business, business description, email address, website URL, business hours and more.
Before making a purchase decision, any audience wants to get that helpful information about the brand, and providing all those details about you enhances your credibility of being contacted by your target audience. Alongside customers’ messages through your WhatsApp Business app, others can also see that your number belongs to a business account.
You Can Make Use Of Many Other Features:
Alongside setting up a unique business profile on WhatsApp, there are many other features on the app that you can use, such as seeing message statistics helps you know the number of messages sent, delivered, and read. To some extent, you can also set greeting messages, quick replies, and away messages to automate your conversation with your target audience.
Furthermore, you can label every chat on your WhatsApp Business apps, such as new orders, pending payments, new customers, order complete, and other custom labels.
You Get A Seamless Experience Like A Regular Messaging App:
If you are still on the fence about whether or not you will be able to manage the WhatsApp Business app, there is no need to freak out. Apart from the additional features, the app works like regular WhatsApp. Both the apps have the same interface and same accessibility, which makes the business app easy for any existing WhatsApp user.
Just like your contact list on your WhatsApp, the same will appear on the WhatsApp Business app. Plus, you can delete sent messages, set up business promotion statuses, and use WhatsApp web on your computer.
You Can Make Monetary Transactions:
Sending and receiving money using WhatsApp is now easy. If you are using the WhatsApp Business app to generate leads and convert your leads into your customers, you can now receive payments through the business app. The WhatsApp payment method has proven to be safe. Since the application is a safe and secured method of communication, even your customers will not hesitate to make payments using the app.
Last But Not Least, It’s Free:
Small business owners always look for ways to improve their business without spending a fortune. And that is where WhatsApp fits as the most viable solution to their requirements. WhatsApp is recognized for keeping personal and professional accounts separate, and the WhatsApp and WhatsApp Business apps are free to use with many features.
How To Set Up WhatsApp For Business Use?
For business users, we always suggest using the WhatsApp Business app, which is available on Android and iOS. And here is a step-by-step guide on downloading and setting up the WhatsApp Business account.
- Search for WhatsApp business on the apple store or Google Play and download the application if it is available in your region.
- Now accept the terms and conditions.
- Add a dedicated business mobile number to register on the app. Remember, if you have an existing WhatsApp and are setting up your WhatsApp Business profile, you will need a different mobile number for that purpose. If you want to use both apps on the same mobile phone, you need to use a dual SIM phone, and you can buy another SIM card for a Business account. However, the 3rd option is to convert your existing WhatsApp profile to a WhatsApp Business profile if you do not have a dual phone and want to use the WhatsApp business application.
- While registering, your app will send you an OTP to verify your phone number, and most of the time, WhatsApp automatically will detect the OTP so that you don’t have to fill it manually.
- The next step is to add your business information, including your business name, logo, and additional business information such as your address, working hours, type of business, products, and services.
- If you want to make the best use of the application, you can also incorporate the payment options of WhatsApp. You have to accept the WhatsApp payment policies to accept payments. You can select your bank name and fill in the details to accept payment on WhatsApp. The app will also send you an OTP to verify your account details.
- It is a good idea to notify all your existing contacts about the change in your WhatsApp account. You can also let them know that you have switched to a business account; from now on, they can contact you for any business-related queries.
Once You Are Done With Setting Up Your WhatsApp Business Account, You Must Know About Some WhatsApp Marketing Strategies To Get Started.
But before you start your marketing strategy, the first step is always to create a brand persona that resonates with its target audience. If you are creating a logo for your business, remember it must reflect your business’s core purpose and connect with your audience simultaneously. A good logo can make your audience feel they are directly talking to your brand and not with a robot.
The following strategy is to build a strong contact list to run your promotional message. Even after creating a solid marketing strategy, you can, at any point in time, alter your existing strategies on how to update your consumers about your products and services.
From letting your audience know about your product line and services to delivery, you can make it a hassle-free experience for all your customers using WhatsApp.
Now Here Are A Few More Points To Keep In Mind:
Set up your business profile correctly: If you want to get the most out of your WhatsApp business, it is essential to add all the relevant information about your business to your profile. The most important of all is your business name and profile picture. You can then add your business website, email address, location, business hours, and whatever you think is necessary. Lastly, put your business category and description as all this information is essential to legitimize your business and show your potential consumers that you are serious about it.
Use The WhatsApp Business Tools:
You can save time and workforce by using the automated messaging tools of WhatsApp. You can set up away messages, greeting messages, and quick replies to maintain good customer relationships without investing extra minutes on the Internet. Setting away messages is applicable for different times as per your convenience when you are not available for chat. Whenever any of your audience messages you directly, the greeting message will be sent to them also after 14 days of no activity.
Quick replies to your consumers based on their queries, and all the above features of WhatsApp help save lots of your precious time and thinking of replies.
Use Labelling For Better Tracking:
No matter what the nature of your business is or what kind of customers you deal with regularly, every contact on your contact list will be associated with you for different purposes. Instead of remembering the purposes of the contract or saving their names with awkward terms such as “Samir Due Payment,” you can add labels to their chats. You can also update the labels according to your need first aggregating groups.
5 WhatsApp Marketing Strategies To Grow Your Business
With increasing engagement, every marketer must know about these five proven WhatsApp marketing strategies to grow their user base and sales.
Stand Out With Your Brand
WhatsApp was first invented for personal and intimate messaging where people generally talk to their family members, connect with friends, and sometimes develop romantic relationships. But any brand that seeks to get the most of this messaging app must create an engaging brand. Customers don’t like to chat with an unfriendly representative. Many famous brands have lively company cultures, even in customer relationships.
Alongside, the person in your company who takes care of your WhatsApp channel must have an identity. Remember that your WhatsApp number must be available at all times to engage with the customers so that even the busiest customers find it easy to engage with your brand to exchange their views about your products and services. Sometimes customers also want to get added information about payment and delivery terms. When you reply to their messages promptly, you keep yourself away from accumulating an idea in their mind that they are talking to a fictional character.
Offer Great Value In Building A Strong Database
WhatsApp is an ad-free platform; therefore, you need to put all the effort into building a base of users. To offer great value to your users, you can offer something in exchange for their phone number. It can be a free service or a freebie. For example, the Delhi Police, when they decided to create an anti-corruption WhatsApp number, asked all the users to send an image of any policeman who was not doing their duty correctly. As a result, people took interest, and on the launch date of their WhatsApp number, they received more than 23,000 WhatsApp messages which also led to the booking of 6 cops in charge. As a bonus, the police got a robust database of thousands of citizens for free.
Always Offer Relevant Content For Free
What will you do after building a user list? Remember, WhatsApp has a more than 95% engagement rate, higher than Facebook. Therefore if you can offer great content on relevant topics, the vast database you made will stay connected with your brand. Many brands have created WhatsApp groups to educate their customers about their business. This method allowed them to stay connected with their potential customers free of cost, and it is also an excellent way to nurture the database of your WhatsApp users.
Deliver Fast Customer Service
WhatsApp has an opening rate of 98%, meaning that if you send great content, many customers will connect with you. Leveraging this number, many brands have started solving queries of their customers over WhatsApp. In a test, 99% of consumers said that they found it helpful as their queries were getting solved over messages. Remember, you need to be adequately resourced to solve customer queries promptly. The worst thing you can ever do is to have a WhatsApp business account but not respond for hours. Depending on the traffic, you can dedicate a person to ensure that the responses are made on time.
Research About Your Consumer
Till now, WhatsApp has never been used for extensive research, but the application is easy to use. This is also an inexpensive and quick platform if you want to run some quick research. You can ask your potential consumers or the users about what improvement they want in your business, and you can also ask them to choose between some of your products to know which can be fast-selling ones. WhatsApp is also an excellent platform for conducting quick discussions within your company.
For example, New Delhi Police has a substantial database of numbers. They can now start asking people about which area of the city they think is not much safe and what the citizens think can be possible solutions.
Conclusion
An ideal WhatsApp marketing strategy must be helpful, engaging, and relatable to the audience. A well-defined WhatsApp marketing strategy can help you overcome your business challenges while building a long-term relationship with your potential and existing customers. When you adopt the right WhatsApp marketing strategy, you get the best opportunity to widen your reach and establish yourself as a brand. The most significant part of WhatsApp’s marketing strategy is the content. When you invest in designing creative content ideas and incorporate that into your WhatsApp marketing strategy, you get the best results using the free platform. Many brands, including Netflix, Saffola, Hellmann, Absolut Vodka, Sunfeast Marie light, BookMyShow, and Oyo rooms, have achieved extraordinary results using WhatsApp marketing.
What’s more? Since creating a WhatsApp business profile is the first step in starting a profitable WhatsApp marketing strategy, you must create a WhatsApp Business account and start reaching your potential audiences through WhatsApp. I hope this article helps to learn all the basics before getting into WhatsApp marketing so that you can sustain yourself longer in the business.
