With over two billion users and over one million messages sent each second, WhatsApp has established itself as one of the world’s leading social networks.
According to studies, nearly 90% of people respond within 30 minutes on WhatsApp, while responses from emails are estimated at only 17% within the same time frame. The statistics from WhatsApp suggest why you should be interested in adding this channel to your marketing strategy.
Salesforce offers two WhatsApp-related functionalities:
- WhatsApp for Service Cloud: A platform dedicated to customer service agents who want to interact with customers from the service console in the Service Cloud App. This allows one-to-one conversations with customers where you can initiate the exchange based on a unique case record.
- WhatsApp for Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement: You can talk to your customers on a one-to-many basis and create a personalized conversation experience. The marketing department can send commercial and transactional messages, inviting customers to interact with the brand or promote products and services.
In this article, I will be focusing on the Marketing Cloud Engagement aspect with key emphasis on the different message types, their specific pricing models, opt-in management, and the different ways to configure it on the platform.
WhatsApp for Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement
On Marketing Cloud Engagement, it’s interesting to note that Salesforce provides customers with two different integrations:
- WhatsApp Chat Messaging: Salesforce initially partnered with Sinch, Meta’s official partner, which acts as an intermediary for account creation and WhatsApp channel management through a package that you can download from AppExchange.
- WhatsApp First Business Integration: Released recently, this direct cloud API integration between Marketing Cloud Engagement and Meta is the preferred option for the future with improved performance.
If you are interested in switching from WhatsApp Chat Messaging to WhatsApp First Business Integration, contact your account executive to get more information.
Message Types and Account Provisioning
Template vs. Session Message
When using WhatsApp in Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement, you are expected to define the type of message you want to send. Let’s differentiate what template and session messages are…
Template messages are related specifically to a business transaction. They include transactional messages that share important information with customers, like account and order updates or specific alerts. Marketing messages allow you to send promotional offers or product announcements. Then you can send one-time passwords that give customers the ability to access their account with verification codes.
You can use it to promote offers or services in specific countries when more traditional channels underperform. They are generally described as business-initiated messages.
Session messages are responses to a user-initiated conversation. When a user sends a message to your WhatsApp channel, you can respond with a free-form message instead of a template.
For example, during the Salesforce World Tour in Paris in 2023, I received a session message from NTO (Northern Trail Outfitters) inviting me to schedule a meeting with a sales specialist to discuss how WhatsApp for Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement could be useful for my business – it was definitely part of a specific session message campaign.
Translation:
First response from NTO: “You choose to receive notifications. If you no longer want to receive any notifications answer “Cancel notifications”.
Second response from NTO: “Hello, before continuing this discussion I would like to know if you want to receive a gift or schedule a meeting with a WhatsApp expert”.
Account Provisioning
Many different queries can impact the order form that you’ll get from the Salesforce team. Are you planning to communicate under multiple WhatsApp business accounts for multiple brands or by geographical region? If so, you need to set up multiple phone numbers or channels. How many WhatsApp communications do you plan to send? And to which country-based customers?
If you plan on activating such a powerful communication channel for your account, reach out to your Salesforce Account Executive.
Once you have these questions answered, you’ll generally find that WhatsApp in Marketing Cloud Engagement pricing is divided into:
- WhatsApp feature access: Billed monthly at a fixed price.
- WhatsApp business messaging: Billed monthly at a negotiated price of 1,000 conversation units.
For example, let’s say you plan to send a WhatsApp campaign to promote a specific service available only for your customers based in Algeria.
Following the above rate ratio, to find the conversation volume that an Algerian-based campaign will consume, you have to multiply the volume of your targeted audience by the ratio of the marketing business initiated ratio (27.78 x 500 = 13,890). This is important for your dedicated budget plan as you’ll have to share the number of conversations to provision on your account with your Account Executive.
Opt-In Management
Businesses must clearly state that a person has given their permission to opt-in to receive messages over WhatsApp and has obtained it from SMS, WhatsApp itself, in person, or through a physical document.
To be policy compliant, users should expect messages they receive, such as product recommendations or offers. Always be sure that you provide clear instructions with intuitive opt-in and opt-out flows to mitigate the risk of users blocking you due to unsolicited messages.
If customers believe they didn’t opt-in to receive messages, they can block or report a business. This has a direct impact on business quality scores, as WhatsApp limits businesses when their quality score is low for a sustained period.
When rolling out new opt-in methods for this channel, carefully monitor your unsubscribe percentage as it impacts your quality rating and the number of WhatsApp communications you can send to your customers.
Steps Configuration in Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement
Account Configuration
If you don’t have a Meta Business Account, the first step is to go to Facebook Business Manager and create one. Then, add some key information about your company, such as the name, phone number, website URL, and email address.
It’s basically where you need to authenticate yourself as the owner of the WhatsApp account. If you need to communicate to your customers with different accounts for different reasons (i.e. brand management, geographical regions, etc.) then you’ll need to get multiple accounts configured.
Channel Set Up
After your account is set up, you then have to create channels that represent your branded sender identity (aka display name).
When you rely on Sinch package integration, your phone number is provided by Sinch as a Salesforce partner. Otherwise, phone numbers are provided by Salesforce. A number can be generally used to communicate with up to 25 countries so it doesn’t impact your quality score.
Quality scores are based on recent messages that customers received over the past 7 days. From this quality score, a messaging limit is determined.
There are different tiers when it comes to sending messages :
- Tier 1: Send messages to 1k unique customers
- Tier 2: Send messages to 10 unique customers
- Tier 3: Send messages to 100k unique customers
- Tier 4: Unlimited
You can only be upgraded to the next tier if you have a good quality rating. The cumulative number of users you send notifications to adds up to twice your current messaging limit within a seven-day period.
Template Creation
WhatsApp templates are approved message content for common reusable communications. It is strictly managed by WhatsApp as it has to be compliant with their policy. After a template is approved, you can no longer edit it, instead you need to submit a new template message for approval. You can share approved templates across WhatsApp channels but not across business units.
From template name to language, body, header, and footer, this is where you draft and design your entire template. You are not expected to add real data here, such as first names or other personalization strings. You just have to show Meta which information will be included so it can check for compliance.
When approved, you can go to Content Builder and create a WhatsApp communication based on previously approved templates.
Audience Management
To create a WhatsApp audience in Marketing Cloud Engagement, you have to import Contacts to show you’ve acknowledged that you received consent from customers.
Journey Design
Use cases can be designed directly from Journey Builder with the dedicated WhatsApp message activity.
Reporting and Logs
Measuring and reporting a marketing channel activity is crucial as it provides insights into the performance and effectiveness of your communication. By analyzing available data, marketers can understand which channels drive the highest engagement, conversions, and Leads.
In Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement, you have two different ways to get this additional data.
1. Journey Builder on the User Interface
When a send is configured in Journey Builder via specific WhatsApp activities, two screens are available depending on the type of message that was sent.
The one on the left identifies deliverability and open rates which are also accessible via a specific report. The one on the right is when a customer response is expected and the total number of responses is identified.
2. WhatsApp Intelligence Dashboard (New)
Announced during this Spring 24’ Release, a new WhatsApp Intelligence Dashboard is available and allows you to see the performance and delivery of your WhatsApp communications.
Note: This applies to Pro, Corporate, and Enterprise editions.
3. Data Extract in Automation Studio
Through data extracts, you can make a copy of specific data used to gather information about customer interactions. This will help you use, organize, and analyze this data for multiple marketing purposes.
When configured, three different files are accessible from FTP:
- Tracking file: Contains interesting data like journey activity status to know if it’s been read or delivered.
- Inbound Message file: Contains message data sent by a customer and includes its mobile number, the specific date the message was sent, and other information regarding your channel configuration.
- Potential Unsub file: Contains potential bounce count, mobile number of the Contact, and other information related to your channel configuration. A customer is marked as a potential unsubscribe if at least three messages have failed to be sent to them.
Should You Use WhatsApp in Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement?
If you are wondering whether you should go for WhatsApp features in your Marketing Cloud Engagement account, just remember that although setting up the feature is quite easy, it requires some careful scoping before you get started…
- What is the contact strategy for such a channel?
- Which use cases should be implemented?
- Who is the target audience?
- What is the estimated number of conversations to purchase?
- How many channels need configuring?
- Is my WhatsApp opt-in management compliant?
- Are data and privacy topics studied?
Summary
WhatsApp is deeply integrated with Marketing Cloud Engagement from Contact Builder to manage your WhatsApp audience. Use Content Builder to generate, personalize, and preview specific content, and use Journey Builder to send multi-channel campaigns and even more with the last direct integration.
Have a look at some interesting new features that were announced during the Spring ‘24 Release here!