Cutting through the digital noise on social media and inboxes is becoming necessary for businesses to engage and retain their customers. With a more intuitive and naturally conversational interface, WhatsApp has been making waves for helping companies to personalize communication.
But to run functions like marketing, sales, advertisements, and support at scale, businesses need the WhatsApp Business API which can add to their spends.
In this post, we’re going to share some affordable ways to use WhatsApp Business API to drive higher ROI from the channel.
Tips for Affordable WhatsApp Business API Setup
To make using WhatsApp Business API more affordable:
1. Choose the right solution provider
WhatsApp Business API can be accessed and used through official solution providers called BSPs (Business Solution Providers). You must choose a provider that offers a tiered WhatsApp API pricing model or the option to pay-as-you-go. Compare providers based on their automation capabilities, WhatsApp templates, ease of setup and fees, customer support and success, and scalability.
2. Start with only the essentials
Before you start to explore all the features and capabilities of WhatsApp Business API, run a quick SWOT analysis on your status quo. Identify opportunity gaps and their impact on your business, and prioritize only those that will have a direct impact on customer experience and your bottom line revenue. For example, we recommend automating notifications, quick replies, and basic customer support when getting started and then slowly scaling to other functions in marketing, sales, etc to assist conversions.
3. Integrate with existing tools
Instead of having to work on building a WhatsApp list and running campaigns at scale to gather customer data, integrate with your existing tools. Solutions like Interakt can easily integrate WhatsApp with eCommerce platforms, CRMs, helpdesks, marketing, and analytics suites, to help you run comprehensive growth strategies at no additional setup cost.
4. Utilize free resources
Many BSPs provide free WhatsApp Business API resources to help businesses get started with WhatsApp. These can include onboarding sessions, articles, guides, and extensive support documents to understand how the API works. So before you reach out to experts for paid assistance, explore the resources available to you.
Cost-Effective Strategies for WhatsApp Business API Implementation
If you want to keep the cost of using the WhatsApp Business API in complete control:
1. Segment your audience
Sending messages using the API involves costs per message. We recommend segmenting your audience based on their previous interactions with your business and targeting only those who are more likely to make purchases. For example, loyal customers will make repeat purchases when targeted with recommendations, and cart abandoners will complete the purchase when offered a discount.
2. Automate frequently asked questions
Reduce the workload of your customer support team by automating FAQs. BSPs like Interakt offer a no-code chatbot builder that can help you create bots to answer queries like order status, return and refund policies, and initiating exchanges. This lets human agents focus on more complex issues.
3. Use rich media strategically
Including rich media like images, videos, and PDFs in your WhatsApp messages can help improve customer engagement. But it can also increase your data costs, so use them only when they add significant value to the message. We recommend using them for promoting limited-time offers, product demos, and user guides to start with.
4. Set up a seamless hand-off
Even when you have automations running, ensure you set up a hand-off process for human agents. The BSP should trigger the process as soon as a complex query gets identified, helping save on the back and forth of messages not yielding any results.
5. Make use of approved templates
WhatsApp Business API providers like Interakt come with pre-approved template messages. These messages are typically charged at a lower rate than free-form messages and can be used for transactional communication such as order confirmations, payment reminders, and delivery updates.
Tips for Maximizing ROI with WhatsApp Business API
Here are some ways in which you can maximize the ROI while setting up only the affordable ways to use the WhatsApp Business API:
1. Create multi-purpose campaigns
When possible, combine multiple objectives in a single message.
For example, you can include a promotional offer alongside an order confirmation notification. This can help reduce the number of messages you send, while increasing the value of every message to the customer.
2. Include WhatsApp in your omnichannel strategy
Instead of using the channel in siloes, make WhatsApp a part of your omnichannel strategy. This can help save costs by distributing communication across multiple customer touchpoints. For example, using WhatsApp to offer real-time customer support, and using emails for detailed follow-ups.
3. Run targeted drip campaigns
Instead of mass-messaging or bulk messages with WhatsApp, segment your audience to create drip campaigns. This helps you focus on only high-impact interactions and personalize the campaigns for better engagement and conversions.
4. Monitor and optimize regularly
Whether they’re one-time campaigns or daily-use automations, track metrics like message delivery rates, response times, resolution rates and engagement. This helps identify underperforming campaigns and workflows where costs can be reduced to optimize the overall strategy for better resource management.
Conclusion
To make using the WhatsApp Business API cost-effective, you need to strategically put its features to work.
The only way to make the most of every capability is to use a BSP like Interakt that offers an intuitive interface to set up campaigns, automations and more so you can scale on WhatsApp with ease.
