WhatsApp is a hugely popular messaging app with over 1 billion active users. But did you know that you can use WhatsApp to create a chatbot? Chatbots are robots that simulate human conversation, and they’re used in a number of different contexts, including customer service, digital marketing, and even education. Are you looking for a way to automate customer support tasks, qualify leads or just want to add a little chatbot intelligence to your messaging app? You’re in the right place! In this blog post, we’ll explain the basics of WhatsApp Business, Cloud and Unofficial API gateway, along with the different providers available and why you need it to create a WhatsApp chatbot.
What is a chatbot?
Chatbot technology has been around for a while now, and its popularity is only growing because business are getting more inquiries online, and they needed to automate many of the commonly asked questions. Chatbots are a computer program that can imitate human conversation, and they are used in a variety of industries – from customer service to marketing. They are versatile tools that can be used for many purposes, so learn more about them today!
What are the benefits of using a WhatsApp bot?
The benefits of WhatsApp chatbot are limitless. Even today, creative marketers are finding new ways to maximise the value and use cases of chatbots. Here are some of the most common advantages of chatbots:
- Automate customer support
- Pre-qualifying leads
- Lead generation
- Segment audience
- Improve customer experience by allow them to interact with your business through their favourite mobile messaging platform
- Collect customer feedback
- Handle internal helpdesk support
- Order confirmation and track shipping status
- Handle refunds and exchange requests
- Nurture leads
- Appointment bookings
- Place e-commerce orders online
- Deliver content
- Product recommendations
- Promotions
- Human resource and hiring
- Reminders
- Food ordering
- Collecting customer reviews
Some Amazon or other marketplace sellers have even utilise chatbots for product launches and real estate agents show casing their properties available. The main idea of chatbots are to get customer’s attention and have them follow a guided set of instructions.
What is the cost of a WhatsApp chatbot?
Every different chatbot service offer a different pricing and on top of that, there is also the cost of using the WhatsApp API. For the cost of WhatsApp Cloud or Business API, it depends on where the user is located, as well as if the conversion is started by the business or the user. As for Unofficial WhatsApp API Gateway, the cost is usually a fixed monthly pricing for a limited or unlimited number of messages sent. Here at WaRespond, we include the WhatsApp API Gateway as well as all the features you require such as chatbot platform, bulk sending, autoresponder, file hosting and more with our starter plan at only $20/mth.
What is Official WhatsApp Business/Cloud API & Unofficial API Gateway?
The main differences of the Official WhatsApp Business or Cloud API & the Unofficial API Gateway would be that the official API requires a new number registered for a business account, does not allow sending of unapproved messages after 24 hours. Unofficial API allows a lot more flexibility in terms of your messaging since there is no approval required for new messages and works with your current phone number whether it is a WhatsApp personal or business account. As of today, the current unofficial WhatsApp API does not support list messages with images but otherwise the features of both official and unofficial APIs are almost similar, with unofficial API allowing more flexibility and freedom in messaging your customers through chatbots and automations. Hence here at WaRespond, we choose to offer the unofficial API gateway.
What are the different WhatsApp Business & Unofficial API Providers?
To get access to WhatsApp Business API also known as On-Premise API, you would need to reach out to official third-party providers known as Business Solution Provider(BSP). Some of the most popular BSPs include WATI.io, Dialog360 & Twilio. However, with the release of WhatsApp Cloud API, you can now access official WhatsApp API with Meta directly. As for Unofficial API Providers, there are providers such as Maytapi and Wassenger but if you really want a full suite WhatsApp solution, WaRespond is the best choice.
How to create a WhatsApp chatbot in WaRespond?
WaRespond’s chatbot is simple and easy to use with the ability to jump in to the live chat and take over the conversation. Our chatbot is triggered on keywords in the customer’s message and we highly recommend you to use button messages or list messages to make sure your user follows the chatbot flow.
Step 1: Plan out the chatbot conversation
Before you start creating a chatbot, the first thing to do is to map out an entire conversation and where it can lead to. Chatbot conversations are a series of questions and templated answers. For example, if a customer sends you a message, you may start the conversation with,
“Hi, thanks for reaching out to us. How can I help you today?”
Your answer choices or button replies can be:
- Sales
- Customer Support
- Others
And then if your customer selects “Customer Support”, you can follow up with
“What is your query about?”
With the choices:
- Shipping
- Billing
- Refund or Exchange
This should give you an idea how to start planning out your entire chatbot conversational flow.
Step 2: Connect your WhatsApp account with WaRespond
You need an account with WaRespond to utilise our chatbot solution. You can create a free trial account and make sure to activate your account by clicking on the activation link in your email after registration.
Once you have access your WaRespond account, go to WhatsApp and click on the “+” button to connect your WhatsApp number to WaRespond.
Login to your WhatsApp mobile app, go to Settings then Linked Devices.
If you have not joined Multi-Device Beta, be sure to join it by tapping on the Join Beta button.
Lastly, tap on the Link a Device button and Scan the QR code and connect your WhatsApp number to WaRespond.
Step 3: Create your Autoresponder message
Whenever you receive a message, you can create an auto reply to trigger the start of your chatbot. Click on autoresponder on the sidebar menu to configure your auto reply message. You may want to create button or list messages as your autoreplies.
Enable your autoresponder message, and choose whether to have the message trigger on both WhatsApp individual and group chats or either one. You can then upload a media to go with the message via the File manager or upload from your local drive. Next, enter your message. You can also make use of spintax in your message.
Here, you can set the interval before the autoresponder message triggers again and also exclude contacts from the autoresponder messages. Submit the message once you’re ready.
Step 4: Create your chatbot conversation
With the autoresponder message being setup, you can now set the chatbot messages based on replies to the autoresponder. Click on chatbot on the sidebar menu to configure your chatbot messages.
To create a new chatbot reply, click on + Add new. Similarly to how you setup the autoresponder, you can set up the same for the chatbot’s status as well as having the message trigger on individual or group chats or both.
Here you can set whether you want the message to be triggered whenever the keyword appears in messages you receive from the user, or when all the keywords appears. Then name the chatbot message, as well as enter the keywords to trigger the chatbot message.
Next, you can choose between a simple text, button or list message to send out. Then save the chatbot message when you’re ready.
Repeat the process until you complete the entire conversation and you will have successfully created your WhatsApp chatbot.
Conclusion
Since chatbots usually work when you receive a message, there is no difference at all between using the official or unofficial WhatsApp API. However, if you wish to utilise messaging via the chatbot or automation tools that extend to more than 24 hours, then unofficial WhatsApp API is the only solution.
There’s no doubt that chatbots are here to stay and are redefining how we interact with technology. Chatbots have come a long way in the past few years and are making waves in various industries. We believe that chatbots will play an even more important role in the future and are excited to see what innovations they will bring about. If you have any questions about chatbots or want to share your own experience, do leave a comment below. We would be curious to hear from you!
Start your free trial with WaRespond today and create your own WhatsApp chatbot.
