Table of Contents
Using WhatsApp Business, you can streamline communication, sales, and automation for your small business.
In this WhatsApp Business tutorial, we’re going to guide you through the step-by-step process of how to use WhatsApp for business.
Why Use WhatsApp for Business?
The WhatsApp messaging platform allows business owners to directly interact with their customers in a safe and secure manner.
Unlike SMS, WhatsApp for business ensures that your messages are not only delivered on time but are also encrypted.
You can even tell whether the customer/client has received the message given that they have turned the “Read receipts” option on.
Moreover, your sales and marketing team can answer all product-related queries using rich, contextual, and premade messages.
With the increasing use of mobile devices for consumers shopping online, the use of WhatsApp for business-related activities has amplified.
How to Use WhatsApp for Business?
Let’s begin with our WhatsApp Business tutorial:
1. Getting Started
In the first step, you need to download the WhatsApp Business app from your app store.
Once the app is installed, open it and click ‘Agree and continue’.
You now have the option to use your current phone number or a different one (We recommend using a different number for business-only activities with WhatsApp Business).
Allow access to various permissions including contacts once you enter your number.
The WhatsApp Business app will take a few moments to update your contacts and transfer your information over to your app.
You can now head over to your business profile.
2. Setting Up Your WhatsApp Business Profile
After the first step is complete, enter your business name (or your name if it represents your business), change your profile picture (ideally your business logo), and then pick a business category.
For this WhatsApp business tutorial for beginners, we’ll pick ‘Marketing Agency’.
Now, add your business description and click ‘Next’. When you see ‘Explore business tools’, click ‘Not Now.
Your initial setup is now complete.
3. Navigating the WhatsApp Business App
While navigating through WhatsApp for business, you’ll realize how similar it is to the normal WhatsApp application.
As you can see, we’ve got ‘Chats’, ‘Status’ (where you can update your business status about what’s going on with your business/product/service and update your potential customers by adding text/images), and ‘Calls’.
The only difference you’ll notice is the ‘Business tools’ (you can find it in the top-right corner). Click on it and this is where you can streamline your sales, communication, and automation.
4. Understanding the Business Tools
The first option you’ll find within the Business tools is the ‘Business Profile’.
This is where you can manage your address, websites, and opening hours. Below that, we have ‘Catalogue’ and this is where the magic happens.
You can add your products or services here and send those to your prospects, customers, or your other contacts on WhatsApp.
To add a product, click ‘Add Item’ and then enter the item name, price, description, link to your website (detailed product description page, for example), item code, and upload a picture of your product (or service).
Once you’ve completed all the information, click ‘Save’. You will be redirected to your catalogue manager where you can add more products and services.
On the top-right, you’ll find the product link that you can copy and send to your contacts.
When your customers click on the link, they’ll be able to see all the information.
———————————————————————————————————————————
Also, read: Best Video Editing Software
———————————————————————————————————————————
Messaging Tools
Head back to your ‘Business tools’ and this is where you will find the ‘Messaging tools’.
To leverage WhatsApp for business use, you can make use of the semi-automation that this platform has to offer.
For example, you can set up an ‘Away’ message on WhatsApp Business. This is an automatic reply that you can customize here.
Then you can set up an automated ‘Greeting’ message for new contacts reaching out to you on WhatsApp.
You can also automate ‘Quick replies’ for messages that are sent quite often. This saves you time from having to type the same message over and over again.
To create a new message, simply click the ‘+’ sign.
For example, if one of the most common questions you get is about the marketing packages, you can simply create a quick reply just for that.
Next, you need to add a shortcut (this whole answer is going to pop up when you message someone) and keywords.
This would help you generate the answer when you’re communicating with your contacts.
Now under ‘Messaging tools’, we also have ‘Labels’.
This is where you can identify and label the stage of your customer journey. Then under ‘Labels’ we have ‘Short link’.
This is the link to your WhatsApp Business profile that you can share with your potential and existing customers.
A quick reply can look something like this:
“Thank you for your business! We look forward to working with you again”.
Think about the most common questions your potential customers may have and create quick replies for those questions.
You can also turn on the ‘Message’ option which is basically an automated message that your potential customers can edit and send to you when they get in touch with you through WhatsApp Business.
5. Watching the Automation at Work
In this section, we’ll explain how this automation actually works. For that, first, we need to head over to ‘Chat’.
Slide into the messages of any of your contacts and type ‘/’. You will now be able to see the automated messages and quick replies that we created earlier.
Now by clicking ‘Label Chat’, you can label this customer as a new customer or any other label. The process is pretty straightforward and important for managing your customers.
WhatsApp Business Tutorial for Beginners (Video Tutorial)
WhatsApp for business is an incredible communication tool for enhanced customer engagement and communication for small businesses.
This wraps up our WhatsApp business tutorial for beginners. If you have any questions, feel free to pop those down below.
We also have a video tutorial that will walk you through how to use WhatsApp for Business.
Feel free to check that out below.
