Hacks to Apply for Meta's WhatsApp Cloud API

Here’s your step-by-step guide to apply, get, and set up Meta WhatsApp Cloud API for business communication and promotion 👉🏽

Have you ever received a message like this on WhatsApp?

If yes then it was sent using the official WhatsApp API.
And if you want to send similar messages with buttons to your audience, then continue reading

Table of Contents

What is WhatsApp Official API

It is a cloud-based solution provided by WhatsApp using which you can send broadcast messages like the one above and answer your customer’s questions using an automated chatbot or manual human support team

What are the Features of WhatsApp cloud API

You can send buttoned bulk broadcast messages, with attachments to thousands of people in one go.
Multiple support agents of your company can communicate from a single WhatsApp handle.
You can run 24×7 automated chatbots.
You can apply for the WhatsApp green tech verification for free.
You can message thousands of people without the fear of banning.
It’s super easy to use: if you follow the steps you can apply, get approved and start messaging within minutes.

Key Benefits of using WhatsApp’s Official Cloud API

Get close to 100% responses for all your marketing and transactional messages by using WhatsApp buttons.
Engage your customers and provide 24×7 instant, automatics support on their favorite channel (WhatsApp).
Automatically answer common user queries with trigger-based auto-responses and chatbot.
When you send a particular read the first message, easily give him an option to unsubscribe, so he can opt-out if he’s not interested.
Easily create and maintain a WhatsApp subscriber list, and automatically remove the people who unsubscribe so that they never get included in any future WhatsApp broadcast messaging list
Provide multi-agent WhatsApp support on a single WhatsApp number.
Get your entire sales and support team’s WhatsApp communication history on a single dashboard.

Who is eligible for WhatsApp Cloud API

Any business with

A website
A Facebook page
And A registered business entity

is eligible for the official WhatsApp API

Note: you can apply and get started with a limited version of the WhatsApp cloud API even without these things but you really scale it up to the next level you will need these things in place

How to apply/get started with WhatsApp Cloud API

Here’s the step-by-step process for signing up for a WhatsApp cloud API account.

Open developers.facebook.com.
Go to My Apps and click on Create App.
Select app type as business and click next.
Fill out the details and click create app.
Select WhatsApp from add products.
Now scroll down and click on the add phone number.
Fill out the details about the WhatsApp business account (this is what will be visible to the users).
Enter a phone number and verify with OTP (you can only use a number that is not already in use on any other WhatsApp).

Once you do this, your number is registered with WhatsApp Cloud API and ready to send messages

The next step is to connect your WhatsApp Cloud API with TeleCRM to Start messaging. Watch this video to see how you can do that

Before you actually send the messages you can check the details of the different messaging teachers and how WhatsApp monitors tiers quality rating of your account. and the actual process of sending bulk WhatsApp messages.

What are the charges of WhatsApp Official Cloud API

There is no one-time setup or hosting charge. Plus at TeleCRM we don’t levy any power message charge either.

But WhatsApp charges you a specific amount for every conversation!

Understanding WhatsApp API’s charging system

UIC & BIC

UIC (User Initiated conversation): it is any conversation between the user and your WhatsApp API number that is initiated by the user i.e. where the first message is sent by the user to the business.

BIC (Business Initiated conversation): it is any conversation between our user and your WhatsApp API number that is initiated by the business i.e. where the Business sends the first message to the user.

What is a conversation according to WhatsApp’s cloud API charging system

When you send a message to a particular number it starts a conversation. The conversation gives you a 24-hour window. Any message sent or received during the 24 hours is considered to be part of that single conversation. You will not be charged any additional amount for those messages.

But if you send another message after the 24-hour window expires then it is considered as starting another conversation. This gives you another 24-hour window.

WhatsApp’s actual charges in India

UIC: Rs 0.55/ conversation.

BIC: Rs 0.35/ conversation.

Check WhatsApp UIC and BIC pricing for other countries

5 most important hacks to quickly get approved

1. The business should have a website

It’s not absolutely compulsory to have a website. But if you have one you will get approved for WhatsApp cloud API very quickly

2. Verify your Facebook Business account

Without business verification, you get a maximum of 5 numbers and a daily messaging limit of 1000 messages per number per day.

But after verifying your business you can send up to 100,000 messages or higher from 25 numbers in one go.

Check the steps for business verification on Facebook

3. Guidelines around your WhatsApp handle/display name

It should be the same as the name you have on your website and Facebook page
It should not violate WhatsApp Commerce and Business policies.
It must have a clear relationship with the business.
It must contain a minimum of 3 characters.
It may not be in URL format. Ex- telecrm.in
Do not change the spacing from the spacing used in your business name.
Ex- TeleCRM – Correct, Tele CRM – Wrong

4. Should be a new number

Don’t use a number that you have already used on WhatsApp or WhatsApp business. This delays the approval process.

5. Carefully and correctly enter the basic details

When you sign up for the Official WhatsApp cloud API, WhatsApp will ask you for 4 basic details

WhatsApp display name
Business website
Country
Business type

As long as you have a Live verifiable business website with the same name as your WhatsApp display name. your application for WhatsApp cloud API will be approved quickly.

Limitations of WhatsApp cloud API

Once upgraded to API, can’t use any other Whatsapp application on the chosen number
First, you have to signup and get verified on Facebook to use WhatsApp Cloud API
Every message template that you use to initiate conversations has to be pre-approved by Facebook.
WhatsApp does not provide a direct interface for this and you have to rely on tools like TeleCRM for sending messages through the official API

Benefits of using TeleCRM with WhatsApp Cloud API

Capture all your leads from different platforms and send them an automatic welcome message on WhatsApp.
Give your audience an option to unsubscribe and automatically remove the unsubscribed audience from any messaging list.
Easily check sent delivered and read statuses after sending messages.
Automatically capture their responses and segregate the leads based on their responses.
Easily run WhatsApp retargeting campaigns for all the people who reply with ‘interested’.
Run a WhatsApp chatbot, to provide 24 seven customer support and automatically answer common queries.

All this, with no additional per-message cost (other than what Facebook charges you directly)

Conclusion

This article gives you a quick preview of all the things that you can do with the official WhatsApp cloud API, how to sign up and how to start using it, what are the charges that you have to pay, and a few of the capabilities that you can have by integrating WhatsApp cloud API with TeleCRM.

If you need further assistance with setting up cloud API, just sign up for a free account on TeleCRM and we will help you out