How to set up WhatsApp Business for better customer service: a practical guide for small businesses

Before you start: the app, not the Business Platform

WhatsApp has two business products. The WhatsApp Business app is a free app on your phone, just like regular WhatsApp. The WhatsApp Business Platform is meant for connecting to software and runs through a provider. This guide is only about the app.

Are you currently using regular WhatsApp on the business number? Then you can move that account, including its chat history, to WhatsApp Business. Make a backup first: the chats do not move back if you stop later.

Have these ready beforehand: your business hours, address, a short description and the questions you get most often. Automatic messages are only sent when the phone is online.

Step 1: Fill out your business profile completely

The profile is the first thing a customer sees when they tap your name. A complete profile answers the simplest questions before anyone asks them: where you are, when you are open and what exactly you do. You will find it under Settings (tap your business name) or under Tools.

1. Fill in every field

   Don't leave any field empty that a customer might ask about, and use your logo or a clear photo of the business as your profile picture.

2. Get your business hours right

   You also need them for step 3: the away message can then be sent automatically outside these hours.

3. Check it as a customer

   Ask someone to open your profile from another number and tell you what is missing.

Step 2: A greeting message that helps the customer along

The greeting message goes automatically to anyone who writes to you for the first time, or after 14 days without contact in that chat. It is a first welcome: it asks right away for what you need and says honestly when a reply will come.

1. Turn it on

   Under Tools, choose Greeting message and turn on sending.

2. Write the text and choose the recipients

   Use the script below, in three to five sentences. You will usually choose everyone as recipients; you can also leave out people in your address book.

3. Test it

   Send a message from a number that has never written to you, and see what the customer sees.

Step 3: An away message for outside business hours

The away message goes to anyone who writes to you while you are unavailable. You turn it on under Tools and choose when it applies: always, on a custom schedule, or outside the business hours in your profile (that option only appears once you have filled in your business hours). Here too, you choose the recipients.

Use “Outside of business hours” for every day, and a custom schedule for a holiday, a vacation closure or the lunch break. Set the schedule back afterward.

Step 4: Quick replies for questions that keep coming back

With quick replies you save texts you send often. In a chat you type a forward slash (/) and choose the right reply. That way every customer gets the same, correct answer, whoever is answering the phone.

1. Choose the questions

   Start with the five to ten questions that come up most often in your chats.

2. Write one reply per question

   Short and friendly, and end with a question or next step, so the conversation keeps going.

3. Save them with a shortcut

   Under Tools, choose Quick replies (the name can differ by version) and use short shortcuts such as /address that the whole team can remember.

4. Review them every month

   Prices and times change. Make one person responsible for this.

Step 5: Use labels as a task list

With labels you give a chat a name and a color, and you can then filter by it. You usually do this by pressing and holding the chat. Use labels for the status of a conversation, so you can see at a glance what still needs to be done.

• Every chat has exactly one status label. Remove the old one when you add a new one.
• Whoever takes a chat off “New request” owns that conversation until it is resolved or has clearly been handed over.
• A complaint also gets a label of its own, so the business owner always sees it.

Step 6: Agree on who answers messages

If the business phone is lying around “somewhere” in the shop, nobody feels responsible. So for each part of the day, write down who answers the messages and who covers for them.

Choose a response time yourself that fits your business and staffing, for example “within an hour during business hours.” That is an example, not a standard. Put the same time in your greeting message and check for a week whether you meet it. If coworkers use the same number through WhatsApp Web, the labels decide who has which chat.

Step 7: Wrap up each day with a ten-minute check

A set check just before closing time keeps today's messages from being forgotten by tomorrow.

1. Filter by “New request”

   Every chat here gets a reply today, or an honest message that you will get back to them tomorrow.

2. Filter by “Action needed”

   For each chat, put the next action, and who does it tomorrow, in your follow-up list or calendar.

3. Look for chats without a label

   Nobody has picked these up. Give them a label now.

4. Go through “Waiting for information”

   Has a chat had this label for longer than your follow-up period (for example two business days)? Move it to “Resolved” or send one friendly reminder.

5. Check the away message

   Is it on for tonight, and is the schedule right if tomorrow is a holiday?

Also note the number of new and open chats. You set up a weekly measurement of these in lesson 5 of the course.

Example: a salon in Zorg en Hoop

Consent and privacy

WhatsApp's business policy requires that someone has given you their number and agreed to receive messages from you, and that you respect every request to stop. Customers can block or report you; WhatsApp can then limit your messages or block your account.

• Don't send unsolicited advertising to numbers you found somewhere or bought.
• Ask a customer whether they want to receive offers before you send them, and stop immediately if they ask you to.
• Never ask for card details, passwords or codes in the chat, and don't ask for medical information unless it is necessary.
• Protect the business phone with a passcode, and unlink the devices of employees who leave.

Checklist

• Business profile complete, with business hours and address.
• Greeting message on, with a response time you actually meet.
• Away message on for outside business hours, tested from another number.
• Five to ten quick replies with logical shortcuts.
• Five status labels (or lists): one status label per chat.
• A schedule: who answers when, and who covers.
• A ten-minute end-of-day check on the calendar.

Continue with the lesson and the download

This guide goes with lesson 3 of the free course, where you also connect WhatsApp to your phone process and follow-up list. You can download ready-made quick replies and the label system below.

Do you also miss phone calls when it gets busy? Then read how to set up a simple callback system.

Does most of the work go into the same questions over and over? Bits Please can set up Claudia to answer suitable, recurring WhatsApp questions and record requests, depending on the package. Everything in this guide also works without it.

Frequently asked questions