At the onset of 2020, WhatsApp announced having over 2 Billion Users.

On average, a person spends 23 minutes of their day on this messaging platform.

There are 3M WhatsApp Business Accounts already.



Read those 3 stats again. Are you where your customers are?

Back in the 90’s enterprises were moving into an era of digitization. They were moving from offline communication to online communication. They moved from paper trails to emails. From Excel macros to ERPs. From 9 to 5 to all the time working.

And somewhere in between this scale-up, age-old methods of connecting became too cumbersome. Rather than going where the people were, these systems and processes demanded they come to specific platforms.

Enter WhatsApp. 2009 changed the way we’d converse with one another, forever.

With the rise of smartphone sales and data becoming more and more accessible, WhatsApp became the favorite platform of communication for both, business and pleasure. The company, WhatsApp, took until early 2018 to launch a formal way for businesses to be present on WhatsApp, a.k.a WhatsApp Business. Today, more than 3 million enterprise customers are connecting with employees and customers on WhatsApp, simply to be where they are.



But just getting a verified business account is not enough. You get your business on WhatsApp, get a blue tick as a stamp of trust. And then what? Next up, a company needs to be prepared to manage the flood of conversations the platform can ignite with its customers. And to manage that, conversational AI Digital Assistants on WhatsApp come in handy.

It’s rare, but not too far from a mass reality when we’ll see WhatsApp Virtual Assistants which could come in handy to solve for a variety of business communication needs.

WhatsApp Digital Assistants = WhatsApp on Steroids

Well not literally, but almost. Imagine a scenario wherein a conversation is occurring between your customers and enterprise. Now imagine that happening seamlessly and automatically on WhatsApp. You’re able to share images, send rich media, links, and in the very near future, even accept payments. Smooth, right? Here are some of the low-hanging use-cases your enterprise can adopt today:



Notifications:

Have business-critical messages to be sent? Get a higher delivery rate than SMS and Email combined. And what’s better than getting your business objectives met. Whether it’s about a payment reminder or a service close message, it’s better served on WhatsApp to ensure timely action from the customer(s).



Customer Engagement:

Whether it’s about engaging with customers through a quiz or launching your traditional TVC on WhatsApp; a marketer’s world is the possibility. The best part about engaging with your customers on WhatsApp is that it’s completely on-demand. Your customer doesn’t have to go too far or take too many steps to be connected with you. Perhaps that is why it’s working like a charm for brands like Xiaomi and more.



Customer Support:



Customers world over are preferring to chat with a virtual assistant to get their queries resolved faster. Zero waiting. Zero explaining. 100% customer satisfaction.

With query resolution happening right on WhatsApp, customers are able to skip the headache of ticketing, long wait times… and whatnot. And good customer service leads to excellent customer retention which leads to recurring revenue. And who doesn’t want that?

Employee Engagement:

Many contemporary organizations are today onboarding and connecting with soon to become employees on WhatsApp. There’s a lot that can be automated on WhatsApp through a Digital Assistant – from accepting KYC documents, sharing videos on corporate culture, sharing holiday policy, getting reference checks…

