Every marketer is up for reaching new customers, building better communication channels. The reason can be to have another channel where you can have meaningful conversations. Or to have another channel where you can contact stranger is masses, deliver a bunch of cold content and see what sticks. This tutorial won’t be useful in the second case, but you can benefit from it if you belong to the first group.
Whatsapp business has been around since beginning of 2022, giving you the option to communicate with your clients through this cost effective channel. But long before that there were integrators, who connected Whatsapp Web to an API enabling you to communicate through they interface with your clients.
This channel should be in no way used for mass communication, but perfect for delivering meaningful messages directly into the Whatsapp inbox of others. And the cost is: peanuts.
Should you go with a Whatsapp Business Account or use the Web based integration? What are the pros and cons?
| Whatsapp Web | Whatsapp Business | |
| Cost | Small flat fee | 1000 conversation free, then sms like pricing |
| Verification process | No verification | Strict vetting process |
| Integration with Mautic | Whatsupp plugin | Through Twilio |
| Challenge | Monthly need to rescan QR | There is no official plugin (2022.06.) |
| Channel | Replaces SMS | ? |
| Delivery quality | 90%+ according to my tests | ? |
| Message templating | Free | Approved business templates |
Going into details:
Cost
In the Whatsapp plugin I’m connecting to a service called Wo-Wa. They charge me USD 14 every month and I can send as many messages I want. This cost would be probably above the Whatsapp business account pricing based on the low number of messages I’m sending, but a client of mine uses it for order confirmation, delivery dispatch information and other customer service. They need to send multiple messages to each client during the life cycle of each order, and this turned out to be the best way. (Order confirmation, dispatch info, delivery person arrival, invoice, feedback) Weekly 150 customer x 5 message x 4 = monthly 3000 messages. This would cost around 150 EUR / month with Twilio.
Verification Process
Each Whatsapp Business account owner has to go through a verification process, as Whatsapp also would like to protect the service and not to have spam in they system. The process is couple of steps, and honest sender can be approved, but it still takes time.
If you send through Wo-Wa, you don’t need any special process, just register, scan your QR code, and you are ready to go. Certainly, you’ll need to rescan your code from time to time, but if you are using the service frequently, then it happens only once in couple of month.
Integration with Mautic
I’ve seen some posts about Twilio’s Whatsapp Business integration with Mautic but most of them are webhook based, and require you to do some hacks.
With the Whatsapp plugin, you only need to add credentials you get from Wo-wa, and ready to go.
Challenge
The Whatsapp business account integration with Twilio supposed to just work out of the box, but like I said, I haven’t seen any well documented solution yet, just workarounds and hacks. With a Whatsapp Web integrator you only need to make sure your QR code is regularly scanned. If you keep messaging people your Whatsapp Webb will never log out, so you don’t even need to rescan it for months.
It’s up to you if you choose one pain over the other.
Channel
Since there is no real Whatsapp Business plugin with Mautic there is no point to discuss which channel is it replacing. If you are hacking your Twilio account together with Whatsapp Business, then probably it replaces the SMS channel. It means you can’t send SMS, just Whatsapp messages.
It is the same case with the Whatsapp Plugin. You will send Whatsapp messages, but Mautic will still say “Text message” or “SMS”. The plugin just diverts the SMS channel to Whatsapp. In the near future there will be a solution where a new channel is created, so you’ll be able to keep sending SMS and Whatsapp on different channels.
Delivery Quality
Like I said before, I expect to get 100% delivery over Whatsapp Business, but I have no experience with it, so I can’t tell you how good deliverability is. My tests with Whatsapp Web are very very good, over 90% of the messages are getting delivered to the clients. I’m not sending any spam of course, and they especially expect my messages.
Message Templating
You can send your individualised messages with Whatsapp without restrictions. At the same time they they try to regulate the content businesses send, and similarly to a Facebook ad, you’ll need to submit the templates you are using for mass messages. This can be a major dealbreaker for many, because we don’t want to wait, get refused by someone who has 25 seconds to decide if our text is according to the rules or not. But again, this might be the way to go for many, especially if you plan to deliver cold messages.
With Whatsapp Web it’s different you can use any text you like, with some restrictions. This is the official rule set for Wo-wa for example:
- Connect WhatsApp numbers which already >30 days old or has been used as human normal activities such as reply chats, save contact, join group, send photos, scan qr code on personal desktop Whatsapp, fill in profile details, and other types of activities in WhatsApp chat application,
- Avoid sending spam messages or mass messages or blasters that are not desired by the recipient,
- Make informed consent or request permission to the recipient of the message who state that they are willing to be sent messages via WhatsApp,
- Avoid sending messages in more than 500 messages/hour,
- Avoid sending messages with words or sentences that are 100% identical to >20 numbers in same time.
So what can you send? You can send really cool personalised messages like:
- Abandoned cart reminders
- Reactivation of non-active visitors
- Personalised offers
- Special content relevant to a specific user
Make your choice
So Whatsapp business or Whatsapp web?
If you are a business, that relies on cold messages or has fewer them 50 / day interactions to different numbers, and you can hack your Twilio account to Mautic I suggest to use Whatsapp Business.
If you want to start to send Whatsapp messages right away, you are okay with rescanning your QR code from time to time, I would go with the Whatsapp Web solution.
Get your Mautic plugin now – it’s free
The plugin is super-easy to install:
1. Download from Github
https://github.com/jos0405/mautic-whatsapp
2. Unzip in your plugins folder and make sure the folder name is MauticWhatsappBundle
3. Make sure you reload your plugins (mind using the right user / permissions)
php bin/console mautic:plugins:reload4. Get your credentials, register an account on Wo-Wa. I use the 14 USD / month subscription.
5. Add your domain, phone number.
6. Scan your QR (just like any WhatsApp web app) + get your API Key:
7. Go to your settings and publish the plugin:
8. Publish the plugin and add your key
9. Choose Whatsapp as SMS channel in your Configuration – Text message settings:
10. Send a regular SMS (Which will arrive as Whatsapp message from your phone number.)
Next steps
As you can see, this is just a starting point for adding Whatsapp to your Mautic communication channels. I’d like to create a new channel, and make sure this plugin doesn’t overwrite the SMS channel. I’d also like to add image upload capabilities and incoming message reading.
Plz forgive me for any bugs, it’s a work in progress, but as you subscribed to my news I figured you’ll be happy to be the first ones using this plugin.
Any comment, contribution are appreciated.
Luis Méndez Alejo
says:
Hi Joey,
Thanks for sharing this integration, by the way, much sought after by many Mautic users and automation marketing implementers.
Regards!
jos0405
says:
You are welcome. I hope people will pick it up and delevlop it further.
Stay tuned for more awesome stuff!
miamiman
says:
Looks great Joey. One question.
The Whatsapp Plugin works only via Woo-wa works with Whatsapp web? not work with Whatsapp Business via Twilio, correct?
jos0405
says:
Hi, only wo-wa.
It’s on purpose doesn’t work with Twilio. It’s a different business model, different rules. I’m sure you can find a plugin for that.
Renato Carabelli
says:
I am using Zender to solve that. Not using a plugin for it but doing it with webhooks directly in the message.
Zender is a script I bought at CodeCanyon: https://codecanyon.net/item/zender-android-mobile-devices-as-sms-gateway-saas-platform/26594230
Screenshot of how I use it
https://snipboard.io/Lsehmf.jpg
I was trying to find someone to do the Plugin but haven’t been successful so far.
BTW, I am only a user of that system, have no affiliation at all. Probably you will find it useful as I did.
Of course you can’t send too much because numbers get blocked for SPAM but for notifications, answers or a few hundred messages a day is great and cheap. Also you don’t need to configure those WhatsApp templates in advance.
I am currently testing your plugin, is great. Thanks! Both things seem great to work together.
Olanrewaju Okunola
says:
Hi Renato,
I would like you to give me more details on how this script works and the functionality. Especially how the SMS gateway works. I am willing to pay a token for your consultancy if need be
Renato
says:
I just can help you, don’t know if Joey approves that I exchange my email with you through here.
miamiman
says:
Just to report back.
We’ve used the plug-in for two different event campaigns and it’s worked well.
It’s important to make sure the phone # is synced via Woo-wa. On our first go around, we lost the sync (and hence no message sent), but this week the Woo-wa has remained synced for an entire week.
Still testing to measure response between Twilio SMS and Woo-wa but it’s great to have the option.
Congratulations and thank you.
jos0405
says:
Thank you so much for your feedback! I’m happy the plugin is useful for you. I’m also experiencing synch issues, maybe another provider is better then Wo-wa. Not sure. I think this plugin should be the basis of other plugins, and this is why I opensourced it.
Andy
says:
Hi, I understand this solution is intended to be used with woo-wa.com and not twilio. My question is:
Does the store owner has to exclusively use the normal whatsapp app in their phone?
Or this whole woo-wa/Joey’s/Mautic integration can be done from a smartphone running whatsapp business?
Thanks, great article btw!
jos0405
says:
Hi, Whatsapp for business is a different solution. You can already use Twilio with that. In the Mautic Forums you might find guidance for that business case as well. I’m also working on a Whatsapp Business connector.
Angel
says:
a super powerful tool if you combine it with whatsapp message automation https://www.autoresponder.ai/
jos0405
says:
Thank you for the suggestion.
Julio Roldós
says:
Hi Joey!
Many thanks for sharing this new alternative, that surely opens the eyes of a lot of Mautic users!
Twilio may be great for WhatsApp for Business, but it’s still pretty a high rate cost for begginers. With WoWa (and your great solution) we talk about half of the price, and we can test it and be able to give you feedback.
Congratulations!
Chirayu
says:
Thank you for showing this amazing way to send WhatsApp messages.
Like this, is there any way to connect mautic with “WhatsApp Business API” directly?
Thanks again!
Fabian Gonzalez
says:
Joey i need some help.
I followed all the instructions, but when running the command to update plugins
i get this response: 0 new plugins were installed and 0 updated.
I’m using mautic 4.4.4
any idea?
jos0405
says:
Hi,
I just installed it, it should be working.
Did you make sure the plugin has the same permissions / ownership as the rest of the folders?
Paulo
says:
Hi! Can you solve this problem? I have same situation. All permission are Ok, CRON job is OK, but don’t show plugin to install in Dash
Paulo
says:
For everyone’s information: I managed to solve it after deleting the cache via File Manager. Tks!
jos0405
says:
Hi, thanks for the feedback. Yes, you should ALWAYS refresh your cache after installing a plugin.
Fabián González
says:
Hi Joey! thanks for the reply.
Still couldn’t make it work.
the same response 0 new plugins were installed and 0 updated.
I already check the permission and ownership of the folders, they are the same.
chown diffacad -v MauticWhatsappBundle
ownership of ‘MauticWhatsappBundle’ retained as diffacad
Any other idea…
jos0405
says:
I think this can be solved by clearing the cache?
Fabián González
says:
Yes it worked!!!! Clearing the cache from the VAR folder in the Mautic installation does the trick!! Finally i will have the chance to test it!
Tobias
says:
Hello,
my colleague who left the company installed WhatsApp on Mautic 4.something. Unfortunately I crashed mautic by updating on Mautic 5. I managed to make a new Mautic installation and unziped the Plugin in the Plugin folder. I cleared the cache, but the plugin doesn’t show up.
Now I am wondering, if the plugin is actually working on Mautic 5, because I am wondering why it doesn’t show up.
For me there are two options:
a) i din’t clear the cache right
b) the plugin doesn’t work on Mautic 5
How would you usually clear the cache?
I did with command line mautic:cache:clear and with deleting mautic/var/cache.. but last always caused problems, so I am just wondering.
Thank you and best regards
Suresh
says:
I have used Mautic predominantly for Email Marketing, I have an existing localized WhatsApp Provider which is similar to woo-wa. Can we use that with your plugin through Mautic ?
jos0405
says:
Sure you can.
jos0405
says:
It would work yes.