6 ms·

Building for People, and Now Businesses

45 points by doppp 9y ago

Maarten88 9y ago
Finally! The information they give is not much, however. They'll run a closed pilot. They are building a free business tool. Will there be an API? Will it be possible to develop bots? Will WhatsApp get features like cards, custom keyboards, payments, etc? Undoubtedly it'll cost money eventually, right? Will it be aimed at big companies or smaller ones too?
- sgt 9y ago
  I'm pretty sure there must be an API. Businesses want to respond with a text immediately and provide a way for people to interact with the company even outside business hours. What would be cool is a way for the app to hand over control to a manual WhatsApp user (i.e. the employee) if necessary and continue the conversation there.
hypfer 9y ago
Just use Telegram.
- Maarten88 9y ago
  I do, but nobody else around me does. I know other countries are different, but in most of the EU WhatsApp is the standard messaging app, everyone uses it. WhatsApp's success here singlehandedly makes it impossible to introduce WeChat-style commercial applications or Telegram-style bots.
- Jamieee 9y ago
  Or if you're security conscious[1] use Signal. [1] - https://www.eff.org/node/82654 https://www.eff.org/node/82654
  - wruza 9y ago
    At the time we looked for really secure messaging and voice calls, Signal did show very poor voice quality even over wifi in our country. While the choice of secure communication should be based on mentioned features, it must also be usable at least (and have decent interface for regular chats/groups). So it depends. Telegram implemented voice calls pretty good, i.e. one can speak and be heard on daily basis. I don't know if things got better with Signal, would be nice to hear the feedback from various regular users. Correct me if i'm wrong, but there was also no incidents of secret chat leaking from the beginning, so trusting one push-provider over the other by just EFF preferences seems like a nonsense to me.
gardnr 9y ago
> a verified profile so people can identify a business They seem really keen to verify identities of end users as well. Why does WhatsApp need access to your contact list for you to start a new conversation when you can just type the number in?
ap46 9y ago
And the oops-I-did-it spam begins.
- spiderfarmer 9y ago
  It's opt-in.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
jmknoll 9y ago
Very interesting. WeChat has been doing official business accounts for a couple of years - I'm interested to see if WhatsApp takes these in a similar direction. Official WeChat accounts have become the primary way that small businesses in China keep in touch with their customers, and a very significant source of revenue, for online and offline sales, through WeChat Pay. Especially considering the extensive use of WhatsApp in less-developed markets like India, Indonesia, and Brazil, Facebook could be putting themselves into a very strong position as an enabler of commerce in these markets. Could we possibly even be looking at Facebook Pay if these business accounts take off? Info about official WeChat accounts -https://walkthechat.com/wechat-official-account-simple-guide/ https://walkthechat.com/wechat-official-account-simple-guide...
- soneca 9y ago
  In Brazil, companies of all sizes already use Whatsapp for Customer Support, as it is by far the most effective channel to communicate with current customers. Companies buy cellphones that stay in the office with sole purpose of using Whatsapp with customers.

45 points by doppp 9y ago

Finally! The information they give is not much, however. They'll run a closed pilot. They are building a free business tool. Will there be an API? Will it be possible to develop bots? Will WhatsApp get features like cards, custom keyboards, payments, etc? Undoubtedly it'll cost money eventually, right? Will it be aimed at big companies or smaller ones too?

sgt 9y ago
I'm pretty sure there must be an API. Businesses want to respond with a text immediately and provide a way for people to interact with the company even outside business hours. What would be cool is a way for the app to hand over control to a manual WhatsApp user (i.e. the employee) if necessary and continue the conversation there.

hypfer 9y ago

Just use Telegram.

Maarten88 9y ago
I do, but nobody else around me does. I know other countries are different, but in most of the EU WhatsApp is the standard messaging app, everyone uses it. WhatsApp's success here singlehandedly makes it impossible to introduce WeChat-style commercial applications or Telegram-style bots.
Jamieee 9y ago
Or if you're security conscious[1] use Signal. [1] - https://www.eff.org/node/82654 https://www.eff.org/node/82654
- wruza 9y ago
  At the time we looked for really secure messaging and voice calls, Signal did show very poor voice quality even over wifi in our country. While the choice of secure communication should be based on mentioned features, it must also be usable at least (and have decent interface for regular chats/groups). So it depends. Telegram implemented voice calls pretty good, i.e. one can speak and be heard on daily basis. I don't know if things got better with Signal, would be nice to hear the feedback from various regular users. Correct me if i'm wrong, but there was also no incidents of secret chat leaking from the beginning, so trusting one push-provider over the other by just EFF preferences seems like a nonsense to me.

gardnr 9y ago

> a verified profile so people can identify a business They seem really keen to verify identities of end users as well. Why does WhatsApp need access to your contact list for you to start a new conversation when you can just type the number in?

ap46 9y ago

And the oops-I-did-it spam begins.

spiderfarmer 9y ago
It's opt-in.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

jmknoll 9y ago

Very interesting. WeChat has been doing official business accounts for a couple of years - I'm interested to see if WhatsApp takes these in a similar direction. Official WeChat accounts have become the primary way that small businesses in China keep in touch with their customers, and a very significant source of revenue, for online and offline sales, through WeChat Pay. Especially considering the extensive use of WhatsApp in less-developed markets like India, Indonesia, and Brazil, Facebook could be putting themselves into a very strong position as an enabler of commerce in these markets. Could we possibly even be looking at Facebook Pay if these business accounts take off? Info about official WeChat accounts -https://walkthechat.com/wechat-official-account-simple-guide/ https://walkthechat.com/wechat-official-account-simple-guide...

soneca 9y ago
In Brazil, companies of all sizes already use Whatsapp for Customer Support, as it is by far the most effective channel to communicate with current customers. Companies buy cellphones that stay in the office with sole purpose of using Whatsapp with customers.