Boost Your eCommerce business: Selling on WhatsApp Store 

In the current time, WhatsApp has explored a lot in many areas other than its basic messaging feature. WhatsApp commerce has been a game-changer in the arena of online business i.e. e-commerce. WhatsApp is available as another channel for marketing.  

Now, you can sell your product or service as a business on the WhatsApp platform by opening a WhatsApp store, offering your products and services with description and pricing. 

In this Article, we are highlighting the insights of WhatsApp store. Let us start with knowing what WhatsApp Store is. 

What is WhatsApp Store? 

WhatsApp Store is a solution developed by WhatsApp to allow businesses to sell their products and services on the messaging platform. This involves allowing the business to set up WhatsApp catalog on WhatsApp Business with details, including prices, an add-to-cart function, and a way to accept payments for the orders placed via smart integrations using a WhatsApp Business API solution. 

Why You Need a WhatsApp Store? 

It’s a million dollars question for businesses planning to or having online businesses and going for WhatsApp commerce, must have a WhatsApp store. These are convincing proofs showing the potential of WhatsApp store. 

The genuine reasons for the same are as per given below: 

Key Benefits of WhatsApp Store

Let’s refer here the key benefits of setting up a WhatsApp Shop:

1. Enhance customer lifecycle conversion rate 

Leveraging WhatsApp to communicate with your customers boosts the sales cycle by permitting you to employ a single platform for acquiring, engaging, and converting leads. 

WhatsApp allows increased personalization, making strong, prompt and easily accessible customer interactions. That means, the complete journey from lead generation to a sale becomes seamlessly smooth. 

Customers can receive timely alerts on purchases, delivery ETAs and alerts about order status on WhatsApp apart from vital product information. 

Also, by refining the customer interactions quality, by doing sales on WhatsApp Shop, online businesses can strongly reduce negative feedback. It could otherwise hamper the brand’s reputation and spoil its online credibility. 

2. Reduce cart abandonment rate  

Shopping cart abandonment can be a main issue most online retail businesses face. This can be due to forgetfulness or indecisiveness on the customers’ side or due to competitors swaying off the customers.  

As per the statistics, the average cart abandonment rate is around 70%, making it one of the most critical bottlenecks for any business. 

WhatsApp Shop is an excellent opportunity for businesses to restrain high cart abandonment rates. With a wonderful offer message or setting up a cart abandonment reminder on WhatsApp, you can again reach out to customers and gently nudge them to return and complete the purchase. 

3. Build and improve customer loyalty 

WhatsApp creates more personal and meaningful customer communication, creating organic growth in your customer relationship.  

So, WhatsApp Shops can be a suitable medium to prepare and build a loyal customer base that can benefit your business in the long run. By carefully looking after your customers, you can develop devoted followers who are more likely to buy often and become promoters of your company. 

4. Create and utilize upselling and cross-selling opportunities 

Upselling and cross selling on WhatsApp increases when customers have comfortable and positive experiences with that business. This way, WhatsApp Shop is a great platform for creating trust by providing excellent purchase experiences and using upselling and cross-selling strategies.  

By cross-selling, you can promote and display more of your products/services to your existing customers. 

Through the chat functionality of WhatsApp, you can mostly engage with your customers, sharing information about deals, discounts, offers and personalized recommendations you have available. This sets up a very efficient distribution channel for your business. High-end brands like Swarovski are also utilizing WhatsApp to engage their customers and offer exclusive deals, making it a powerful platform for luxury brands to create personalized shopping experiences.

5. Offer fast and trustful support 

It is true that WhatsApp is a very comfortable and reliable platform for customer support and query resolution.  

Customers can tell issues or bring forth queries directly from the chat window. Your team may also quickly assess the problem as they can access important customer history instantly. 

WhatsApp Shops can provide highly personalized and reliable issue resolution, which means more satisfied customers and more potential sales. 

Build Your WhatsApp Store in Just 4 Steps 

Are you ready to build your business’s WhatsApp store for growth? 

 Here are the steps you need to follow:  

Step 1: Download WhatsApp Business and create a business profile 

The first step to create WhatsApp eCommerce Store is to download the WhatsApp Business app. WhatsApp Business app differs from the WhatsApp messenger app, with its business-specific tools and functionalities. 

The WhatsApp Business app can be downloaded from the App Store or the Plays Store, on the device you have. After this is done, you can create your unique business profile by following these steps:  

You now have a WhatsApp Business profile, which can be verified for better brand credibility. Verified business accounts will display a green verified badge at the end of the business name. 

Also, gaining access to WhatsApp API allows collaboration among multiple users, allowing them to collectively respond to your WhatsApp Business messages on a unified platform accessible across various devices. This is where signing up on a platform like comes into play.  

Step 2: Set up timings and create welcome messages  

After streamlining your WhatsApp Business profile, focus on more details vital to your business, like: 

Step 3: Implement WhatsApp automations  

Out of the several advantages of having a WhatsApp Shop is the capability to enhance and simplify workflows with a WhatsApp Business API solution like WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce.  

Allowing WhatsApp automation to sell on WhatsApp Shop equally takes a huge burden off your customer service team. WhatsApp automations simplify the whole process of guiding customers through the shopping experience while offering automated answers to generic queries. 

They can also perform tasks like offering menus, sending info and product images upon request, guiding customers to product pages to get more orders or even connecting customers with live agents for resolving their queries whenever required. 

Step 4: Set up rules 

The next important step to build a highly performing workflow for your WhatsApp Shop is to set up rules for it. 

Your team will have to perform a diverse set of tasks, and these require a remarkable amount of attention and time. By setting rules you can prioritize tasks better and automate some tasks based on WhatsApp customer conversation triggers. 

Rules can be applied to task automation like dispatching customer satisfaction surveys, assigning queries to team members using round-robin logic, labeling conversations as spam, and other identical actions.  

This way, your WhatsApp Shop can be made to run in a more simplified and better-organized fashion, leading to higher customer engagement.  

Payment Mode on your WhatsApp Shop 

One of the remarkable advantages of having a WhatsApp Shop is its capability to serve as a platform for the entire sales funnel, including smooth transactions up to the payment stage.  

With a WhatsApp Business API provider like WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce you can integrate with payment gateways like Razor Pay and PayU, allowing a smooth and complete checkout experience on your WhatsApp Shop. 

How Can your Business Apply for WhatsApp Shop API? 

Businesses must apply for WhatsApp Business API to use WhatsApp Shop. It allows businesses to message automation, declining the need for manual support and improving efficiency. This can support businesses and save time and resources.  

Let us check out how to apply for WhatsApp API.  

About WhatsApp Shopping Group Link 

A shopping group link in WhatsApp Shop is a distinct link that is made when a business establishes a shopping group on WhatsApp. This link is shareable with customers. It allows them to join the group and search the business’s product catalogue, make the purchases, and get direct support via the group chat. The shopping group link makes it easier for businesses to promote their WhatsApp Store and reach a wider audience. Businesses can also use the link to distribute special offers or deals with customers, raising engagement and sales. Businesses will have to develop a shopping group, also send out client invitations, and share the link to their WhatsApp Shop by following these steps. 

Top 3 WhatsApp Store Examples 

As Many businesses are turning to messaging apps for e-commerce, WhatsApp Shop is becoming a popular choice. Here, we’ll know how companies are using the WhatsApp platform to improve their customer experience and the bottom line of their businesses. 

1. Zara

Zara, a leading Spanish fashion retailer has started a WhatsApp Shop to reach its customers. It permits customers to browse its catalogue, purchase, and receive support directly via the messaging app. With an emphasis on offering a smooth and personalized shopping experience, Zara has improvised on customer loyalty and sales through WhatsApp Shop. 

2. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines: 

KLM Royal Dutch Airlines are also using their WhatsApp Shop for supporting their customers and boost the booking experience. So, now Customers can get flight updates, check-in reminders, and other important information directly to their WhatsApp accounts. 

Customers can also book flights directly through the app, in a way which is now a more simplified and comfortable booking experience, boosting customer satisfaction and sales improvement. 

3. Decathlon India  

French sporting goods retailer Decathlon in India has initiated their WhatsApp Shop to cater a smooth shopping experience for its customers. It enables customers to browse products, order bookings, and to get fresh updates directly on chat. Also, with interactive buttons, catalogue, and payments, Decathlon India is ready to facilitate a personalized shopping experience to its customers. This leads to higher customer engagement and conversion rates accordingly. 

Best 5 Strategies for Using WhatsApp eCommerce Store 

It’s an easy and comfortable task to create your WhatsApp eCommerce Store.  

Well, WebMaxy allows you to connect your eCommerce Store with WhatsApp. You can integrate WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce to eCommerce store platforms like Shopify to WooCommerce, and OpenCart.

Let us explore 4 top strategies of the WhatsApp eCommerce Store for its full utilization. 

Send Automated Notifications to recover around 45 to 60% of Abandoned carts 

Abandoned Cart Notifications is one of the best strategies to utilize WhatsApp eCommerce Store.  

There are nearly 8 out of 10 customers (so, we can say nearly about 80% customers) who keep their desired item in their shopping carts and forget or just skip the cart due to loss of intent or time availability. 

A simple trick works for this. You can just automate Notifications for abandoned carts on WhatsApp with a simple timely reminder to the users to finish their purchase. 

Sending Abandoned Cart Notifications on WhatsApp has been a successful strategy for our clients, with a 25% jump in sales. 

Automate WhatsApp Notifications of your WhatsApp eCommerce Store 

You can automate WhatsApp notifications to all our customers. They may be types of Delivering Notifications such as Order Confirmation or order tracking, Delivery Updates, Abandoned Cart Reminders, Payment Confirmation/ Reminders, New product Reminders & product stock alerts much more are extremely important for an Ecommerce store.  

For instance, if you are running an ecommerce store online. Then you can definitely automate your customer interaction or communication with engaging contents and approach to buy instantly for your target buyers via WhatsApp Automation.  

As a WhatsApp eCommerce Store, you can update your customers via WhatsApp notifications for their order delivery status, stage wise order tracking status reminders till they receive, payment status, payment confirmation messages, Order availability along with ‘in stock’ or ‘back to stock’ alerts. Also, Payment processing status, payment reminders, abandoned cart notifications, new product launching alerts, seasonal sales offers and discount notifications etc. For improving efficiency and simplifying the operations of your e commerce store i.e. WhatsApp eCommerce Store, due to automation using WhatsApp has been implemented on it. 

Display products via WhatsApp Catalogues 

Another successful strategy for your WhatsApp eCommerce Store is showcasing catalogues of your products (with their available variants like types, sizes, color range etc.) directly on WhatsApp. 

WhatsApp Catalogue enables businesses to create and share catalogues of their products and services through WhatsApp. Customers who wish to buy desired products or services can browse your catalogue, know more about your products, and can complete their purchases without ever exiting from WhatsApp. 

WhatsApp Catalogues gives an easy path for customers to browse, find and purchase your products or services on WhatsApp. 

WhatsApp Catalogues are always well equipped with proper quality product images, product descriptions with all required details, price and a payment link within the WhatsApp Window. WhatsApp Catalogue is supposed to be an integral part of your WhatsApp eCommerce store. 

Reduce RTO (returns) on COD by offering spot Discounts on WhatsApp 

Return to Origin (RTO) is one of the major hassles of the Ecommerce industry. Buyers purchase products online from your WhatsApp eCommerce Store via Cash on Delivery term. At the time of delivery, they simply deny payments for them.  

The order is returned to the warehouse & the business must incur dual shipping charges.  

Almost 40% out of 70% COD orders are returns costing double shipping charges to the business. This is a major cause for any ecommerce enterprise. 

To drop the returns rate on COD orders, we can use a strategy. 

Whenever a customer books an order with COD as the payment method, you can send an offer on WhatsApp (such as 10% or 15% off if in case of instant payment), thus captivating the user to do the payment upfront, right away.  

Also, you can send promotional offers that will be helpful in converting 40-50% of your COD Orders into prepaid modes. This will obviously drop the losses by RTO on COD orders. This is a significant strategy to work on Returns and to save your shipping charges. 

Use WhatsApp Carousel Messages for driving 2x more clicks  

WhatsApp Carousel Message is the newest WhatsApp Template type incorporated by Meta which enables you to send almost 10 carousel cards in one message.  

This is another winning strategy for your WhatsApp eCommerce Store. With this type of   Carousel Template, you can showcase new product launches, major discounts and other offers with many things. There are possibilities with the use of this particular feature. 

It is proven that Carousel messages drive 2 times more clicks than normal broadcast messages. As it is a new messaging type, there is always a bright chance that the audience will feel ‘attracted’ due to the message and the engagement doubles up! 

Run WhatsApp Retargeting Campaigns for 3x more conversions 

WhatsApp Retargeting Campaigns offered by WebMaxy platform have really measurable results. You can retarget your earlier audience group or can download the existing customer data and form a list, who is likely to purchase your products & services. You may run WhatsApp retargeting campaigns with WebMaxy platform. 

Here are some examples of WhatsApp Retargeting Campaigns: 

If you have an earlier customer (buyers) data to whom you had broadcasted WhatsApp messages regarding earlier model of iPhone say iPhone 13, then you can again plan for your WhatsApp campaign with this data, by using WhatsApp retargeting campaign facility offered with WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce platform.  

Many buyers of iPhone are always interested to go for and stay updated about the latest version of iPhone, due to the technological upgradation and latest features addition in the new model. Today, every buyer prefers to be with the latest gazettes with fresh features. 

You need to update and equip your WhatsApp eCommerce Store for such products before you decide to run such a campaign.  

End Summary 

WhatsApp is an exciting channel that is obtaining popularity among businesses. Still, there is an untapped eCommerce potential in WhatsApp Shop, to convert and improve sales in a more efficient and highly personalized manner. 

Joining with a good WhatsApp Business API solution provider like WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce, a Wati Alternative, you can unlock the whole potential of WhatsApp store, improving personalization, leveraging smart automation and providing seamless payment processes. 

WebMaxy WhatsApp Commerce team is dedicated to serving customers 24/7. For more clarifications and queries, kindly mail us at: info@webmaxy.co. We are delighted to guide and support. 

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