WhatsApp has announced today that it will soon start charging business users and brands for using the platform for marketing and customer service purposes.
With Facebook profits starting to take a dive and the use of WhatsApp for marketing on the rise, this is of course a very savvy decision indeed.
In Latin America and Asia, marketing through WhatsApp is huge. It's more popular than Facebook, and it's their main social network overcoming the four step process of:
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- A customer asking a brand a question by commenting on a post
- A brand directing the customer to discuss the matter in a private message
- The brand then asking for a phone number or email address
- The customer finally getting the chance to discuss their question.
How this will ultimately affect brand and customer service strategies around the world is yet to be known.
Apparently, the charge will be impacted by the volume of people who receive the messages and brands will charged somewhere between 1p -10p per delivery. So if you're marketing databases is, let's say, 50,000 customers that could mean anywhere from £500-£5000 per broadcast or content push.
So what does this mean for the future of brand marketing and customer services? Well, WhatsApp could be just the first of many messaging apps and social network that will start the trend. And it begs the question, will brands pass on the cost to customers through subscription fees for high value content and messaging? Or will this simply be another new medium for targeted advertising?
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