WhatsApp Customer Engagement - Getting Started
WhatsApp Customer Engagement by Truora enables companies to create automated WhatsApp conversations to engage with their users through their favorite channel. With our platform, creating a WhatsApp chatbot requires minimal coding, empowering companies to build and deploy conversational experiences easily.
This guide outlines the essential information and step-by-step guidance to help you start using our platform and get the most out of it.
Prerequisites
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Account Creation: To integrate with any of our services, you’ll need a Truora account. Your Truora sales representative can assist, or you can set one up yourself for free:
- Sign up for a free account: https://account.truora.com/#/create-account/?product=engagement.
- Log into an existing account: https://account.truora.com/#/auth/login.
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Create a Truora API Key: An API key is required to integrate with Truora’s services. For instructions, see our Truora API key guide.
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Familiarize with Key Concepts: Having a basic understanding of WhatsApp Customer Engagement concepts is helpful. If you haven’t already, check out our WA-CE Main Concepts guide.
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Postman: Use Postman or any other collaboration tool for API development. Although it is not required to perform the integration, it will help perform tests along the way.
Truora provides a Postman collection online that includes the necessary tools to simplify the testing process.
Acquire and Activate WhatsApp lines in Truora
To integrate with WhatsApp services on Truora’s platform, you’ll need an official WABA (WhatsApp Business Account) line, configured with your business’s name, logo, description, and phone number. When fully integrated and ready for production, having your own WABA line will be essential. As an Official Meta Partner, Truora can assist you in activating this line seamlessly.
For a step-by-step guidance, refer to How to Acquire WhatsApp lines.
Creating an Outbound Message
To initiate communication with clients through a WhatsApp Business Account (WABA) line, the message that will be sent to your clients must first be pre-approved by Meta. Known as Outbound Messages on our platform (or Message Templates in Meta’s official documentation), this is the only authorized method (by Meta) for reaching your clients.
Note: The approval process for Outbound Messages (Message Templates) by Meta can take from 5 minutes to 5 business days.
To learn how to create a new Outbound Message in our platform, follow this Guide.
Creating a WhatsApp Flow
A WhatsApp Flow is a customized WhatsApp conversation that lets you guide the direction of interactions, helping users navigate information or make decisions. By designing a WhatsApp Flow, you create an engaging, personalized experience that meets users’ needs.
Users can interact with your Flow on WhatsApp in two ways:
- Outbound Message: Start the conversation by sending an approved message linked to your Flow from your WABA line. See our guide on Outbound Messages to learn more.
- Inbound Message: Users initiate the conversation by sending a message to your WABA line, triggering the configured Flow. See our guide on Inbound Messages to learn more.
To easily create your first WhatsApp Flow, follow our guide: Creating a WhatsApp flow in 5 minutes or less.
Starting Conversations via API
For certain applications, you may find it helpful to use our API to start conversations and interact with your customers. These requests will require details about your flow, outbound message, and a basic understanding of APIs and authentication methods. We recommend working with a developer or a tech-savvy individual for assistance with these processes.
To learn the basics of starting conversations via the API, visit our guide on Starting Conversations via API.
Getting details from your conversations
Our platform lets you retrieve results from specific customer interactions or access a history of exchanges between customers and your chatbots. This information will help your business analyze flows behavior and specific conversation details.
Refer to our Get Results from WhatsApp Chatbot Processes guide to learn how to retrieve this information via our Dashboard, along with a basic introduction to using our API for simple data retrieval.
API Reference
For detailed information about our available API endpoints and requests, we encourage you to refer to our API reference.
Connecting an external API
You can integrate External APIs within a WhatsApp flow to retrieve data or execute actions in your systems. This custom integrations will allow you to enhance flows by connecting with external services in real-time. For detailed instructions, please see our guide on Connecting an external API with your WhatsApp Flows.