Rate Adjustments and Updates on the WhatsApp Business Platform

September 23, 2024 — by 360dialog Communications Team

We are excited to share significant updates from the WhatsApp Business Platform. Please take a moment to review the latest news, and feel free to reach out to our Support Team if you have any questions.

Updates to Marketing and Utility Messaging Rates

We recently announced updates to the rates for marketing and utility messaging services on the WhatsApp Business Platform.

These adjustments are part of Meta’s ongoing commitment to creating a ecosystem that drives value, enhances user experience, and supports strong business performance. With this initiative, new utility messaging rates have already been applied, with further changes to marketing messaging rates to follow soon.

Utility Rates – Effective since August 1, 2024

As of August 1, 2024, rates for utility messages have been reduced to remain competitive with alternative communication channels. This reduction is designed to encourage businesses to use WhatsApp for a complete post-purchase customer journey.

Marketing Rates – Effective from October 1, 2024

Starting October 1, 2024, Marketing Messaging rates will be adjusted in specific markets. These rates may be updated quarterly to reflect the value delivered by marketing messages, so please stay attentive to future updates.

The pricing adjustments also incorporate valuable features introduced for marketing and utility conversations, such as customizable TTL, to enhance their effectiveness for businesses.

For more information on these pricing updates, please refer to Meta’s official documentation.

New error code for Per-User Marketing Messaging Limits

Since introducing the per-user marketing template limit, Meta has observed significant improvements in read rates and user sentiment. According to platform-wide surveys, users find business messaging more valuable and feel less overwhelmed by the volume of messages.

To further optimize user experience, delivery limits for marketing messages to less-engaged users will continue to be refined. For example, data shows that negative user engagement—such as NFR (no further replies), archiving, and muting—increases as the number of marketing templates in a conversation rises.

This means that businesses are limited to sending a maximum of two marketing template messages within a 24-hour conversation window without a customer response. If a customer responds, free-form messages should be used to continue the conversation.

If a marketing template message is not delivered to a given user due to the limit, Cloud API will return error code 131049 with the description “This message was not delivered to maintain a healthy ecosystem engagement.”

If you do receive this error code, it is due to the limit, so avoid immediately resending the template message, as it will only result in another error response. Instead, retry in increasing larger time increments until the message is delivered, since the limit may be in effect for differing periods of time.

For more details on Per-user marketing limits, please visit our documentation.

New Business Verticals Now Allowed: Alcoholic Beverages, Over-the-Counter Drugs, and Real-Money Gambling

Meta has expanded the types of businesses that can use the WhatsApp Business Platform to include certain regulated business verticals (“Verticals”).

From August 27, 2024, lawful and licensed businesses in specific regions of India, APAC, and LATAM* will be able to onboard the platform if they fall within the following verticals:

• Alcoholic Beverages
• Over-the-Counter (OTC) Medication (Prescription drugs and medical devices remain prohibited)
• Real-Money Gambling and Gaming (including Online Gambling & Gaming)

Please note that while these businesses can use the WhatsApp Business Platform for marketing purposes, any messaging related to the buying, selling, or payment for goods/services in these verticals remains prohibited. Additionally, messaging related to these verticals via the WhatsApp Business App continues to be disallowed.

For more details, please refer to Section 5 Further Guidance on Regulated Verticals which outlines limited exceptions, subject to specific requirements, for promoting certain regulated or restricted goods and services (“Regulated Verticals”).

Be sure to review the updated WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy, and learn about the new verticals. In the coming months, Meta will share more information on this topic and we will keep you informed. As of now, businesses must ensure they have all required licenses, notices, permits, and registrations.

You can find more details in our documentation.

*The WhatsApp Business Policy is globally applicable, with additional restrictions based on local laws. Businesses must refer to the Official Policy for the exact list of permitted countries for each vertical.

Now Available: Support Widget for All Users

We’re happy to announce that the Support Widget is now available for all users! This is to make it easier and faster to get help from our Support Team directly within your 360dialog Hub.

Soon, ticket creation via the Hub’s navigation bar will be disabled. Moving forward, all support requests should be submitted through the Support Widget in the right corner of the Hub. We’ll be sending out more information about new features and best practices for using the Support Widget.

If you have any questions, please reach out to us via the Support Widget.

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