Salesforce and WhatsApp Integration - How it works

The seamless integration of WhatsApp in Salesforce opens up numerous benefits for companies and expands the possibilities of customer interaction.

The integration of WhatsApp in Salesforce allows you to communicate with customers via WhatsApp in an automated way through actions on the Salesforce platform. This ensures that you can manage all aspects of customer interaction in a centralized way, leveraging the functionality of the popular messenger service.

So you can send specific actions or notifications via WhatsApp and take automated actions in Salesforce on incoming WhatsApp messages. This makes communication faster and more efficient, both in terms of customer service and sales activities.

In this article you will learn how to successfully integrate WhatsApp with Salesforce to optimize your business processes and work more efficiently.

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What is Salesforce?

Before we delve deeper into WhatsApp's integration with Salesforce, it's important to provide an overview of Salesforce itself. Salesforce is a leading customer relationship management (CRM) platform that helps companies manage and optimize their customer interactions.
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Salesforce logo

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Salesforce offers a variety of features and tools to help companies manage their customer relationships more effectively. Here are some of the key features of Salesforce:

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Contact management: Salesforce lets you centrally manage customer contacts. You can store contact information, track interactions, and build a comprehensive customer history.

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Sales automation: Salesforce provides sales automation tools that help you streamline sales processes. You can track leads, manage opportunities, and monitor deal progress.

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Customer service: The platform enables you to manage customer support requests, create tickets, and handle customer concerns efficiently. This leads to better customer support and higher customer satisfaction.

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Marketing automation: Salesforce provides ways to automate marketing activities. You can plan campaigns, perform email marketing, and track the success of your marketing efforts.

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Analytics and reporting: Salesforce provides tools to analyze data and create reports. This gives you detailed insights into your operational business and enables you to make informed decisions.

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Mobile support: Salesforce offers mobile apps that let you access your customer information from anywhere. This allows you to stay productive and track customer interactions on the go.

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The WhatsApp integration extends the functionality of Salesforce by including an additional communication option used by many people worldwide. The WhatsApp integration allows you to conduct customer communications directly from Salesforce and store and manage all relevant data in one central system.

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Salesforce and WhatsApp integration: benefits and use cases

The integration of WhatsApp into Salesforce offers numerous advantages and opens up a wide range of use cases for companies. Here are the crucial aspects to consider:

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Efficient communication and improved customer experience: Connecting WhatsApp and Salesforce allows you to simplify your communication across multiple channels and provide your customers with a convenient way to contact you. Since WhatsApp is a widely used messaging platform, you can answer customer queries directly, share information, and provide support. This contributes to increased customer satisfaction.

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Highly effective marketing with WhatsApp newsletters: Thanks to the WhatsApp API interface, it is possible to send automated marketing newsletters to pre-segmented customer groups. The advantage of this: WhatsApp newsletters have an open rate of over 95% and the emotional purchase decision process of consumers can be influenced much better on such a personal platform as WhatsApp than with emails.

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Central data storage and automated workflows: The integration allows you to store data on customers and customer communications centrally within the Salesforce platform. This means you have all the relevant information in one place and can set up automated workflows to optimize business processes and respond quickly to inquiries.

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Team collaboration and sales support: Linking WhatsApp with Salesforce facilitates team collaboration and supports the sales process. Team members can share information via WhatsApp, assign tasks, and track the progress of sales activities. This strengthens team communication and boosts sales.

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Customer service and individual support: The integration of WhatsApp with Salesforce enables you to provide customer support efficiently and offer individual customer care. The personal atmosphere of WhatsApp allows you to respond to your customers' individual needs and build close customer relationships.
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Event communication and quick interaction: When organizing events, you can use WhatsApp to communicate with attendees, send invitations and share important details. Additionally, the integration enables quick interactions and effective customer support via the familiar messaging platform.

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Connecting WhatsApp and Salesforce opens up numerous opportunities to improve communication, collaboration and efficiency in your business. From effective customer interaction to automated business processes to strengthened team collaboration, combining the two platforms adds value to your Salesforce-based business.

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How to create a Salesforce and WhatsApp integration?

There are several ways to integrate WhatsApp into Salesforce. We will now briefly present these to you.

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‍Option1: Independent implementation
If you have in-depth programming knowledge, you can set up the integration yourself. However, this requires access to the WhatsApp API interface. However, this is only available to selected companies. So if you own a large and well-known e-commerce company and have the necessary resources to implement it, you can contact Meta Platforms, the parent company of WhatsApp, and request access to the WhatsApp API interface.

‍Option2: Mateo as WhatsApp API provider
‍Theeasiest and cheapest way to integrate WhatsApp and Salesforce is via a professional third-party provider such as Mateo with appropriate WhatsApp API access. With Mateo you can use all the features: You can do WhatsApp newsletter marketing, provided your customers have given consent to receive messages. In addition, Mateo 's central inbox integrates various other messaging channels besides WhatsApp, such as Facebook, Instagram, email, SMS and Google Business Chat. You can also significantly improve your Google reviews through automated review management and integrate over 6,000 other apps into Mateo's communication software aside from Salesforce. Our software is available to you for as little as €79 per month. With Mateo, WhatsApp and Salesforce are linked via Zapier software. Find out how this works in the following paragraph!

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Mateo, Zapier and Salesforce integration diagram — Thanks to Mateo and Zapier, you can integrate WhatsApp with Salesforce and many other apps. Without the WhatsApp Business API interface, linking is not possible.

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Here you can find an overview of all applications that can be linked to Mateo through Zapier. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us or book a free consultation appointment directly.

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Link and use WhatsApp and Salesforce with Mateo and Zapier

A short digression: What is Zapier and how does it work?

Zapier is a powerful software tool that allows automating recurring tasks between different applications. With Zapier, you can connect over 6,000 apps and create workflows without requiring extensive programming skills. This automation saves you time and resources by eliminating manual tasks and allowing you to seamlessly share data between different platforms. Zapier supports a wide range of apps and services, giving you the ability to share data between your favorite tools to make your workflows more efficient. You can automate various actions such as sending emails, entering data in spreadsheets, sending notifications in messaging apps or scheduling social media posts. Zapier thus allows you to focus on more important tasks by automating repetitive and time-consuming tasks. A particularly interesting feature is the ability to send automated WhatsApp messages when predefined events occur in other software applications.

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Logos of software applications supported by Zapier — Zapier supports the linking of over 6,000 software applications

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Requirements for the WhatsApp - Salesforce integration

There is an access to the WhatsApp API interface, through Mateo's professional messaging tool
You have a Salesforce account that is connected to your business processes
You have access to a Zapier account with permission to edit zaps
You have formulated WhatsApp message templates for the intended use (e.g. a payment request or shipping confirmation), submitted them to Meta and got them approved

Requirements not met? We will be happy to support you! Simply write to us via our web widget or arrange a free consultation appointment.
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How to: Set up WhatsApp and Salesforce integration

All requirements met? Then you can start linking WhatsApp, Mateo and Salesforce
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Log in to Zapier.
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Create a new "Zap" with the button in the left corner.
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Select Salesforce as "Trigger" if you want to send a WhatsApp message on certain events in Salesforce (e.g. when an order is placed) or as "Action" if you want to perform an action in Salesforce on incoming WhatsApp messages.
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Accordingly, select your WhatsApp Business API provider as "Action" (e.g. Send WhatsApp message template "Order confirmation") or as "Trigger".
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Confirm the new Zap and make it live.
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Congratulations! Fully automated WhatsApp messages are now sent. For example, customers receive an order confirmation and shipping information via WhatsApp for each new order. Or, if you have set up the link the other way around, for example, a new customer contact is created in Salesforce when an incoming WhatsApp message is received from a number that has not been saved.
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Mateo and Salesforce diagram in practice — Example of how Mateo's Salesforce integration works

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Other advantages of Mateo

Mateo has much more to offer than just the integration of WhatsApp in Salesforce. Our customers particularly appreciate the following advantages:

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Central user interface

In addition to WhatsApp Business API, Mateo bundles many other communication channels such as email, Instagram, Google Business Chat, SMS or Facebook Messenger in a central inbox. On the intuitive and clear user interface, you will find various helpful tools for particularly efficient customer communication. For your customers, a web widget with the message channels you support is available for particularly easy contact.

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Custom Message Templates

Thanks to various message templates that can be created individually, the amount of paperwork is minimized and the efficiency of customer communication is increased. This means that personnel resources in the service area can be deployed elsewhere.

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WhatsApp & SMS Marketing Newsletter

With Mateo's WhatsApp API solution, newsletters can be sent in a GDPR-compliant manner. Due to the first-class open rate of 98% for WhatsApp messages, marketing can thus be done much better than via email or other channels. With Mateo, you can also send your marketing newsletters automatically via SMS.

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More positive Google reviews

With Mateo, you create an outstanding customer experience. Mateo can automatically request online reviews from your customers. The more reviews you have, the better you will be found on Google, for example. Reviews also create trust in your company.

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Privacy

Mateo's messaging tool is compatible with all German and European legally binding data protection requirements. If the law changes, the software will be revised accordingly. For absolutely secure customer communication, all messages are encrypted end-to-end. You can read all the info about the GDPR when using WhatsApp in our article"WhatsApp Business and GDPR". This will help you avoid the warnings, severe penalties and expensive legal costs that often occur in the event of non-compliance with the GDPR (= use of the standard WhatsApp Business app).

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‍Scalabilityfor all company sizes

The scalability of the messaging tool has been confirmed by the large number of companies already using Mateo with great satisfaction. Whether customers have just a few employees or many hundreds, the software works smoothly and, depending on the package, with an unlimited number of end devices, users and phone numbers. The fact that Mateo significantly reduces the workload in the customer service area opens up new growth opportunities for many companies.

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Low cost provider for WhatsApp Business API

With an entry-level price of just 79 euros per month, Mateo is a cost-effective provider for WhatsApp Business API solutions on the German market. Combined with the integration of additional communication channels and various helpful tools, Mateo offers excellent value for money. Mateo's personal customer support assists companies with every step of the integration, ensuring very low barriers to entry.

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Salesforce and WhatsApp integration - how-to [October 2023].