The parent company Facebook has been making changes in all of its social media platforms in order to help its users with many things. In light of the major updates, and while Facebook is slowly releasing its new Shops feature but not only on Facebook but also on Instagram.

Moreover, and for making a great expansion in the eCommerce industry within WhatsApp, Facebook is looking for ways to monetize the app’s 2 billion active users.

As for this week, WhatsApp has added two new features in order to help brands better promote their presence on the platform. Let’s start off with WhatsApp adding new QR codes for businesses:

WhatsApp QR Codes:

As you can see in the above video, WhatsApp QR codes offer an easy and simple way to help connect WhatsApp users with your WhatsApp presence and also start a message thread straight from the QR code scan.

In light of WhatsApp QR codes, WhatsApp explains “QR codes are a digital front door that makes opening a chat with business as easy as possible. Previously when people came across an interesting business, they had to add its WhatsApp number to their contacts, one number at a time. Now, people simply can scan the QR code a business displays on its storefront, product packaging, or receipt to initiate a chat.”

Also, QR codes are available in some social media apps such as Messenger and Instagram, however, they have never become a main connective tool in Western markets, even though their popularity in some Asian nations.

However, maybe the use case of WhatsApp QR codes is slightly different. That means a simple WhatsApp QR code option could be an easier way to facilitate direct links to your business presence.

Just put your WhatsApp QR code on product tags, promotional material, on the packaging, and it could be a great way to get more users to connect. Moreover, WhatsApp is also adding new catalog links in order to help promote the product listings within the app.

WhatsApp explains: “Catalogs allow businesses to showcase and share the goods or services they offer, which can help them close sales. Since launching last year, catalogs have become a popular way for people to engage with a business on WhatsApp. In fact, more than 40 million people view a business catalog on WhatsApp each month.”

The catalog listings are simply a basic overview of the products you have within WhatsApp. Anyhow, now, WhatsApp will also provide shareable links for catalogs, besides the individual products and that will make it easier for people to share with connections and friends.
WhatsApp says: “If people want to share a catalog or item they find with friends or family, they can simply copy the link and send it on WhatsApp or other places as well.”

These are the newest updates in WhatsApp’s push into eCommerce (WhatsApp QR codes, Catalog Listings), and Facebook is looking forward to expanding its use case, also evolve the app into a main business connective tool in order to increase the revenue generation capacity.

You can use WhatsApp QR codes for businesses and catalog links now, as they are available to all businesses worldwide, just use the WhatsApp Business app, starting from today.