On Friday, Meta refuted a media story that said the social media behemoth was considering adding advertisements to the well-liked messaging service WhatsApp.
Multiple teams at Meta discussed the prospect of including adverts within the list of conversations on the WhatsApp main screen, as previously reported by the Financial Times. Officially, WhatsApp has stated that it is not testing this functionality, that no work is being done on it in terms of development, and that there are no immediate plans to roll it out.
Given that WhatsApp has more than 2 billion users worldwide and that Meta is seeking methods to commercialize it, analysts have long speculated that Meta may eventually add advertisements to it. Instagram, which Meta purchased for a comparable lesser price, has advanced more in monetization techniques.
But Meta has refrained from putting advertisements on the WhatsApp app, relying instead on WhatsApp Business, a product targeted at businesses that charge them for specific services. Over 200 million monthly active users have signed up for WhatsApp Business.
Meta announced modifications to WhatsApp Business’s messaging categories and price structure to boost revenue in February. These categories were user-initiated service dialogues, utilities, authentication (to provide one-time passcodes), and marketing.
During the previous year’s Q3 earnings call, Zuckerberg mentioned that “click-to-WhatsApp” ads had grown by 80% yearly to reach an annual revenue run rate of $1.5 billion. The business has been preparing to launch a model for customized business communications soon.
Peer-to-peer and customer-to-merchant payments are also made possible in nations like Singapore, Brazil, and India. The business announced in May that it is looking into how to include costs into its streaming function, Channels, which went live globally this week.
“With the 200M MAU milestone for WhatsApp Business subscribers and the testing of GenAI customer care solutions, Meta is moving toward monetizing WhatsApp’s 2B+ active user base. In a recent note to clients, analysts at AllianceBernstein stated: “Click to Message is already running at a 10B+ revenue run rate while training both the consumers and companies to interact within WhatsApp.
The Wall Street Journal reported in 2020 that WhatsApp has considered offering adverts in locations like WhatsApp Status a few times over the past decade, but those proposals have permanently been shelved.
Meta has confirmed its commitment to keeping WhatsApp free from advertisements, with no immediate plans to introduce them. This declaration highlights their dedication to preserving the ad-free experience of the messaging platform, at least in the near term. As per Meta’s statement, users can rest assured that they can continue to use WhatsApp without the disruption of ads.
[Source of Information: Techcrunch.com]
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