Yes, through the WhatsApp Business Platform, and for a lot of operations it becomes the strongest channel fairly quickly.
The reason is not the technology. It is that people actually read WhatsApp, and they will reply to it days later without losing the thread.
What makes it different from web chat
Web chat is synchronous. Someone is on your site, wants an answer now, and the conversation dies when they close the tab.
WhatsApp is asynchronous and persistent. The thread survives. A customer can ask about an install date on Tuesday, ignore you until Thursday, and pick up exactly where they left off with all the context intact.
That suits a whole category of conversation that web chat handles badly. Install updates, delivery windows, renewal decisions, anything where the customer needs to go and think or go and check something.
The constraint that shapes everything
Meta controls who can message first, and it is the rule that dictates how you design outbound flows.
You cannot simply start a conversation. Business-initiated messages have to use a pre-approved template, and you need consent. Once the customer replies, a 24-hour window opens where the conversation can be free-form and natural. When that window closes, you are back to templates until they message again.
So an outbound flow that assumes you can just chat whenever will not survive contact with the platform. Design for the window: the template opens the door, the real conversation happens inside 24 hours, and anything after that needs another approved template.
That constraint is also why WhatsApp works so well for triggered moments. A renewal notice, a failed payment, an install update. Something has genuinely happened, the template is legitimate, and the customer replies because it is relevant.
One agent, several channels
The mistake is building a WhatsApp bot separately from your web chat bot.
You end up with two sets of logic, two knowledge bases drifting apart, and customers getting different answers depending on where they asked. The same underlying agent should serve web chat, WhatsApp, SMS, email and voice, with the channel affecting presentation rather than substance.
The practical test: can a customer start on your website and follow up on WhatsApp without repeating themselves. If not, you have built two things.
What to know before starting
You need a WhatsApp Business Platform account through Meta or a provider, a verified business, and a number that is not already tied to a personal WhatsApp account. That last one catches people out.
Template approval takes time and templates get rejected for being too promotional, so build that into the schedule rather than discovering it the week before launch.
And consent needs to be real and recorded. This is a channel where getting it wrong is both a compliance problem and a fast route to being blocked by customers, which does more lasting damage than the compliance issue.
