A month ago, WhatsApp announced that they are testing features that will make it easier for people to communicate with businesses. This included a free dedicated app called WhatsApp Business which will incorporate these tools in a single app.
It is a month later and today we have seen how the app looks like thanks to Android Police. The publication was able to obtain and check out the app in detail.
As explained before, WhatsApp Business is a standalone app so sometime in the future, you will be able to download the app from the Playstore. It is geared for account managers to separate their personal and business conversations.
The app icon looks like WhatsApp’s but instead of a call icon, we have a large ‘B’ logo inside the chat bubble.
Once you install the app, it looks like the regular WhatsApp interface save for some certain elements. Instead of ‘WhatsApp’ at the top bar, you have ‘WhatsApp Business’ and interesting additions to the Settings Menu (Business settings and Statistics).
The Statistics setting apparently is pretty basic right now since you only see basic info like messages sent, delivered, read and received. Business settings involves you editing the business profile and your away message.
On your business profile, you can add a photo, business category, business description, your email address and your website. You will also see a badge that shows whether your business is verified or not.
When the customer adds your business’ contact, they will get the end-to-end encryption notification and another notification claiming whether the business is verified or not.
The sad thing is that you can’t download the app right now on Google Play but you can download it on APK Mirror. I downloaded it but couldn’t use it since it requires you to be confirmed to be a beta tester. Well, we just have to wait until WhatsApp officially releases the app, but it is great that we can first see what we should expect from the app.
