Products & Catalogs

Learn how to build and send messages with single and multiple products

Businesses can enable Catalogs to share products with customers using Multi and Single-Product messages or showcase their products and services to their customers in the WhatsApp App, allowing them to browse through and add items to their cart without leaving the conversation, providing a seamless and convenient shopping experience.

See below how to create and use Catalogs in your WhatsApp Business Account.

Businesses in India have different regulatory requirements. Please see more information in the Business Help Center.

How to create your Catalog

1. Upload Inventory to Facebook

First, you need to upload your inventory to Facebook. You can use the API or Facebook’s Commerce Manager to do that.

Your inventory needs to be uploaded to Facebook in a catalog format — see About Catalogs for more information.

If you already have a Facebook catalog set up, we suggest that you leverage that catalog for WhatsApp commerce use cases.

If you need to create a catalog, there are two possibilities:

You can upload only one catalog per WhatsApp Business Account (WABA), but the same catalog can belong to multiple phone numbers.

We recommend giving your catalog a unique name such as "Catalog Name" & “_” & "Catalog ID" so it is easier to locate while connecting it in Step 2. Example:

Catalog Name: "Summer Collection", Catalog ID: "14556734" → Unique Name: "Summer Collection_14556734" Catalog Name: "Books", Catalog ID: "24680988" → Unique Name: "Books_24680988"

2. Connect the catalog to a WABA

To connect a catalog to your WhatsApp business account:

Go to Business Manager and select your business
Click
Click WhatsApp Manager
Click Catalog
Click Choose a Catalog. From the drop-down menu, select the catalog that you want to connect
Click View Catalog if you want to view or manage the catalog
Click Connect Catalog

The catalog is connected to your WhatsApp business account. You can start sending Single Product Messages and Multi Product Messages to your customers and receive responses from them

After the Catalog is created and linked to the WABA, businesses have three options to share products when chatting with their customers:

Single and Multi Product Messages: Interactive messages containing a selection of up to a single or 30 items from a business’ inventory.
Multi-Product Template Messages: Template messages containing information about up to 30 products from your ecommerce catalog, organized in up to 10 sections, in a single message.
Catalog Links: Messages containing catalog thumbnails and a link to their entire product catalog.
Catalog Messages: Free-form messages containing a button that, when tapped, displays your product catalog within WhatsApp.
Catalog Template Messages: Template messages containing a button that, when tapped, displays your product catalog within WhatsApp.

1. Single and Multi Product Messages

Both Multi-Product Messages and Single Product Messages are types of interactive messages.

2. Catalog Messages

Catalog Messages are not available in India.

Catalog messages are free-form messages that allow you to showcase your product catalog entirely within WhatsApp. Catalog messages display a product thumbnail header image of your choice, custom body text, a fixed text header, a fixed text sub-header, and a View catalog button.

Once you have your inventory connected, use the WABA API to send this type of message. Use the /messages endpoint with the following parameters:

Properties

Placeholder Description Sample Value

Placeholder	Description	Sample Value
`<BODY_TEXT>` String	Required. Text to appear in the message body. Maximum 1024 characters.	`Hello! Thanks for your interest. Ordering is easy. Just visit our catalog and add items to purchase.`
`<FOOTER_TEXT>` String	Optional. Text to appear in the message footer. Maximum 60 characters.	`Best grocery deals on WhatsApp!`
`<THUMBNAIL_PRODUCT_RETAILER_ID>` String	Required. Item SKU number. Labeled as Content ID in the Commerce Manager. The thumbnail of this item will be used as the message's header image. If the `parameters` object is omitted, the product image of the first item in your catalog will be used.	`2lc20305pt`

<BODY_TEXT>

String

Required.

Text to appear in the message body.

Maximum 1024 characters.

Hello! Thanks for your interest. Ordering is easy. Just visit our catalog and add items to purchase.

<FOOTER_TEXT>

String

Optional.

Text to appear in the message footer.

Maximum 60 characters.

Best grocery deals on WhatsApp!

<THUMBNAIL_PRODUCT_RETAILER_ID>

String

Required.

Item SKU number. Labeled as Content ID in the Commerce Manager.

The thumbnail of this item will be used as the message's header image.

If the parameters object is omitted, the product image of the first item in your catalog will be used.

2lc20305pt

Sample Request

{
  "messaging_product": "whatsapp",
  "recipient_type": "individual",
  "to": "16505551234",
  "type": "interactive",
  "interactive": {
    "type": "catalog_message",
    "body": {
      "text": "Hello! Thanks for your interest. Ordering is easy. Just visit our catalog and add items to purchase."
    },
    "action": {
      "name": "catalog_message",
      "parameters": {
        "thumbnail_product_retailer_id": "2lc20305pt"
      }
    },
    "footer": {
      "text": "Best grocery deals on WhatsApp!"
    }
  }
}

3. Multi-Product Template Messages

Multi-Product Message templates can be used to open marketing conversations, meaning you can start a conversation using this template. See Multi-Product Template Messages.

4. Catalog Link Messages

Businesses can send a link to their entire product catalog by assembling a wa.me link and including it in a standard text message.

When sending a text message, businesses can use the optional preview_url set to true to have the message render a set of product catalog thumbnails of any URL in the message body string.

To assemble wa.me link, append the business's business phone number, including country code, to the end of the following string:

https://wa.me/c/

For example:

https://wa.me/c/+966920033333

If you disable the catalog, wa.me links to your catalog, as well as the View catalog button that appears when you send your catalog link in a message will display an Invalid catalog link warning when tapped.

Catalogs & Carts

When enabled, the catalog storefront icon and catalog-related buttons appear in conversation and business profile views:

When the catalog is disabled, the storefront icon and catalog-related buttons will not appear in any views and the catalog preview with thumbnails will not appear in the business profile view.

By default, the catalog will be off. To turn on the visibility of your catalog within the WhatsApp chat thread and your business profile to showcase your products, you can enable it directly from the WhatsApp Inbox Settings > Commerce Settings in the Bevatel Business Chat Settings.

Carts

By default, customers can add a product to their cart, or amend quantities directly from the list or product details page. When enabled, cart-related buttons appear in the conversation, catalog, and product details views.

When it is disabled, customers can see products and their details, but all cart-related buttons will not appear in any view.

Shopping Cart Experience

After viewing products, a customer can add them to their shopping cart and send that cart to a business. For the purposes of commerce on WhatsApp, a shopping cart:

Is unique to a person/business chat thread in a specific device: Only one cart is created per chat thread between customer and business and carts do not persist across multiple devices. Once a cart is sent, the customer can open another cart with the business and start the process again.
Has no expiration date: The cart persists in the chat thread until it is sent to the business. Once sent, the cart is cleared.

Customers can add up to 99 units of each single catalog item to a shopping cart, but there is no limit on the number of distinct items that can be added to a cart.

Once a cart has been sent, no edits can be made. Customers can send a new cart if they need new items, or would like to change their order. Businesses cannot send carts to customers.

FAQ

Upload your inventory to Facebook Catalog inventory management

Q: Can my catalog be used for other use cases across the Family of Apps, such as ads or Shops?

A: Products work for both Multi-Product and Single Product Messages and ads without additional work —once the catalog has been accepted and enabled. If a catalog is used for Shops, the business needs to create another catalog to be used for Multi-Product Messages, and vice versa.

Sharing your products with customers

Q: Why only 30 items in a Multi-Product Message?

A: We heard feedback from our users that they prefer shopping on WhatsApp because it’s either simpler and more efficient or more personal than going to a business’s app or website. Multi Product and Single Product Messages are the best experiences for use cases that are more curated to the customer e.g. personalized recommendations based on previous purchases, rather than browsing a full catalog. They work best when combined with navigation tools like NLP, text search, or List Messages and Reply Buttons to get to what the customer is looking for fast.

Q: Why are my product messages not arriving?

A: Make sure you have an Open session (Customer Care Window) with your customer. If you are a Business based in India, make sure your Compliance Info is set.

Q: How many items can I add to the Catalog?

A: There is no limit on the number of products to showcase in the Catalog. However, we recommend 100 items per Catalog to improve the user's experience until new functionalities, for example, Categories, are released.

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Last updated 9 months ago