WhatsApp Business

WhatsApp Business in ZenTalk lets your customers message and call your business on WhatsApp, with every chat landing in your normal inbox next to website conversations. Your AI bot and your team share the same queue, and each connected number gets its own persona and knowledge base.

Where it lives

WhatsApp Business lives on the Channels page under the WhatsApp Business card. Owners, admins, and marketeers can manage it. Owners and admins can also reach the same controls from the Social tab of Numbers & Wallet.

Connect your existing number

If you already run WhatsApp for your business, click Connect with Facebook. Meta's own window opens. Sign in, pick your business, your WhatsApp Business account, and the number. There is no monthly fee from ZenTalk for your own number.

Get a new number

1. Click Find a number. The Get a WhatsApp number window opens.
2. Choose a Country, optionally an Area code, and click Search available numbers.
3. Click Rent next to the number you want. The monthly price is on the button and is added to your subscription.
4. Finish the Connect with Facebook step so the number is attached to your own WhatsApp Business account. The verification code goes to a number ZenTalk runs, so it is filled in for you.

While a rented number is being set up, it shows under numbers in progress. Activation is usually automatic within a minute. If it stalls, click Finish setup, or Retry if setup failed. Click Release to give up a number you no longer want.

Name your number

Before you connect, type a label in Name for the next number, such as Sales line or Support. The name appears in your inbox and lists so you can tell your numbers apart at a glance.

Your connected numbers

Each connected number shows its name and status, with these controls:

• Live or Inactive: whether the number is currently taking chats.
• AI & bot settings: opens the bot for this number, where you set its Channel name, persona, knowledge base, and whether the AI answers WhatsApp calls. See AI Sales Agent.
• WhatsApp calls: a switch that lets customers call this number from WhatsApp. Calls ring your team in the dashboard like widget calls, and the AI can answer if that is turned on in the bot settings. Your number must be eligible for calling on Meta's side; if Meta refuses, ZenTalk shows a plain message explaining why.
• Disconnect: stops inbound WhatsApp chats for that number.

When a number shows Disconnected

ZenTalk checks each number's health with Meta. If Meta reports a problem, for example because access was removed on the Meta side, the number shows Disconnected with the message "This number is not working right now", and messages and calls stop getting through. Workspace owners and admins get an email.

• Click Reconnect to run the Connect with Facebook step again and restore access.
• Click Check again after fixing things on the Meta side to confirm the number is working.

WhatsApp calls

When the WhatsApp calls switch is on for a number, customers can call your business from WhatsApp. The call rings your team in a WhatsApp call panel in the dashboard. If nobody picks up and the site allows it, the AI can answer instead.

WhatsApp calls are inbound only. To let the AI answer, open the number's AI & bot settings and turn on Let the AI answer WhatsApp calls. See AI Sales Agent for the full voice settings.

Share an existing site's AI settings

By default each number gets its own bot. To have a number use an existing site's inbox, AI persona, and knowledge base instead, open Advanced: share an existing site's AI settings instead before you connect and pick the site.

WhatsApp in your inbox

WhatsApp chats appear in their own WhatsApp section of the Inbox. They are message threads, so you can reply any time within Meta's 24-hour messaging window after the customer's last message. When a chat started from a Click-to-WhatsApp ad, the visitor panel shows the ad under Came from.

Your team works one queue: WhatsApp chats sit right alongside website conversations, Facebook Messenger threads, and phone calls. The AI bot handles WhatsApp the same way it handles a website chat, using the persona and knowledge base you set for that number.

Teaching the bot about your business

A WhatsApp number has no website of its own, so its bot shows a Learn from a website (optional) URL box instead of the automatic scraper a website site uses. Enter your website and click Scan website. Your typed notes in Your notes always take priority over the scan. See AI Sales Agent for the full knowledge base guide.

For the Channels overview that also covers Facebook Messenger, see Channels. For renting and managing phone numbers, see Numbers & Wallet.