Whatsappening to email? - How Dubai SME’s are driving sales and building customer relationships through WhatsApp and why you should too

A little over 12 months ago I quit my consulting career and started a business.

Almost overnight, I shifted from advising some of the world’s largest Oil and Gas companies, such as Saudi Aramco and Petronas, to producing customised 3D printed products and parts primarily for dental laboratories.

Naturally, I expected to see differences between how businesses function at the MNC vs SME level.

One area which I did not expect to see any change in was B2B communications. Surely all companies use email as the primary tool for connecting and interacting with their customers, right?

Wrong.

What I found fascinated me; SME’s in Dubai have shifted communications almost entirely to WhatsApp.

As I in turn shifted to WhatsApp, I was surprised to see just how effective this communications platform is for driving sales and maintaining customer relationships. I now channel around 90% of my sales communications through WhatsApp and highly recommend any sales, marketing, or business development professional to consider using this platform.   

WHATSapp?

WhatsApp, of course, needs no introduction. Over one billion (yes billion) people in 180 countries use the app to send each other messages, voice memos, or make calls.

The premise of WhatsApp is “Simple. Secure. Reliable Messaging”. The success of WhatsApp is built upon how it has delivered; simple, secure, and reliable messaging. Like a good old fashioned quick drying clear varnish, “it does exactly what it says on the tin”.

So often in the world of tech there can only be ‘one’. (Anyone use Ask Jeeves, Yahoo, or Bing for internet searches?)

With strong functionality and early-mover market advantage, WhatsApp has become the ‘one’ for cross-platform smart phone communication. Its sheer size and scale mean that it is hard to see any new competitors challenging its monopoly on messaging.

With one in seven of the world’s population having WhatsApp and one in two smartphone users having downloaded the app, the platform has incredible penetration and reach.

It is not surprising therefore to see that enterprising individuals are taking advantage of this communication medium and transitioning WhatsApp from a tool to communicate with Family and Friends, to a networking tool for Colleagues and Customers.

HOWSapp?

Smart SME’s use WhatsApp as a direct replacement for conventional email.

• Got a business card of a prospect that you want to follow up on? - send an introductory WhatsApp.
• Trying to arrange a meeting? - send a WhatsApp with the proposed time.
• Want to check the status of an order? - WhatsApp to see if it has been signed off.
• Checking in with an account to see if there are any problems… OK, you get the idea!

However, WhatsApp is so much more than just a like for like email replacement.

• Want to get a new design signed-off? - send photos for approval.
• Require quick customer feedback or engagement? - send photos of work in progress or a video of the team working
• Troubleshooting a problem? - send a series of photos showing the steps to resolve the issue
• Struggling to get a product approved? - send a video showing the product fully
• Chasing an invoice; send a mildly threatening message followed by a smiling emoji (trust me, this works!)

WHYSapp?

So why is WhatsApp such a great tool for business? Five reasons; informality, immediacy, functionality, clarity, and brevity.

Informality:

OK, bear with me, I’m going to delve briefly into the history of electronic communications.

Electronic Mail, or email as the rest of us know it, was developed in the early 1970s to allow computer users to communicate with each other. At this stage, computers were so expensive and large that only businesses and academic institutions could afford them. Before they owned computers, these large businesses and academic institutions conducted most written communication through the penned letter. To be accepted, email needed to adopt the characteristics of the penned letter.

Email adopted these characteristics in several ways; the notion of an envelope and opening, a header summarising the subject of the communication, a formal opening with a salutation, and, of course, a formal sign-off with a signature.  

In almost 50 years email has changed very little. It has remained a formal tool for long prose communication. Men wearing grey pinstripe suits who like talking about golf and being called by their last names thrive on email.

WhatsApp however is different. Instead of evolving from the classical penned letter, WhatsApp has much more modern lineage; the Text Message. The Text Message was developed for mobile to mobile messaging, primarily between Friends and Family. Because WhatsApp comes from the world of Friends and Family it is completely informal. There is no set structure, no subject header, no signature, just a small box to type in to. Throw in an emoji or two, and it’s almost fun.

The informality and light-hearted nature of WhatsApp make it a great tool for effective business communication. It places the user on a level platform alongside customers, suppliers, or colleagues. It allows for individual expression; a profile picture showing what is import to us, or emoji’s to convey our sense of humour. Through WhatsApp it is possible to build a deeply personal yet effective relationship which is all but impossible through the formality of email.

Immediacy:

Classic WhatsApp crisis: You’ve got the message but you don’t want to read it because if you read it they can see that you’ve read it but you have a different message you need to read but if you read it they can see that you are online and then they will know that you don’t want to read their message and they will read into why that may be…!

With its ticks, double ticks, and reporting of when we are online and when we were last online, WhatsApp has created a modern communications equivalent of Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon, where your activity is known and watched at all times by mysterious unseen forces.

This ‘knowing’ and the knowing of the knowing, means that customers feel obliged to respond much more quickly, and at higher rates for WhatsApp vs traditional email.

Functionality:

WhatsApp may pride itself on being simple, but it has some great features which are invaluable for businesses.

• Got lost on your way to a meeting? – Get the location sent to you.
• Want to see a video or photo before you approve the sample? – No issue.
• Need a contact number in an emergency? – It’s there in a jiffy.

OK, you can send photos via email, contacts can be attached, a google map link sent. But, it’s just not as quick or easy as it is via WhatsApp, particularly when you are on the go and away from your desk.

Clarity:

Where there is doubt, let WhatsApp bring clarity. Perhaps this is primarily a Dubai issue stemming from our multi-cultural multi-lingual society, but nothing sorts out a misunderstanding like a WhatsApp.

Go straight to the heart of the issue by sharing a photo or video and getting specific customer feedback.

• Is this the correct one? Photo. Yes. Proceed.
• Should it be like this? Photo. Or this? Photo.
• This paragraph in our contract needs to be amended: Photo.

By using WhatsApp, we can streamline communications, correctly define customer requirements, and swiftly resolve any problems. This improves customer experience, removes pain points for ordering, and helps win more business.

Brevity:

Let’s face it, typing long messages on a smart phone is anything but smart. It is a slow and painful process. Typos will be made. It will be impossible to go back and put the cursor in the correct place. Phones will be thrown.

But you know what, this is great for communication. On WhatsApp, you are forced to say what you need to say, cutting out all unnecessary waffle, and adding only an emoji or two to soften the blow of this more direct approach. This makes for highly impactful and efficient communications. It will also save you an hour drafting a long email which will never get read anyway.

Takeaways and a warning

I have been amazed at how SME’s are using WhatsApp to drive sales and build customer relationships. I now channel 90% of my external customer communication through this platform.

The only business development communication I do not route through WhatsApp is highly formal in nature, for example, a quotation or contract review where I need to send an attachment and also write significant accompanying notes.

Because of the informality, immediacy, functionality, clarity, and brevity of communicating through WhatsApp, the relationships which can be built are deeply personal, incredibly direct, and highly effective. WhatsApp offers a hotline to your customer. When you message them on WhatsApp it is a call for immediate action and response.

BUT, the effectiveness of the WhatsApp communications channel is built upon trust. Trust that you will not use this channel flippantly. Trust that you will not overly contact and pester your customer. Trust that you will use WhatsApp as a tool to communicate ‘with’ rather than ‘at’ your customers. Trust that you will never spam your customer with an advert or general message sent out to all contacts.

Break your customers trust, or fail to build trust, and your WhatsApp’s, just like your emails before, will go unanswered.