WhatsApp on Wednesday launched a new feature, Businesses Nearby. It will make it possible to search for businesses within its app for the first time, the company told Reuters. This is a step towards making the messaging platform a critical connector for more functions. The test is taking place in São Paulo, Brazil. It also allows WhatsApp users to find shops and services through a directory in the app. Moreover, this is the latest feature in Facebook’s drive to bolster e-commerce on its services.
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WhatsApp starts testing new feature to search for businesses
According to Reuters, WhatsApp has revealed that the businesses would include categories like food, retail and local services. This will be across certain São Paulo neighbourhoods. He also confirmed that the test can expand to countries like India and Indonesia. Especially as the company believes these countries are “good candidates to expand the feature”.
Meanwhile, as of now, WhatsApp does not run ads in its app like Facebook. However, the company may introduce in-app ads in the future, something which all users have dreaded for a long time.
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On the other hand, as online retail has continued to boom during the COVID-19 pandemic, Facebook has pushed in-app shopping features across its apps. Zuckerberg announced that Facebook’s Shops feature would expand to WhatsApp in several countries. Recently, WhatsApp also has also launched shopping tools like product catalogues and shopping carts.
The messaging platform has increasingly courted business users. Especially with a specialised app for small firms and an API, or type of software interface, for larger businesses to connect their systems, which generates revenue.
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On a separate note, WhatsApp is now letting non-beta users test the multi-device feature. The company has rolled out the feature in July this year to the beta testers only. However, now it seems that WhatsApp is inching closer to rolling out the feature for all users.
Sushmita Choubey
Marketer to the core, a writer from the soul. Engineer and an MBA turned budding tech writer - dabbling her hands in all genres of writing from tech to fiction. If not writing, you will always find me reading anything and everything. Otherwise, you will find me learning new languages.