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In order to allow your customers to send WhatsApp messages using the Conversation API, you must onboard them to Sinch's WhatsApp service. You will then create a corresponding Conversation API app for your customer. Both tasks can be accomplished using the Sinch Build Dashboard.

One method to onboard your customers is to use the partner-initiated process within the Sinch Build Dashboard. This is the default process.

This process involves the creation of a project for your customer. Then, your customer will provide business details to you and that you will enter into the Sinch Build Dashboard, allowing them to onboard. After that, you'll assign at least one business profile (and phone number) to the account. Finally, you (the ASP) will create a Conversation API app with the WhatsApp channel configured to use the Sender ID created during the process.

Note: The created sender ID is associated with a WhatsApp Business Account, or WABA. Each of your customers will only be able to provision a single WABA. However, you may assign multiple business profiles/sender IDs to that WABA. If you have already onboarded your customer and want to add more business profiles/phone numbers/sender IDs to the existing WABA, skip to the section entitled Provisioning WhatsApp business profiles and phone numbers.

The corresponding procedures are detailed below.

Prerequisites

Prior to completing the onboarding process, review the following prerequisites. Having all of the requisite information readily available can greatly expedite the onboarding process.

Information and Materials

In order to complete the procedures described in the following sections, you or your customer must have the information described below:

The organization's WhatsApp business account name
The organization's desired display name (this is the name that will be shown as the sender of the messages to your recipients and what will be displayed on your customer's WhatsApp business profile). Your customer will be able to update this name, if desired, in the future.
The organization's Facebook Business Manager ID or portfolio ID. This can be found in the Meta Business Suite application. Navigate to Business settings and click Business info. You can also search for business info on Meta Business Suite and follow the instructions displayed there.
Your customer’s industry (category). This category will ultimately be selected from a pre-defined list provided by Meta. If you select the wrong category, you can have it updated after your customer is onboarded.

Verifying the business

Ensure that your customer has verified their business in Meta's system.

Preparing your Sinch account

Prior to beginning the onboarding process, you must ensure that your (the ASP's) Sinch account is properly prepared:

You must have an account type that matches your organization's goals. Because you are planning to offer customers (and yourself) access to Sinch's WhatsApp service, you must have a Reseller account. Throughout this guide, we assume you have a Reseller account.

Warning: If your account is not a Reseller account, you will be unable to onboard your customers. Reach out to your Account Manager if you have any questions about your account.

Your account must be a postpaid account. Reach out to your Account Manager if your account is prepaid or if you don't know the payment structure of your account.
Ensure that you have access to the WhatsApp functionality and pages on the Sinch Build Dashboard. If you don't have access to these pages, or the functionality on these pages is not available, reach out to your Account Manager.

Project creation

When onboarding a new customer, you must create a separate project for them using your Sinch Build Dashboard account.

Note: If you are planning to use Sinch's WhatsApp service for your own business purposes, in addition to providing your customers access to Sinch's WhatsApp services, you may create a separate project for yourself as well. Ensure you complete your own onboarding process within the project you created for yourself, and not within a project assigned to one of your customers.

To create a new project for this onboarding process:

Log in to the Sinch Build Dashboard. Click the Project menu at the top left of the screen.
Click View all projects. The Projects page is displayed:
Click CREATE PROJECT. The Create project dialog is displayed.
Enter a name for your project in the Name field. Enter a name that meaningfully represents the customer you are onboarding. The name should also be succinct; overly long names may be difficult to view on the Sinch Build Dashboard.
Click CREATE.

Note: For more information, see our article on Creating a new project.

Completing the WhatsApp onboarding procedure

Warning: If you are planning to use Sinch's WhatsApp service for your own business purposes and you wish to onboard your own organization to WhatsApp, you must ensure that you onboard within your own project, and not a project assigned to one of your customers.

To onboard to Sinch's WhatsApp service using the partner-initiated method:

Navigate to the Sinch Build Dashboard.
Ensure you have project you wish to onboard selected.
Click the WhatsApp tab. The WhatsApp onboarding page is displayed.

Ensure that the Partner-initiated option is selected.
Click the Continue button and populate the form that is displayed:

For explanations of these fields, see the Information and Materials section at the beginning of this guide.
Review the values you provided for each field. Once each value is confirmed, click Connect to submit the information to Meta.
You are returned to the WhatsApp onboarding & status screen. The Status of this request will initially appear as Pending:

This will initiate a process on Sinch's backend. Sinch's Provisioning team will contact Meta with the information you and your customer provided and request the creation of a WhatsApp Business Account for your customer.

Meta will then send a communication to your customer in the Meta Business Suite to inform that Sinch is requesting to provision a WhatsApp Business Account for your customer. The communication will request the customer’s confirmation to proceed. The WhatsApp onboarding & status screen on the Sinch Build Dashboard will update once the communication is sent. Ensure that your customer accepts the request in their Meta Business Suite:

Once your customer has confirmed the information with Meta, the Status will be updated to Onboarded:

After completing this procedure, you will be able to create WhatsApp business profiles (and, therefore, assign phone numbers/sender IDs) to your customer's WhatsApp Business Account.

Provisioning WhatsApp business profiles and phone numbers

After provisioning your customer with a WhatsApp Business Account, you must assign at least one business profile to that account. Note that you may assign more than one business profile to your customer's WABA as well.

To provision a WhatsApp business profile/phone number to your customer's WABA:

Click Create new in the Business profiles section. This can be done from either the Overview tab or the Business profiles tab of the Sinch Build Dashboard:
The Create business profile and add WhatsApp number page is displayed. Populate the fields with the business information provided by your customer. A preview of the business profile is displayed on the right side of the page:
Select how you'd like to assign a WhatsApp business number to the profile:
- To use a number provided by your customer, select Bring-your-own number and enter the number in the Phone number field.
- To use a number already procured by Sinch, select Select procured number.
- To request the procurement of a new Sinch phone number, select Request new number procured by Sinch.
If your customer wants more business information displayed on their business profile, click the button to show/hide profile details and then click Edit. Then, populate the fields as desired:

Note: Populating these fields is optional.
Once all the required information has been populated, click Save and submit profile:

Once the business profile has been submitted, the corresponding phone number must be verified. Business profiles awaiting verification will have a Pending verification status with a Verify number action item. Once the phone number is verified, the status will update to Connected:

After a business profile has been connected to the WABA, the corresponding phone number (or WhatsApp Sender ID) will be available for use when configuring the corresponding Conversation API app.

Configuring the WhatsApp Channel of The Conversation API

In order to configure the WhatsApp Channel of the Conversation API:

If you haven't already done so, create a Conversation API app.
Select the Apps option. The Conversation Apps page is displayed.
Click the name of the app to which you want to add the WhatsApp channel.
In the Set up channels section, locate the WhatsApp channel and click SET UP CHANNEL.
The Configuration dialog box is displayed:

Select the Sender Identity (in this case, the WhatsApp phone number) you'd like to assign to this Conversation API app. The app will use this Sender Identity when sending messages on the WhatsApp channel.

Click Save after selecting the sender.

Your Conversation API app is now configured to send messages using WhatsApp. Note the following:

In order to initiate certain types of conversations, you must use specific message templates. These templates can be created using the Sinch Build Dashboard or the Sinch Provisioning API. Once you have created your templates, see our documentation on sending WhatsApp template messages. See the linked documentation for more information on the circumstances that require message templates.
If you (or your client) is messaged first, you are often able to respond using generic, non-template messages.

For full information on the Conversation API's capabilities, see the API reference.

Learn more about the Sinch WhatsApp Business API.