Have you heard about all the pros of using WhatsApp for your lead generation strategy as a digital marketing agency? If you’re reading this article, you probably have, and now you’re looking for some inspiration on how to build the best WhatsApp chatbot to help you improve your conversion and send more quality leads to your clients. 

As you might know, WhatsApp is the most popular messaging app in the world, with more than 2 billion users, meaning that whoever your potential customers are, you’ll probably find them there. Also, WhatsApp chatbots allow you to automate communication with your prospects while building a closer relationship with them thanks to their familiarity with the platform. 

This being said, let’s jump into three WhatsApp bot examples to discover how other companies have used this channel to improve their lead generation process and the results they have achieved so far. 

How to use WhatsApp Chatbots for Lead Generation

First, it’s important to know that using WhatsApp as part of your lead generation campaigns will require a double opt-in process by the user. This basically means that you need the users’ consent to send them WhatsApp messages. 

If you have some doubts about this WhatsApp opt-in policy, the video below will help you clear your mind:

And how can you achieve that in an organical and natural way? Well, think about the best ways and channels to capture your leads because the process is pretty much the same. 

For example, you could use your client’s website as the main first touch-point. Whether it is a sign-up form, a landing page, or a website chatbot, you can use these channels to explain the benefits of receiving messages from the brand on WhatsApp, ask them to share their phone number with you, and get explicit consent. 

Other ways to capture leads and achieve the double opt-in are using your usual email marketing campaigns, social media or even WhatsApp itself. How? If someone gets in touch with your client directly on WhatsApp, you can take the opportunity to ask for their consent to receive more communications through that same channel.

Click-to-WhatsApp ads are also a very straightforward way to get your potential customers to chat with your business through WhatsApp. When clicking on the ad, for example, on social media, users will be directly led to a conversation where you can ask them to opt in to receive future updates. 

Last but not least, a physical store can also be a good touchpoint to grow your WhatsApp audience. You can include QR codes in your client’s shop, the link to your WhatsApp channel on receipts, and gift cards so your customers can easily opt-in and join a loyalty program, for example. 

Now that we’re familiar with a few ways of complying with WhatsApp opt-in policy and capturing leads let’s get some inspiration with WhatsApp bot examples by some brands that managed to make their lead generation process much more effective and efficient while improving their conversion.

Changing Lead Nurturing with Landbot's Ungated Conversations Channel on WhatsApp 

At Landbot, we created the Ungated Conversations WhatsApp channel as part of our lead nurturing strategy. Users can join the conversation through a website chatbot we added to the dedicated landing page or, alternatively, by scanning a QR code. 

‍This channel's purpose is to provide leads and actual customers with valuable content about Landbot’s new features, case studies, and best practices for lead management strategies in order to continue the chat and keep them interested. 

Integrating WhatsApp into our lead nurturing strategy at Landbot via the Ungated Conversations Channel has proven remarkably effective. We observed a read rate of 51% and a response rate of 15% throughout this campaign. To put this into perspective, the read rate on WhatsApp parallels the email open rate, which typically averages between 20-25%. Similarly, the WhatsApp response rate is comparable to the email click-through rate, which usually hovers around 2-3%, as highlighted in Campaign Monitor's "Email Marketing Benchmarks (2023).

Think, then, about all the possibilities a WhatsApp chatbot can have when properly implemented. Linking it to the social campaigns you’re performing to capture leads for your clients can help you get more qualified leads, which will ultimately positively impact your margins. How? By automating repetitive tasks related to the lead management process (such as follow-ups or data entry) and integrating the system with other tools like your clients’ CRM or Google Sheets.

How Choices, One of the UK’s Leading Real Estate Agencies, Boosted Conversion to 9%

Can you imagine dealing with hundreds of leads per month from your Facebook and Instagram campaigns and not being able to qualify them because of missing information over and over again? 

That’s exactly what this second WhatsApp bot example is about and what the Sales team at Choices had to sort out. The majority of the leads, coming from social campaigns, didn’t provide real phone numbers nor enough key information to be considered qualified leads. 

How did they manage to solve this and, on top of that, improve their conversion rate? 

They implemented an AI WhatsApp chatbot to automate the meeting scheduling system between sales reps and landlords, improve efficiency, and also reduce no-shows, thanks to tailored and personalized meeting reminders for the leads. 

Apart from improving the show rate, the AI WhatsApp chatbot enhanced the quality of the sales meetings since both prospects and sales reps now attend them with the correct documentation and a clearer understanding, solving one of the main pain points they were struggling with. All this is thanks to the chatbot's 24/7 availability to answer leads' FAQs. 

Now, the conversations between leads and sales representatives are more worthwhile, and their overall process is faster, which translates into an increase of 9% in the conversation rate from a lead generated to an appointment booked with the landlord.

Hash Ads, a Creative Agency, Helped the Biggest Youth Football Academy in South Africa Improve Player Trials by 60%

Stars of Africa is the biggest youth football academy established in 2003 with the mission to develop young football talent by offering players high-quality skill instruction and coaching. To date, the academy has groomed more than 15 professional football players who went on to represent Europe and the South African national football team.

However, the influx of interest and queries about trials, coaching, and league matches on WhatsApp was difficult to handle since the team didn’t have any automation in place. One person was manually gathering all the needed information from each player and copying and pasting it into a Google Sheet, one by one.

The process was too slow both for the Academy and the players and not scalable at all. 

Hash Ads, their creative agency, suggested automating the process and communication by using WhatsApp, the most used app in South Africa. 

They created a guided, fully automated registration experience that exports all collected applicant data to Google Sheets. It also provides information about the trial process, sends reminders about trial dates, and allows candidates to check results, improving the experience of players. 

The implementation of this WhatsApp chatbot resulted in a 70% increase in trial attendance and a 60% increase in recurring revenue coming from trials, with more than 1,300 applications received last year. 

How to Start Using the WhatsApp Chatbot Builder 

Did you get inspired by these real WhatsApp bot examples? Now it’s time to build your own chatbot to discover first-hand all the benefits it will bring to your lead gen campaigns. 

To start, let’s make things easier! You can begin testing a template already available on the platform tailored to lead generation on WhatsApp. 

You just need to access Landbot, choose ‘Create a bot for WhatsApp’, and then ‘Use a template’. 

You will now be able to choose your use case, which in this case would be ‘Lead Generation’. 

Et voilà! Here’s the template you can use to start experimenting with WhatsApp for your Lead Generation strategy. It can be used as a reference and a basis, but you can play around and add all the blocks you need and modify the structure in order to adapt it to your specific needs. 

Once you have the first version of your WhatsApp bot ready, it’s time to test it! Share it with your teammates and validate that everything works as it should since this is the chatbot your leads will see and interact with. 

Looking good and ready to rock? Let’s share it with your prospects then! You can decide whether you want to use a QR code for people to sign up, link it to your social media ads campaign, or use a widget to embed it on your website.

Congrats! Now your leads will start a conversation with your WhatsApp chatbot, and, on your side, you will be able to transfer all their information to your client. 

Conclusion

As you have seen with these three real WhatsApp bot examples, implementing WhatsApp chatbots as part of your lead generation strategy as a digital marketing agency can truly change how you interact with prospects, streamline communication, and improve your conversion rates. 

WhatsApp for lead generation will allow you to get higher open and response rates compared to email marketing campaigns, as well as interact and engage with your leads at any time, ensuring no opportunities are missed due to slow response times. 

Being cost-effective will be much easier. The WhatsApp chatbot can handle and automate repetitive tasks, so your team doesn’t have to, being able to focus on more valuable tasks. It can also be integrated with your clients’ CRM systems, making the whole data and information transfer smoother. And if you’re worried about the large amount of leads and data you generate, forget about this headache, too, since the chatbot can handle a great number of conversations without compromising the quality of the interaction. 

Ready to get into the WhatsApp chatbot builder and take your lead generation strategy to the next level?