HomeResourcesReactivate leads who said "not right now" with a personal WhatsApp campaign
Guide
Reactivate leads who said "not right now" with a personal WhatsApp campaign
You call leads. Some of them say: not right now, but do send me some information. This is how you bring those people back without calling them again, with one message that arrives right after the call and a calculation they do inside WhatsApp.
A WhatsApp campaign from your own system is a sequence of messages on the official WhatsApp Business API where the contacts and the variables come from your CRM, and the replies, button presses and forms come back into your CRM and into a dashboard. Overtoom builds this as a Meta Tech Provider, custom per client, on the systems the client already uses.
What happens
An installer of home batteries calls its leads back. Many calls end the same way: interesting, but not right now. Send me some information. Those people are not gone, they are just not there yet. The question is how to bring them back without a second round of calls.
The answer is one WhatsApp that arrives while the call is still fresh. During the call the advisor ticks "information on WhatsApp", and the message is on the phone a minute later. The lead already knows it is coming, so it does not feel cold. Whoever does nothing gets a reminder later; whoever does something hears from the advisor straight away.
During the call
The advisor ticks "information on WhatsApp" in the CRM.
A minute later
First message, with first name and one button: calculate my savings.
After three days without a response
Reminder with the brochure, in the evening window.
After eight days without a response
Farewell with a choice: advisor or newsletter.
On "call me"
The advisor gets a WhatsApp with name, number and the figures entered.
Why the WhatsApp Business API
They had already tried email. Four reasons this works on WhatsApp, in the order they matter.
Almost no competition for attention
In an inbox you fight dozens of senders a day. On WhatsApp your message sits between family and friends, and it is read the moment it arrives.
Real interaction, in one channel
You ask a question, the customer answers, and gets a calculation back. All inside WhatsApp. Every hop to a website or a form loses people on the way; here there is no hop.
A reminder is one message
Whoever did nothing after three days gets a reminder, only that person, only then. No new round of calls, no new mailing.
You see who you are talking to
Business name, profile photo and Meta's blue verified badge sit at the top of the chat. The recipient does not have to guess whether the message is real.
What the sender looks like
This is the real business profile of our client Zonneplaneet, as the recipient sees it at the top of the chat: company name, logo and the badge verified by Meta.
A calculator inside WhatsApp
The button under the first message does not open a website but a form inside WhatsApp itself, a WhatsApp Flow. You do not expect that in a chat, and that is exactly why it works. This is the screen:
Helder Zonne-energie
Calculate in 1 minute what a home battery saves you
Enter your yearly figures; they are on your inverter or your annual statement.
Yearly production (kWh)
Yearly consumption (kWh)
Calculate my savings
After sending, the result comes straight back as a normal message: what you feed back now, what a battery would keep of that, and an indication in euros per year. Below it, the question whether an advisor may call.
Two fields with validation, so no free text has to be parsed. The form is approved by Meta in advance, like the messages around it.
CampaignPeter→Helder Zonne-energie
The conversation, as Peter sees it.
Peter is an invented customer; the messages are the campaign's real text with the company name replaced.
Scenario
Peter spoke to an advisor last week about a home battery. He sits in the CRM with a name, a number and a tick "follow up on WhatsApp". A day later the campaign starts.
H
Helder Zonne-energie
last seen recently
24h service window closed
Messages are end-to-end encrypted.
One template, a two-field form and a button. The rest happens in your own system: the advisor gets an alert, the dashboard shows where Peter stands.
Speed
Day 1, 10:00. The campaign reads Peter from the CRM and sends the first template.
Hi Peter, thanks for the call last week. Want to know what a home battery would save you? Enter your yearly production and consumption, it takes a minute.
That evening
Calculate my savings
A form opens inside WhatsApp: yearly production and yearly consumption. Peter enters 6,100 and 4,300 kWh.
Thanks Peter. With 6,100 kWh produced and 4,300 kWh used, you currently feed about 2,900 kWh back to the grid. With a 10 kWh battery you keep most of that yourself. Indication: 400 to 550 euros a year.
Shall an advisor call you to work this out precisely for your home?
Call me
Great. Sanne will call you tomorrow between 10 and 12. Reply STOP if you no longer want messages from us.
At the same moment Sanne gets a WhatsApp with Peter's name, number and figures. In the dashboard Peter moves to "advisor request open".
Press play to see the conversation.
Software and custom work
Overtoom works hybrid. You get software you work in, and an integration built for your systems. For a monthly amount, not a one-off with three zeros.
The dashboard
You log in and see your campaigns, your contacts and what happened per person. Leads can be added by hand here if your system does not do it.
Every person in exactly one state, from "appointment made" to "not reached"
Every figure clicks through to the messages underneath
Advisor requests as a work list, with who picks them up
Opt-outs handled automatically, STOP means STOP
The HubSpot integration
The contacts come from HubSpot, so do the variables in the message, and what the customer does in WhatsApp is written back if you want it. This is what that looks like for the example:
HubSpot, or any CRM with an API
First name
the greeting in the message
Phone number
the recipient, checked for country code and opt-out
Information on WhatsApp
the tick that starts the campaign
Advisor
who gets the alert on "call me"
Status
written back: check done, appointment, unsubscribed
Other fields are other variables. The template changes, the integration does not.
A lot of software has a HubSpot integration that does five percent of what you need. We ask what you want to do, and as long as your system's API can handle it, we build it. The HubSpot integration above works like this today; what still needs adding, we add.
How it looks in the dashboard
The figures below are from a demo run with forty invented contacts. Every row is one person in exactly one state.
Home battery savings check
“Hi {{first_name}}, thanks for the call. Want to know what a home battery would save you? Enter your yearly production and consumption, it takes a minute.”
40
Sent
39
Delivered
36
Read
4
Check done
Appointment made1
Spoke to advisor, no appointment1
Advisor request open1
Check done, no follow-up1
Newsletter signed up2
Unsubscribed1
No response32
Not reached1
Delivered and read come from WhatsApp itself. The rest comes from buttons, the form and what the advisor records. Nothing is estimated.
How it fits together
The parts, in the order a contact passes through them. Enough to understand what gets built, not enough to rebuild it yourself.
1
Reading from your system
An integration reads the contacts that meet the condition, in the example the tick "information on WhatsApp". With HubSpot that is the API with a webhook on that property. The number is normalised and checked against the opt-out list before it enters the campaign.
2
Template and Flow
The first message is a template approved by Meta in advance, with the first name as a variable and a button that opens the Flow. The category sets the rate; for a follow-up after a call that is usually marketing.
3
The sequence with conditions
The campaign is a list of steps, each with a moment and a condition. Reminder after three days, only for those who have not done the Flow. Farewell after eight days, only for those who did nothing. Follow-ups fall in an evening window. STOP, with or without punctuation, stops everything for that number.
4
The reply back
Every button press, every completed form and every delivery receipt arrives as a webhook and is stored against the contact. A "call me" sends the advisor a WhatsApp with name, number and figures, and sets the HubSpot status to advisor request. After the call the advisor records whether there is an appointment; that goes back too.
5
One service per client
The whole thing runs as its own service per client on its own server, with the WhatsApp Business API straight from Meta. The WhatsApp number is in the client's name and stays the client's.
What it costs and how long it takes
You pay a monthly amount, sometimes with a start amount on top. There are always two options to choose from. Amounts are not on the site because they depend on the number of steps and systems; a half-hour call gets you them. On top of that you pay Meta per template sent, see the page on WhatsApp pricing.
Lead time depends on two things: Meta's approval of the templates, usually within a day but sometimes a week, and how clean the data in your system is. The integration itself is the fastest part.
The one condition
If your system has a usable API, Overtoom builds the integration. HubSpot, Pipedrive, Salesforce, AFAS, Exact and most web shops have one. A system that can only export works too, but then the reply does not go back automatically. We check that in the first call.
Systems this works with
HubSpotPipedriveSalesforceAFASExactShopify and WooCommerceYour own database or spreadsheet
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a separate WhatsApp number?
Yes, a business number on the WhatsApp Business API. It can be an existing landline or mobile number that is not on WhatsApp yet. Overtoom arranges the connection as a Meta Tech Provider; the number is in your company's name.
Does this work with a CRM other than HubSpot?
Yes. HubSpot is the example because that integration is working today. Any system with an API can be the source; without an API an export works, but then the reply does not go back automatically.
What happens when someone replies STOP?
The campaign stops for that number, including the reminder and the farewell, and the status is written back as unsubscribed. STOP with a full stop or an exclamation mark counts too.
What does Meta charge for sending?
Meta charges per template sent, with a rate per country and per category. Replies inside the 24-hour service window are free. The explanation with current rates is on our WhatsApp pricing page.
Does this look like your situation?
Tell us where your contacts are and what you want to ask them.
A half-hour call. You hear whether it fits, what it costs and how fast it can be done.
