Manage your WhatsApp templates

A WhatsApp template is a message Meta has approved in advance. StoreMink registers one for each order update when you connect your number; you can add your own for anything else you want to send a customer after the 24-hour window has closed, such as a delivery delay or a back-in-stock note.

Open Settings, choose Channels, open the WhatsApp card and choose Manage templates. The page lists every template your number holds, in every language, with Meta's answer: Approved, In review, Rejected with Meta's reason, or Paused and Disabled when Meta has stopped it, or Not submitted when Meta has not received it on this account. Choose Refresh from Meta to read the latest answer; Meta usually reviews a template within a day.

Add a template

Choose New template. Give it a title (its name at Meta is filled in for you: lower-case letters, digits and underscores), pick the language and whether it is Utility (about a customer's order or account) or Marketing (an offer or news). Write the message, using {{1}}, {{2}} and so on for the parts you will fill in each time you send it: each placeholder gets a short label, which the inbox shows you when you send, and a sample value, which Meta reviews the template with. A header line, a footer line and up to three buttons are optional: a quick reply, a link to a web page, or a phone number to call.

Some rules Meta applies are checked before the template is sent: a message cannot start or end with a placeholder, two placeholders cannot sit next to each other, and placeholders are numbered in the order they appear. A utility template that reads like an advertisement, or a marketing message sent as utility, is usually rejected by Meta; the reason it gives is shown on the page.

Choose Send to Meta for review. The template appears as In review and becomes Approved once Meta answers.

Send a template from the inbox

In Inbox, once more than 24 hours have passed since a customer last wrote, the message box offers your approved templates. Choose one, fill in each placeholder and send. A marketing template can be sent only to a customer who agreed to offers and has not turned them off; for anyone else it is greyed out with the reason. A quick-reply button comes back to you as the customer's message with the button's words, so you can answer it like any other. A button worded like STOP or START, such as "Stop promotions", records the customer's choice about offers and is answered for you, as if they had typed it, so a button worded that way can be added only to a marketing template. Templates that need something filled in at sending time, such as a picture header or a copy-code button, cannot be sent from the inbox and are not offered when you add a template.

Delete a template

Choose Delete on one of your own templates. Meta forgets it too, and the inbox stops offering it; a template marked Not submitted was never sent to Meta and is removed only here. If you connect a different WhatsApp Business account, your own templates show as Not submitted: delete each one and add it again to send it to Meta for review on that account. StoreMink's order-update templates are sent for review again when you connect. StoreMink's order-update templates cannot be deleted; to stop one of those messages, switch it off under Settings, Notifications.

Who can change them

Anyone with Channels: view can see the templates. Adding, refreshing or deleting one needs Channels: manage.