In the 21st century, staying connected with your friends and families is a necessity and it is not an impossible task as technology has bestowed us with an option to do that. Social media helps us get connected with people, even if they are from the opposite part of the world.
Apart from staying connected, social media also helps us stay up to date, join communities, and share our similar interests with others and also helps people with their business.
One of the most essential and popular social media platforms that help us stay connected with each other is definitely, WhatsApp Messenger. This instant messaging app is owned by Meta and was founded in the year 2009 by Brian Acton and Jan Koum. Today, the instant messaging app is used by over 2 billion people.
Recently, WhatsApp is said to have launched a new feature called WhatsApp Communities. In this article, we will talk about what WhatsApp Communities is and how it is going to help businesses. So, without any further ado, let’s get right into the business.
“WhatsApp’ began as a simple idea: ensuring that anyone could stay in touch with family and friends anywhere on the planet, without costs or gimmicks standing in the way.” -Jan Koum
What Is WhatsApp Communities?
What Will WhatsApp Communities Offer?
How Whatsapp Communities Is Different From WhatsApp Groups?
How Can Businesses Leverage WhatsApp Communities?
What Is Whatsapp Communities?
The first update about the WhatsApp community feature came from WABetainfo in the first week of November 2021. WhatsApp Communities is an upcoming feature by WhatsApp for its users where they can combine different WhatsApp groups into a single one and can be controlled by the admin.
This community will be used to communicate with people from different groups in the same space and they can also share their opinions here about different topics. The feature is said to be available first for iOS users than for android users. WhatsApp has been working on this feature for quite a while, as its competitors like Telegram and Discord already have a similar feature like this called Telegram Channel and Discord Server.
What Will WhatsApp Communities Offer?
The WhatsApp Communities introduced by WhatsApp will offer some exciting and necessary features to its users and they are:
- One can add multiple WhatsApp Groups with the help of this feature into a larger group known as the Communities.
- Just like any other WhatsApp group, Communities also have the option to add descriptions and names of the community.
- There is an announcement section that is open for only the admins of the group.
- Any kind of message that is photos, videos, voice messages, or files like doc, mp3, and zip can be sent in the community without any restrictions.
- As different groups will be present in a single community, it becomes easier to reach a large number of people at once by sending a message in the community.
How WhatsApp Communities Is Different From Whatsapp Groups?
Some of the differences from regular WhatsApp groups that make WhatsApp Communities unique are:
- WhatsApp lets you add only 256 people to a WhatsApp group, while Communities is said to have an option of adding as many groups as they can in the community, their number of individual contacts will be there in the community.
- The Communities admin is set to have more power and control over the groups added to the community.
- To connect with different groups, now only one message is enough that can be sent to the community and everyone present there from all the groups will receive the message.
- The admin has the power to specify who can message in this community.
- The icon of the Communities is going to be different. While normal chats and groups have round icons, the community will have a square icon with round edges, this will help the user to differentiate normal chats and groups from the Communities.
Annika Motamarri
How Can Businesses Leverage WhatsApp Communities?
WhatsApp is used by businesses to promote their products and services and of course, it also helps in keeping the customers engaged with the brand. With the instant messaging app’s new feature WhatsApp Community that is about to roll in, businesses will also receive some advantages with the help of this community. Those advantages are:
- The community is made to put together individuals who have the same interests in a single big group and create a community that will be for their business.
- Marketing of the products and services can be done easily as videos or other informative things can be shared there to reach the masses.
- The community can be easily managed by the admin; it provides all the similar options to a normal group but also this upgraded feature gives the admin of the community better control.
- The best thing about this is that it is free, and marketing your business through this feature will not cost you an extra penny, and you will also be able to reach a large number of people to market your business.
Abira Dutta
Conclusion
WhatsApp has conquered the entire world since 2009. It is the most used instant messaging app in the world. WhatsApp has always helped small businesses with marketing and other stuff with its features. Now with the new feature called Community, it is only going to get bigger for businesses.
FAQs
What is WhatsApp communities?
Whatsapp communities is an upcoming community feature by WhatsApp that will let you connect with different WhatsApp groups and will give more power to the admin.
When will WhatsApp communities launch?
There is no release date announced yet as the feature is still under development and will launch on iOS first and then on Android.
