Customer behavior differences on WhatsApp and email

Should you treat email, SMS, and WhatsApp the same? Absolutely not. Email is expected. It’s the channel customers check when they have time. It’s passive, it sits quietly in the inbox. SMS and WhatsApp are different - they interrupt. They live next to messages from partners, friends, group chats. You’re not just competing with other brands, you’re stepping into someone’s personal life. If you're going to use those channels, the message has to earn its place. What’s worthy? A product drop with real demand. A time-sensitive, high-impact promotion. A restock alert for something I actually wanted. “New arrivals” and “browse the latest” might be fine for email, but they're lazy content for SMS or WhatsApp. If you’re working across multiple platforms, the question isn’t just what you’re saying, it’s how, where, and when you're saying it. We should be considering: Sequencing: If the customer received the offer via email this morning, should SMS follow up tomorrow if unopened? Or should WhatsApp be used only if they’ve historically engaged there? Suppression logic: Avoid over-messaging. Are we throttling based on frequency and channel mix? Personalisation by behaviour: Does the channel match the customer's engagement pattern? (E.g. only send SMS to those who click and convert from it.) Context-aware content: Messaging should feel native to the channel. WhatsApp shouldn’t feel like an email copy-paste. SMS shouldn't mimic a website banner. Most importantly: your customer is one person. They deserve a joined-up, intentional journey, not three disconnected nudges about the same thing.

Things I Learned the Hard Way about Customer Support. 1. Providing a solution might be easy. Getting the solution executed is hard. Indian users are very open to sharing their grievances. They are equally quick to drop off chat or call once a solution has been given. Maintaining a conversational relationship to see the customer implementing a solution is critical. Otherwise the customer will return to customer support. 2. WhatsApp is the only scalable way to support customers. I was surprised that only a handful of emails are replied to by customers every week — until I realised that inboxes of SMBs are full of spam! It's difficult for SMBs to even find an email from customer support of a specific service or product. This leads to almost zero open rates on emails. (WhatsApp performs much better but requires a significant investment in a WhatsApp-based CRM). 3. Customers expect agents to just call back. It took me a long time to realise that if someone is not responding on chat or to a WhatsApp message — the best way to contact them is to directly call them. Customers feel better supported on calls over the hassle of explaining their issues in writing. Many customers begin chatting by directly asking for a call back. They express frustration that they have to reinitiate chat support despite them having written their issue once, and then have dropped or got distracted before an agent could respond. Customers expect that if you are serious about customer support, you will call them back. In fact they will send a screenshot of the list price of services or products and ask for discounts or sales call back! — invest in a customer support team that is comfortable with switching from chat support to calling customers. 4. If your services are website-only or browser-dependent while your support is on mobile, specifically WhatsApp — you should think about the experience of customers operating across platforms and plan for customers to have access to the information they need on WhatsApp itself. Your support team cannot guide users operating across platforms, effectively. Many of your customers might be logged in to your website on a mobile browser while seeking support on WhatsApp or call, this means that they will constantly be switching between apps while your chat agent waits or might need to put their phone on speaker mode (assuming most Indian SMBs aren't earphones savvy) if your agent called them and shared solutions for them to execute on their phone browser. Most likely your agent will also have to send the solution to the customer in easy to follow steps on WhatsApp, after the call. My experience stems from building a customer support workstream from scratch for 4 years along the blurred lines of B2C and B2B. #India #SMB #WhatsApp #CustomerExperience #UserBehaviour #CustomerSupport #Chat #Call PS: I am looking for new gigs preferably remote: 0-1 set ups, Operations Generalist, Founder's office, Chief of Staff, Project Management.

The biggest hack in growing a business in 2025 is understanding consumer behaviour, especially when it comes to platforms. From my research and experience, different audiences interact with content differently and belong to communities in unique ways. Outside the US, WhatsApp is the go-to platform for communication and community. No wonder all the top brands now have WhatsApp channels and communities. To put this in perspective, WhatsApp has over 2 billion global users, making it the leading messaging app in many regions outside the US. Brands are leveraging WhatsApp’s group and community features, which support up to 1,024 members per group and up to 50 groups within a community, to build highly engaged audiences. We conducted a litmus test on community building and engagement. We discovered that email open rates, Slack engagement, and other platforms performed considerably lower compared to WhatsApp. For example, WhatsApp messages have an average open rate of 98%, while email open rates hover around 21-25%. Conversion rates on WhatsApp can reach 45-60%, significantly higher than the 2-5% typically seen with email or SMS campaigns. Now, with the rise of AI, WhatsApp automation and chatbots are helping businesses increase engagement, boost appointment show-up rates, and drive overall sales. Businesses using WhatsApp chatbots have reported up to a 60% increase in sales, 3x higher customer conversion rates, and a 30% reduction in operational costs. These AI-powered tools enable personalised, real-time communication, which 72% of consumers say makes them more likely to engage, and 66% have made purchases after interacting with a brand on WhatsApp. As a founder, you should not only tailor your customer journey to the platforms your audience already uses but also start leveraging AI to speed up conversations and free up your time. Building and managing communities on WhatsApp, using sub-groups, broadcast lists, and polls, keeps engagement high and fosters a sense of belonging. If you’d like to learn more about how WhatsApp can help you scale your business, I’m happy to chat. ♻️ Repost and Share with someone who needs this strategy #socialmedia #digitalmarketing #ai #marketing #growth #community #communitybuilder #whatsapp #aiautomation