The client did not decide to use WhatsApp because your process asked them to. They used it because it was open on their phone, they had your account lead's number, and it was faster than email. That is how a great deal of client communication now happens in agencies, recruiting firms, advisory practices and anywhere else the relationship is personal. The problem is not that clients write on WhatsApp. It is that the conversation then lives on one person's phone, invisible to the rest of the team, outside every record the company keeps.

This article is about turning that into shared work: what WhatsApp itself allows, what changes when you move from the app to the Business Platform, and what a shared inbox has to handle to run a number properly. We build Sektra, which includes a WhatsApp shared inbox, so treat the last section accordingly. The facts about Meta's rules and pricing are from its developer documentation as of September 2026.

What is a WhatsApp shared inbox?

A WhatsApp shared inbox is a workspace where several teammates read and reply to the conversations on one WhatsApp Business number, with each conversation owned by someone, annotated with internal notes, and kept in the company's record alongside email. It requires the number to be on the WhatsApp Business Platform, connected through a provider, rather than on the WhatsApp Business app on a phone. The inbox then handles the rules the platform imposes: the 24-hour customer service window, approved message templates, and per-message billing for templated messages.

The app and the Platform are different products

The WhatsApp Business app is what most small companies start with. It is free, it runs on a phone, and it can be linked to a handful of other devices. It has no concept of who on the team handled a message, no internal notes, no way to route a conversation, and its history lives on the device. It is built for one person answering customers, and for that it is fine.

The WhatsApp Business Platform is the API version. The number is registered to a verified business, messages are sent and received through a Business Solution Provider, and any software the business chooses can sit on top. That is what makes a shared inbox possible: many teammates, one number, conversations as records rather than as a chat log on a phone. It also brings Meta's rules with it, and those rules shape everything a shared inbox has to do.

The rules a team inbox has to handle

The 24-hour customer service window

When a customer messages the business, a 24-hour window opens during which the business can reply with any free-form message. Outside that window, the business can only send pre-approved template messages. In practice that means a team can answer a client normally on the day they wrote, and if the reply slips to the day after tomorrow, it has to go out as a template. A shared inbox should show the window on every conversation, and switch the composer to templates when it closes, rather than letting a reply fail silently.

Message templates and approval

Templates are the messages a business is allowed to send outside the window: a follow-up, a document request, a meeting reminder, a renewal notice. They are submitted for Meta's review, categorized as marketing, utility or authentication, and can be rejected for structural reasons that are easy to get wrong. A team inbox should let you create and submit templates, tell you why one is likely to be rejected before you submit it, and let anyone on the team pick an approved one from the composer with the placeholders filled in.

Per-message pricing

Since July 2025, Meta charges per message rather than per conversation. Free-form messages inside an open customer service window are free. Marketing templates are charged whenever they are sent. Utility templates are free inside an open window and charged outside it. For a client-facing team this is good news: replying to a client who wrote to you costs nothing, and the bill comes only from templated outreach outside the window. It also means the inbox should make clear which kind of message you are about to send.

Opt-in and identity

Businesses may only message people who have agreed to hear from them on WhatsApp, and the number carries a verified business name rather than an individual's. Both are worth planning for: the opt-in usually happens naturally when a client writes first, and the shift from a personal number to a business identity changes the tone of the conversation slightly, which most clients accept and some notice.

What changes for the team

Once the number is on the Platform and in a shared inbox, a WhatsApp conversation behaves like an email thread. It has an owner. It can carry an internal note the client never sees. Two people cannot answer it at once without seeing each other. It shows delivery and read state per message. And it stays in the company's record when the account lead who used to hold the number leaves, which for many firms is the single reason to do this at all.

The subtler change is that WhatsApp stops being a separate world. A client who emails on Monday and messages on Wednesday is one relationship, and a promise made in a WhatsApp message is a promise. A shared inbox that treats the two channels as one record is worth more than one that simply puts them in adjacent tabs.

What to look for

  • Works with your provider. The Platform is reached through a Business Solution Provider; the inbox should connect with the credentials your provider issues and store them encrypted.
  • The window, visibly. Free-form replies inside it, templates outside it, from the same composer, with the state shown on the conversation.
  • Template management with checks. Create, submit and reuse approved templates without leaving the inbox, and catch structural problems before Meta does.
  • History import. Where the provider makes past conversations available, the inbox should import them so the record does not start empty.
  • One record across channels. Email and WhatsApp with the same client should feed the same memory: commitments, open questions, and the rhythm of contact.
  • A plan that counts a number as a shared inbox, so you can see what it costs next to your mailboxes.

Where Sektra fits

Sektra connects a WhatsApp Business number through your provider and runs it as a shared inbox next to Gmail and Outlook. Conversations are threads with an owner, notes, tags and history. The composer handles the 24-hour window, with free-form replies inside it and approved templates outside it, and shows delivery and read state on each message. Templates are created, checked and submitted from Sektra and reused from the composer once approved. Past conversations are imported where the provider allows. And the memory layer reads WhatsApp and email together, so a commitment made on WhatsApp is tracked next to one made by mail, and a client who goes quiet on both is flagged once. A connected number counts as one shared inbox on any plan. The WhatsApp integration page has the details.

The number on your account lead's phone is already a shared inbox in everything but structure. Moving it onto the Platform and into a team inbox does not change what clients do. It changes what the company keeps.