What this integration does
Once connected, your WhatsApp Business Account's conversations flow straight into your SalesThumb Inbox — right alongside your SMS threads, each carrying its own WhatsApp channel badge so you can tell at a glance which channel a conversation came in on. Your team replies from one place instead of switching over to WhatsApp Business or Meta Business Suite.
WhatsApp connects differently than Facebook Messenger does in SalesThumb. There's no token to copy and paste. Instead you click Connect and a one-click Meta signup popup walks you through picking or creating your WhatsApp Business Account and phone number — SalesThumb never sees a token you'd have to type in yourself. That's not a design choice so much as a Meta requirement: the kind of credential SalesThumb needs to send and receive on your behalf only comes out the other end of that guided signup, there's no way for a shop owner to generate one on their own the way you can with a Facebook Page Access Token.
You connect and pay Meta directly for your own WhatsApp Business Account — SalesThumb never fronts or marks up your messaging costs.
Connecting your WhatsApp Business Account
You'll need Owner or Admin access on your SalesThumb account — connecting and disconnecting integrations is restricted to those two roles.
1. Go to Settings → Integrations and find the WhatsApp card, or open the WhatsApp integration page directly. 2. Click Connect WhatsApp. This opens Meta's guided signup in a popup — you'll log into (or confirm) your Facebook account, then pick or create the WhatsApp Business Account and phone number you want to connect. Nothing is typed or pasted back in SalesThumb. 3. Complete the popup. SalesThumb picks up the details that come back from Meta once you finish — including a short-lived authorization code and identifiers for the WhatsApp Business Account and phone number you just chose — and uses them to establish the connection automatically. You don't need to do anything else once the popup closes. 4. Once connected, the page shows your connected phone number and how long ago you connected. SalesThumb double-checks that the credential it received actually has authority over the phone number you picked before it finishes connecting, so a signup can't accidentally attach a number you don't control.
A WhatsApp phone number can only be actively connected to one SalesThumb shop at a time. If you try to connect a number that's already active on a different shop, you'll get a clear message telling you to disconnect it there first.
Where messages show up
New WhatsApp conversations arrive in your Inbox automatically once you're connected — they're pulled in by Meta pushing events to SalesThumb in the background, not by anything you need to configure by hand. Each WhatsApp message shows its own channel badge in the thread list so it's easy to tell apart from SMS at a glance. Replying from the Inbox sends through your connected WhatsApp Business Account, and only works for numbers that have already messaged your shop's WhatsApp number first — you can't cold-message a new number from the Inbox. Sending can also pause automatically if your shop sends an unusually high volume of WhatsApp replies in a short window, or if your shop's monthly messaging spend cap is reached — both are built-in safeguards, not something you need to configure.
Disconnecting
If you need to turn the connection off, go to Settings → Integrations → WhatsApp and click Disconnect. You'll see a confirmation prompt: "Disconnect WhatsApp? Messages already pulled into the Inbox stay; no new ones will sync."
Confirming that prompt marks the connection inactive — it does not delete the connection record. New WhatsApp conversations stop syncing into your Inbox right away, and any reply you try to send afterward drops into the same safe demo mode described below — logged, but not actually delivered — rather than reaching the customer. Everything already in your Inbox stays put, and your connection history is preserved. Once disconnected, that phone number becomes available for a different SalesThumb shop to connect (WhatsApp numbers can move between businesses over time), so reconnecting the same number later goes through the signup popup again rather than a simple toggle.
A note on demo mode
If you haven't connected a real WhatsApp Business Account yet, the WhatsApp settings page and Inbox show clearly labeled demo data so you can see how the feature works before you commit to setting one up with Meta. Once you complete the connect popup with a real account, demo mode turns off and everything switches to your live conversations.
Things to know
- Connecting and disconnecting WhatsApp is restricted to Owner and Admin roles.
- There's no manual token entry for WhatsApp — connecting always goes through Meta's one-click signup popup, unlike Facebook Messenger's paste-a-token flow.
- You connect your own WhatsApp Business Account directly with Meta and pay Meta for your own messaging usage; SalesThumb doesn't front or mark up that cost.
- Replies from the Inbox only go to a WhatsApp number that has already messaged your shop first — there's no way to start a fresh WhatsApp conversation from SalesThumb.
- Sending can pause automatically if you send a high volume of WhatsApp replies quickly, or if your shop's monthly messaging spend cap is reached — both are built-in safeguards rather than something you configure.
- A given WhatsApp phone number can only be actively connected to one SalesThumb shop at a time.
- Disconnecting is reversible and non-destructive: it stops new messages from syncing and any attempted reply from actually delivering, but it keeps your existing Inbox history and connection record intact.
Frequently asked questions
Q: Do I need a Facebook account to connect WhatsApp?
A: Yes. The one-click signup popup runs through Meta, so you'll need a Facebook account to complete it, the same as you would setting up WhatsApp Business tools directly with Meta.
Q: Do I have to paste in a token like I do for Facebook Messenger?
A: No. WhatsApp connects entirely through a one-click signup popup — you never see or handle a token yourself. This is different from Facebook Messenger, which uses a manual Page Access Token paste.
Q: Does SalesThumb charge extra for WhatsApp messages?
A: No. You connect and pay Meta directly for your own WhatsApp Business Account's usage — SalesThumb never fronts or marks up that cost. Sending can still pause temporarily if your shop's monthly messaging spend cap is reached, or if you send an unusually high volume of replies in a short window.
Q: Can I message a WhatsApp customer who hasn't messaged us first?
A: Not from the Inbox reply box. Replies only go to a number that has already sent your shop a WhatsApp message first — you can't start a fresh WhatsApp conversation from the Inbox.
Q: What happens to my Inbox history if I disconnect WhatsApp?
A: Nothing is deleted. Disconnecting stops new WhatsApp messages from syncing in and stops replies from actually delivering, but every conversation already in your Inbox stays exactly where it is.
Q: Can I reconnect the same WhatsApp number later?
A: Yes — go through the Connect popup again. Since the connection is inactive rather than deleted after a disconnect, SalesThumb reactivates it rather than starting completely from scratch, as long as no other shop has since connected that same number.