Connect WhatsApp

WhatsApp is the channel DMLY is built around. Connect a number once and it works everywhere: the Inbox, Broadcasts, Automation, appointment and invoice notifications, and voice calls. Getting there means going through Meta, and Meta’s rules shape everything you do afterwards. Read the next two sections before you start. They surprise people most. Prefer to watch first? This walkthrough covers connecting a number end to end.

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The 24-hour window governs everything

You can send a free-form WhatsApp message to a contact only within 24 hours of their last message to you. Outside that window, Meta delivers approved templates only, nothing else. This is Meta’s rule, not DMLY’s, and there is no way around it. Three consequences follow:

• A contact who has never messaged you has no open window. A brand-new lead you imported from a spreadsheet can only be reached with an approved template. Not a “quick hello”.
• WhatsApp gets no extension. Facebook Messenger and Instagram give you a longer period when a human replies. WhatsApp does not; 24 hours is 24 hours.
• The window is per contact, and every inbound message restarts the clock.

DMLY enforces this before anything leaves the building. A free-form send to a contact whose window has closed is stopped and recorded as failed, not pretended into a “Sent”. The Inbox shows you the window as you work:

• a countdown on the conversation,
• a WhatsApp 24-hour customer-care window hint,
• the template route, offered when the window is shut.

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Connecting is not instant

Connecting a number is a Meta process, not a DMLY form. Expect to:

• have a phone number that meets Meta’s criteria (below),
• have access to your Business Manager,
• have business documents ready if your business is not already verified with Meta,
• register the number with a 6-digit PIN before it can send or receive anything,
• wait for Meta to approve each message template before you can use it.

Templates are submitted for review and come back Approved or Rejected on Meta’s schedule. Plan your first broadcast around that, not around the day you connect.

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Before you connect

Meta’s own limits, shown verbatim during signup, are worth reading twice:

• To onboard via Cloud API you can either delete an existing WhatsApp account or use an eligible WhatsApp Business Account.
• Not all WhatsApp Business Accounts qualify for embedded signup — only accounts with significant message history and growth potential can onboard.
• Some features may not be available for WhatsApp Business Accounts due to Meta’s limitations.

You can still use the number for regular calls and messages after registration.

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Connect your number

The recommended path is Meta’s Embedded Signup. The page describes it as Configure WhatsApp via Embedded Signup — Simple (10 mins). If something breaks on the way back, the message names the step that failed: the authorisation code couldn’t be exchanged, no WhatsApp Business Account was granted, or the account has no phone number yet. In each case, retry signup and complete every screen.

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Keep using the WhatsApp Business app too

By default, connecting a number to DMLY’s Cloud API takes it over exclusively. The WhatsApp Business phone app stops working on that number. So if your front desk still answers customers from the phone app, and you want DMLY’s inbox and automation running on the same number, choose co-existence mode instead. On the requirements page, below the main Connect a WhatsApp number button, there’s a separate section: Already using the WhatsApp Business app? with its own Connect in co-existence mode button. Use that one instead of the main button. The rest of the Meta signup is the same. Two things behave differently on a co-existence number:

• Messages you send from the phone app appear in the DMLY inbox too, recorded against the same contact so the thread stays in sync. They’re logged as sent by you, not routed to your bot or automations, because a human is already handling that conversation from the phone.
• Automation can run on the same number as the app. If you’d rather your bot stay quiet whenever you’ve personally replied from the phone, turn on Pause the bot when I reply from the phone app. It pauses the bot for that one contact only, and it’s off by default.

Both the Co-existence badge and that toggle live on the WhatsApp Cloud API Configuration page, the same page you land on to connect in the first place. To get back to it once a number is already connected, go to Integrations → Channels, select Add account, then the WhatsApp tile again. Instead of a fresh connect form it shows your connected number, the Co-existence badge and the pause toggle.

Bring your own WhatsApp Cloud API keys (advanced)

The second option on the same page, Bring your own WhatsApp Cloud API keys — Complex (30 mins), is for businesses that already run their own Meta developer app. Select Configure and supply:

• API Token: a system-user generated permanent API token
• WhatsApp Phone Number ID: from your Meta Developer App › WhatsApp › Getting Started
• WhatsApp Business Account ID

DMLY checks the API Token and Phone Number ID against Meta before saving. The WhatsApp Business Account ID isn’t validated.You then paste the Callback URL and Verify Token shown on the page into Meta Developer App › WhatsApp › Configuration (exactly as shown, with no trailing slash) and subscribe the messages field.If Meta rejects the inbound subscription, the number still connects but messages won’t arrive: the token needs the whatsapp_business_management permission and the number must be registered, not pending.

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Register the number

Connected is not the same as registered. A number that isn’t registered for Cloud API can’t send or receive anything, even though it shows up in DMLY. Open Bot Setup → WhatsApp → Configuration. If the number shows Not registered, enter the 6-digit two-step verification PIN for that number to register it for Cloud API messaging. If Meta refuses, the reason appears on the PIN field; DMLY won’t claim success it didn’t get.

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Check the number’s health

The Configuration tab reads live from Meta every time you open it:

• Quality rating: Meta’s view of how recipients react to your messages. Let it slide and your limits drop.
• Messaging limit (your messaging tier): how many customers you can start conversations with per day. The row reads whichever Meta currently reports: 50 customers / 24h, 250 customers / 24h, 1,000 customers / 24h, 10,000 customers / 24h, 100,000 customers / 24h, or Unlimited. An unverified business starts at 250. Meta raises this on its own as you send well-received messages; nothing in DMLY changes it. See WhatsApp limits.
• Registration and verification state, including whether the display name has been reviewed.

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What you get

The Bot Setup → WhatsApp page (WhatsApp Cloud API Configuration) holds all of it: Configuration, Profile, Commerce, Conversational Components, Forms, Calling and Compliance (India).

Voice calling in short

Three settings on the Calling tab:

• Enable voice calling turns WhatsApp Business calling on for the number.
• Auto-grant call-back permission lets you call a customer back for 7 days after they call you, without a separate permission request.
• Call button in WhatsApp controls whether the call icon shows in the customer’s chat with you.

Inbound calls are free and global. Outbound calls are billed per minute and need the contact’s permission. They cannot be placed at all from business numbers registered in the US, Canada, Egypt, Vietnam or Nigeria: your own number’s country decides, not your contact’s. Full detail: WhatsApp calling.

Compliance (India): only if Meta asks you for it

Meta requires some businesses selling to customers in India to submit WhatsApp Commerce compliance information. This only applies if Meta’s own rules require it of your business; most workspaces will never need this tab.If it applies to you, open the Compliance (India) tab and fill in:

• Legal business name and Entity type (sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability partnership, private or public limited company, or Other with a field to specify it). For partnerships and Other, a Registered business switch records whether it’s a government-registered legal entity.
• Customer care contact: email (required), plus optional mobile and landline numbers.
• Grievance officer: name and email (required), plus optional mobile and landline numbers.

Select Save compliance info. Nothing is stored in DMLY: the form pushes straight to Meta and reads the values back live every time you open the tab. If your number isn’t gated for India compliance, Meta rejects the save and the tab shows its error message rather than a false “saved”.

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Templates: the ones you get and the ones you build

Open the WhatsApp Templates page. It has two tabs. System holds 20 templates DMLY ships and maintains, marked Managed by DMLY. They cover:

• appointment confirmations, updates and reminders, each with a second variant carrying a join link for bookings that happen online, plus one confirmation covering a whole series of bookings at once,
• staff alerts and new conversations,
• invoices, payment receipts, failed payments and renewal reminders,
• gift cards, letter links and phone-number requests,
• review requests, CSAT surveys and client-portal login codes.

All but one are in Meta’s utility category. The login code sits in authentication, Meta’s own category for one-time passcodes. Either way, once approved they are deliverable outside the 24-hour window. They’re created as drafts and submitted to Meta automatically when you connect a live number. My Templates is where you add your own with Add template. Two things to know:

• The template name is what Meta references: lowercase letters, numbers and underscores only.
• Media templates are reviewed against a sample you upload: JPG/PNG up to 5MB, MP4 up to 16MB, PDF up to 100MB.

Every template moves through Draft → Pending → Approved or Rejected. Only Approved templates can be sent; anything else fails at send time. Statuses keep themselves current. DMLY re-checks them with Meta about every ten minutes, and the page shows when it last synced. Refresh templates does that sync on demand when you don’t want to wait.

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Opening the window on purpose

A closed window is the default for anyone new, so get them to message you first:

• Click-to-WhatsApp links and QR codes from Growth tools open a chat with a prefilled code. The flow starts when the contact sends that first message, which is also the moment your 24-hour window opens.
• The Inbox and Contact pages offer Message on WhatsApp wherever a reachable contact appears.
• Store triggers (Shopify, WooCommerce) almost always fire outside the window. Start those flows with an approved template.
• A Click-to-WhatsApp ad does the same thing, and tells you which ad did it. See Arriving from a Click-to-WhatsApp ad.

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Arriving from a Click-to-WhatsApp ad

A Click-to-WhatsApp ad is a Facebook or Instagram ad whose button opens a chat with your number instead of sending people to a website. When somebody taps one and sends that first message, Meta tells DMLY which ad they came from, and DMLY keeps it. There is nothing to switch on. Run the ad in Meta Ads Manager, point it at the number you connected here, and the next person who taps it arrives with the ad attached. Their message also opens the 24-hour window, so you can reply free-form. That matters because otherwise the tap vanishes. Their first message would read exactly like anyone else typing your number in off a business card, and the ad you paid for would be invisible from the moment the conversation started. Instead it lands in three places: on the contact record, on the message itself in the Inbox, and in a flow if you want one.

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What the contact’s Source says

The contact’s Source names the ad. The format is the words WhatsApp ad, a colon, then the ad’s own headline: WhatsApp ad: Summer Sale Three variations to expect:

• They tapped a post, not a paid ad. It reads WhatsApp post: Our new opening hours instead. Same shape, different first word.
• The ad has no headline. The source is the bare WhatsApp ad.
• A very long headline is trimmed, so the record stays readable.

The headline is used rather than the ad’s ID number because the headline is the half you wrote and will recognise on sight. An ID like 120209428414010371 names nothing to the person reading a contact record. The ID is kept too, on the message, which is what Reports → Ads groups by. Source shows on the contact’s profile, and it is a segment field as well. Pick Source, choose contains, then type:

• WhatsApp ad for every contact any ad has ever brought you,
• the full WhatsApp ad: Summer Sale for one campaign.

See Tags and segments.

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The first ad keeps the credit

Source answers one question: which ad brought this person to you in the first place. So once it is set, an ad never overwrites it.

• A later ad doesn’t steal it. Somebody won by Summer Sale who taps your Winter Clearance ad six weeks later still reads WhatsApp ad: Summer Sale.
• A source you set yourself is never touched. If you’d typed Walk-in referral on that contact, the ad click leaves it exactly as it is.
• The bare channel name counts as blank. A WhatsApp contact starts life with a source of just WhatsApp, which is a placeholder rather than an answer, so the first ad they tap replaces it. That holds for contacts you already had, not only brand-new ones.

This is deliberate, and it protects your figures. The ad that paid to win a customer should keep that customer, rather than handing them to a re-engagement ad that merely reached somebody you already had. Every message still records its own ad, though. The Winter Clearance tap above is stored on the message it arrived on, so nothing about the later click is lost; it just doesn’t move the contact’s Source. That is what lets Reports → Ads count what each ad produced in conversations while still crediting each customer to the ad that actually won them.

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On the message itself

In the Inbox, the customer’s message carries a small card above their words: a strip of the creative, the line From an ad (or From a post), the headline, and the first couple of lines of the ad’s body text. Full detail: when a message came from an ad.

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When things go wrong

Connected, but nothing arrives in the Inbox

Two things must be true: your WhatsApp Business Account must be subscribed to the app, and the number must be Registered. Check the Configuration tab first.If both look right and messages still don’t arrive, the remaining suspect is the webhook configuration in the Meta App Dashboard: the callback URL and the messages field. DMLY can’t read or set that from here, so it has to be checked at Meta. Full walkthrough: No inbound messages.

The channel shows Unauthorized

This means the access token stopped working: Access token has expired. Reconnect your account. DMLY emails the workspace admin (subject: We’ve Lost Connection - Action Required) once per disconnect. While it’s unauthorized, the profile, commerce, conversational and calling settings all go blank and nothing sends. Reconnect the number to fix it.

It says Connected but messages silently fail

DMLY marks a number Unauthorized when Meta returns an authentication error. Other kinds of Meta rejection (a policy block, a quality restriction, a disabled account) don’t look like authentication errors, so the channel can keep showing Connected while sends fail.If sends are failing and the badge looks fine, check the number’s status directly in your Meta Business Manager, then see Account disabled and Logs.

Nothing sends to one particular contact

Two likely causes, in this order: the contact has opted out (nothing is sent to an opted-out contact, ever), or their 24-hour window is closed and the message isn’t a template.

An old reconnect left a second WhatsApp profile

Reconnecting a number now updates the existing profile in place, even when it is a different WhatsApp Business Account. Workspaces reconnected before August 2026 can still be carrying a leftover profile from then, because nothing removed it automatically. If the channel selector offers two profiles for one number, disconnect the stale one. See Delete a WhatsApp number.

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