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WhatsApp

Connect WhatsApp to your Workspace to receive customer messages the moment they arrive, answer them with text, files, buttons, and menus, and reach customers again later with approved message templates — on your own business phone number.

What Luo can do

  • Receive messages — Luo is notified of every message a customer sends to your number: text, images, video, audio, documents, stickers, locations, button taps, and reactions. Your workspace can store them, route them by keyword, or start a task automatically.
  • Reply — send text (with WhatsApp formatting and link previews), images, and documents, and quote the customer’s message so your reply shows as a threaded response
  • Send files from your workspace — send a generated report, invoice, or stored image straight from your workspace, without needing a public link. WhatsApp shows it as an image, video, audio clip, sticker, or document depending on the file type.
  • Interactive messages — send up to 3 reply buttons, a menu of up to 10 options, or a single button that opens a link (a booking page, an invoice, a tracking page). When the customer taps, the choice comes back to Luo.
  • Reactions — react to a customer’s message with an emoji, or remove the reaction
  • Read receipts and typing — mark messages as read (blue ticks) and show a typing indicator while a reply is being written
  • Download media — save the photos, documents, and voice notes customers send you
  • Message templates — list, create, edit, and delete templates, and send approved templates to reach customers outside the 24-hour customer service window
  • Delivery tracking — follow each message you send as it’s sent, delivered, read, or fails
  • Account alerts — Luo is told when a template is approved or rejected, and when Meta restricts your account or the connection needs reconnecting

If you keep using the WhatsApp Business app on the same number, Luo can also bring in your chat history, your contacts, and the messages you send from your phone — see Using the WhatsApp Business app at the same time.

Luo asks for your confirmation before it sends a message or template, and before it creates, edits, or deletes a template. You can choose to always allow an action — for messages, that covers only that recipient; for new templates, only that category; for edits and deletes, only that template. Reactions, read receipts, and typing indicators don’t ask for confirmation.

What Luo can’t do

  • Read past conversations. WhatsApp has no way to look up old messages. Luo only sees messages that arrive after you connect, so a workspace that shows or searches your conversations stores each message as it comes in. (The one exception is the chat history imported from the WhatsApp Business app.)
  • Group chats. Luo handles one-to-one conversations with customers.
  • Message a customer freely after 24 hours of silence. Outside the customer service window, only approved templates can be sent.
  • Create every kind of template. Luo builds templates with a text header, body, footer, and buttons. Templates with an image, video, or document header, and authentication (one-time passcode) templates, have to be created in Meta’s WhatsApp Manager — Luo can still send them once they’re approved.
  • React to old messages. Reactions only work on messages from the last 30 days.

Before you start

  • You’ll need a Facebook account to sign in to Meta during setup, and a business phone number for WhatsApp — either a new one, or the number you already use in the WhatsApp Business app.
  • Meta bills your business directly for messages, on the payment method you set up with Meta. Luo adds nothing on top.

How to connect

WhatsApp connects through a Meta window that opens on top of Luo. There are no keys to copy.

  1. Open your workspace in Luo, go to Settings → Integrations, and click Add Integration.
  2. Select WhatsApp.
  3. Choose to connect as a User Integration (your personal connection) or a Workspace Integration (shared across members), and click one of the two buttons on that card:
    • Connect my WhatsApp Business app — keep using WhatsApp Business on your phone; Luo joins the same number. See Using the WhatsApp Business app at the same time.
    • Connect a new number — use a number that isn’t on the WhatsApp Business app, or set up a new one.
  4. In the Meta window, sign in with Facebook and follow the steps:
    • New number: pick or create a WhatsApp Business account, then add or verify the business phone number Luo should use.
    • WhatsApp Business app: enter the number you use in the app. Meta shows a verification code — enter it in the WhatsApp Business app on your phone.
  5. When the window closes, Luo finishes setting up the number. You’ll see Connected to WhatsApp.
  6. Click Create Integration. The connection is named after your business name and number, e.g. Acme Bakery (+49 151 2345678).

Each connection is one business phone number. To answer on another number, add WhatsApp again and pick that number.

Using the WhatsApp Business app at the same time

When you connect with Connect my WhatsApp Business app, your number works in both places: you can keep replying from your phone, and Luo answers through the same number.

  • Chat history — your one-to-one chats from the last 6 months are imported into Luo. Photos and files are included only for the 14 days before you connected; older ones show as placeholders. If you choose not to share your history in the WhatsApp Business app, none is imported.
  • Contacts — your WhatsApp Business app contacts sync into Luo, so conversations can show the names you saved. Contacts you add, rename, or remove on your phone later are synced too.
  • Messages sent from your phone show up in Luo as well, including edits and deletions, so your workspace shows both sides of each conversation.

Things to know before you choose this option:

  • It needs WhatsApp Business app version 2.24.17 or newer.
  • Group chats don’t sync.
  • On a shared number, disappearing messages, view-once messages, live location, and broadcast lists are turned off.
  • A shared number can send at most 20 messages per second.
  • Messages you send from your phone aren’t limited by the 24-hour window, but messages Luo sends still are.

Set up your inbox right after connecting. Meta only sends the history and contacts within 24 hours of connecting, and Luo only keeps them if your workspace is ready to store them when they arrive. If you connect first and build your WhatsApp inbox later, ask the assistant to request the history (or contacts) again — it can do that within the first 24 hours. After that, the only way to get them is to reconnect the number.

The 24-hour customer service window

WhatsApp only lets businesses send free-form messages — text, images, documents, files, buttons, menus, and reactions — within 24 hours of the customer’s last message. Each new message from the customer reopens the window.

Outside the window, a free-form message fails. To reach the customer then — a reminder, an order update, a follow-up — Luo sends an approved message template instead. Once the customer replies, the window is open again.

Message templates

A template is a reusable message that Meta reviews once, before it can be sent. Ask the assistant to set up the few templates your business needs (for example an order update and an appointment reminder) — not a new one for every message.

  • Categories — Utility templates are for updates the customer expects from an existing relationship: orders, appointments, account and payment notices. Marketing templates are for offers and anything promotional; Meta limits how often each customer receives them, and customers can opt out. Meta may move a utility template it judges promotional into marketing, which is billed at a higher rate — the assistant tells you if that happens.
  • Content — a template has a body (up to 1,024 characters) with numbered placeholders like 1 and 2 that are filled in when it’s sent, plus an optional text header, footer, and up to 10 buttons: quick replies, links, a call button, or a copy-code button for coupons.
  • Review — Meta reviews each new or edited template, usually within minutes and at most 24 hours. Luo is told when a template is approved, rejected (with the reason), paused, or disabled, so you don’t need to keep checking. Only approved templates can be sent.
  • Editing — fix a rejected template by editing it rather than creating a near-duplicate. An approved template can be edited once every 24 hours and up to 10 times in 30 days, and each edit is reviewed again.
  • Deleting — deleting an approved template blocks its name for 30 days. Editing it, or using a new name, is usually better.
  • Opt-in — you need the customer’s permission before you message them first with a template.

Good to know

  • Customers with a WhatsApp username. Some customers use a WhatsApp username instead of showing their phone number, and Meta stops sharing a customer’s number 30 days after your last exchange. Luo can still receive and answer these customers’ messages. Authentication templates can’t be sent to a customer whose number isn’t known.
  • Download customer media within 7 days. Meta deletes the photos and files customers send after 7 days, so a workspace that keeps them saves them as they arrive.
  • Keep copies of the files you send. WhatsApp doesn’t let Luo fetch a sent file again later, so workspaces that show sent media keep their own copy.
  • File size limits. Images up to 5 MB, video and audio up to 16 MB, stickers up to 500 KB, and documents up to 100 MB.
  • Quality rating. Meta rates your number green, yellow, or red based on how customers respond to your messages. A red rating slows down sending. Ask the assistant to check your number’s current rating.

Troubleshooting

  • The Meta window doesn’t open, or “Could not load the Facebook SDK” — allow pop-ups for Luo, and if you use an ad or tracking blocker, allow connect.facebook.net. Then try again.
  • “You declined the permissions Luo needs” — run the signup again and allow access to the WhatsApp Business account.
  • “The signup code expired” — Meta allows only 30 seconds after the window closes. Connect again.
  • “The signup did not share any WhatsApp Business Account with Luo” or “The WhatsApp Business Account has no phone number yet” — run the signup again, select a WhatsApp Business account, and add a phone number in the Meta window.
  • “The account has … phone numbers and the dialog did not say which one to connect” — run the signup again and pick the number you want Luo to use.
  • A message failed with error 131047 — the 24-hour window had closed. Send an approved template instead.
  • A template was rejected — the assistant shows Meta’s reason (for example, promotional content in a utility template, or a formatting problem). Edit the template and it’s reviewed again.
  • No chat history from the WhatsApp Business app — see the note above. Within 24 hours of connecting, ask the assistant to request it again; after that, reconnect the number.
  • Messages stopped arriving or sending — the connection needs to be reconnected. This happens when Luo was removed from your Meta business settings, or when Meta restricted, disabled, or disconnected the account or number. Luo is notified when this happens; reconnect WhatsApp under Settings → Integrations.

Privacy and data handling

Luo connects with a token that only covers the WhatsApp Business account you chose in the Meta window, and stores it encrypted. Data flowing through Luo is governed by Luo’s security and privacy practices.

To revoke access, remove Luo in your Meta Business settings under Business Settings → Integrations → Connected apps — sending and receiving stop immediately. Then remove the integration in Luo.