The most common first message to a WhatsApp chatbot in India is some version of "agent". Not a question — a request to skip the bot. People have learned that a menu of numbered options is where their time goes to die, and they would rather wait for a person.
That is a design problem, not a WhatsApp problem. Here is how to set up a WhatsApp chatbot that people actually talk to, in the order the decisions need making.
What you need before the bot
The WhatsApp Business API, not the app
The free WhatsApp Business app on a phone cannot run a chatbot properly: one device, a few quick replies, no integration. A chatbot needs the WhatsApp Business Platform (the API), reached through a provider. Every provider resells the same API from Meta, so the choice is about the software on top. What you are actually buying.
A number you own
Register the number in your own Meta business account, not your provider's. It is the difference between changing provider in an afternoon and starting again from zero. Why it matters when you switch.
A list of what people actually ask
Export the last few hundred chats and sort them by what the customer wanted. You will find that a handful of intents — order status, price, availability, booking, a complaint — make up most of the volume. Those are your bot's job description. Everything else is a handover.
Menu bot or AI chatbot?
A menu bot is a flowchart: buttons and numbered replies, every path drawn by hand. An AI chatbot reads the sentence the customer actually typed — in English, Hindi written in English letters, or a mix of both — and answers from your knowledge.
Menus still have a place. WhatsApp's own buttons and list messages are good for a final choice ("Which of these three slots?"), and WhatsApp Flows are good for structured forms. What fails is forcing a menu at the start, before you know what the person wants. Let them say it; use buttons to confirm it.
Setting it up, step by step
- Write the job, not a personality. Who the customers are, which four or five things the bot handles, what it must never do, and the tone. Three sentences of scope prevent most embarrassing transcripts. How to write the instruction.
- Give it your facts. Prices, policies, delivery areas and FAQs as documents or crawled pages. If the bot does not know, it should say so — not guess. Arranging a knowledge base for an agent.
- Write the first message. One line that says what it can do and that a person is available. "Hi, I can check orders, prices and book a visit — or get you a person" earns more replies than a greeting and a menu. Writing the first message.
- Add the one action that matters most. Usually booking a slot or looking up an order. A WhatsApp chatbot that can finish one job beats one that can describe ten. Giving a bot functions.
- Write the handover conditions. The customer asks for a person; it is a refund or a complaint; the lead qualifies; the bot is not confident. Each condition says where the chat goes. Writing handover conditions.
- Test the unhappy paths. Spelling mistakes, Hinglish, a voice note, a question you did not cover, a customer who is angry. The happy path almost always works. Testing a bot.
- Point the channel at it. Only now. And watch the first hundred conversations yourself.
The 24-hour rule, and why your bot is cheaper than you think
When a customer messages you, a 24-hour customer service window opens. Inside it your replies — the bot's included — are free-form and are not charged by Meta. Outside it you can only send an approved template, and since July 2025 Meta bills per delivered template. What drives your WhatsApp bill.
Two practical consequences. A chatbot that answers instantly keeps the conversation inside the free window instead of letting it lapse overnight and needing a paid template to restart. And anything that gets customers to message you first — a wa.me QR code, a button on your site, a click-to-WhatsApp ad — moves conversations from the paid column to the free one.
Five WhatsApp chatbot examples that work
- Order status for an online store
- The customer sends an order number or the phone number on the order; the bot looks it up and replies with the status. Delays and damaged items go to a person. WhatsApp for e-commerce.
- Site visits for property
- Asks budget, location and timeline, then offers real slots from the sales team's calendar and books one inside the chat. Real estate lead conversion.
- Appointments for a clinic
- Books, moves and reminds. Anything that sounds clinical goes straight to staff — the bot does not give medical advice. AI for healthcare.
- Course enquiries for admissions
- Answers fees, eligibility and deadlines at 11pm, when students actually ask, and books a counsellor call. AI for education.
- Payment and confirmation
- Confirms the order and takes payment inside the chat, so the sale does not leak to a checkout page.
Five mistakes that make people type "agent"
- A menu before a question. Let them type what they want first.
- No way out. If asking for a person does not get a person, they will remember.
- A handover that restarts. The teammate who takes over should see the whole thread and the contact record, not ask "how can I help you?" again.
- Invented answers. A confident wrong price is worse than "let me check". Five controls that stop it.
- The bot on WhatsApp only. The same customer messages your Instagram tomorrow. One bot pointed at every channel gives the same answer everywhere.
Running it in Convarza
Connect WhatsApp with Facebook sign-in, build the bot once — instruction, first message, knowledge base, functions, handover conditions — and point WhatsApp at it. The same bot can answer Instagram, Facebook Messenger, your web widget and email too.
Chats the bot is handling sit in the shared inbox with an AI badge. Assigning one to a teammate takes the bot out and puts the person in, with the contact's notes, last call and lead stage beside the thread. There is no separate bot console to watch. More on the AI chatbot.