Facebook will, at last, introduce ads to WhatsApp
According to The Wall Street Journal, WhatsApp will start introducing ads next year. WhatsApp users in the United States can expect to see something like the ads shown on Instagram Stories.
This news is separate from the recent revelations that WhatsApp will start charging businesses to contact customers via their official WhatsApp Business channel. The new business charges are expensive compared to regular business SMS messages, but WhatsApp only charges if the business hasn’t responded to the original query within 24 hours.
Since Facebook bought WhatsApp, it has continuously been searching for a successful monetization model. The Facebook motto could be “slap an ad on it” so it comes as no surprise that they’ve finally relented and will start invading the more than 1.5 billion users private chats with targeted ads.
This new Whatsapp revelation could be a good thing if you think about why and how you use WhatsApp. Ads done well could show hotels when you’re talking in a group with friends to plan a vacation, but it is likely they’ll be for things you’ve already bought like 95% of the ads we see on Facebook today.
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As with other WhatsApp monetization attempts, this is not guaranteed to succeed. We’ll have to wait and see how WhatsApp users respond to ads in the app. This could end up being excellent news for the likes of Telegram and other messaging apps.
