You know that moment when you’re staring at a graph in a meeting, flatter than your post- lunch energy levels? The campaign was solid. The ad copy? On point. The design? Flawless. But the results? A big, fat meh.

Naturally, the conversation turns into a series of suggestions. Tweak the audience. Rewrite the CTA. Add more budget. Deep down you know the truth. The strategy isn’t broken. The execution is. Leads drop off. Customers vanish. Conversations are… non-existent.

With one ad click, Click-to-WhatsApp (CTWA) Ads take users to WhatsApp, enabling a direct chat with your business. By skipping steps like landing pages and forms, CTWA ads make it effortless to turn ad clicks into real-time conversations, fostering instant engagement and stronger connections.

In this blog, we’ll explore challenges with conventional ad and messaging strategies and how CTWA Ads can help you stop chasing leads and start converting them.

Gaps in Conventional Ad and Messaging Strategies and How to Bridge them

Currently, marketers use different tools and channels to engage and track customers as they move from one stage of the funnel to another. Ads for discovery, landing pages and forms for conversion, and emails or push notifications for re-engagement.

With so many tools, the information is fragmented, and users end up with disconnected experiences, such as impersonal communication and delays in responses. This results in customers dropping off.

CTWA Ads improve full funnel performance by turning ad clicks into instant WhatsApp conversations. These ads reduce drop-offs with their engaging and personalised content format and also drive re engagement with timely follow up messages.  Even Analysts project that Meta’s generative AI-powered chatbots on WhatsApp will deliver incremental revenue of $16.6 billion in 2025 and potentially reach $45 billion by 2030.

The best part about it is that CTWA Ads can be used from acquisition to retention to create seamless and efficient customer centric journeys.

Let’s take a closer look at each stage of the funnel to see what methods brands typically use, the challenges they face, and how Click to-WhatsApp (CTWA) Ads can offer a better solution.

Customer Acquisition Strategies Brands often turn to platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Google to bring in new customers. These channels offer wide reach and enable marketers to create highly targeted ad campaigns. However, the process they follow is often predictably marred by friction:

1. First, the user clicks on an ad and is taken to a landing page, an app or a lead form.
2. Then, they fill out their contact details (email, phone number, etc.) and submit the form.
3. Finally, brands follow up with them through emails or phone calls (which usually happens hours or even days later.)

Challenges with conventional customer acquisition strategies

We are at a point where these strategies are used by every company. Customers are overwhelmed by brands contacting them on their emails and SMS. In fact, with new and faster communication available, users have stopped using the old channels. And this is why the conventional methods are not as successful with effective lead acquisition. Below are some more reasons.

1. High friction in the journey: Every additional step in the user’s journey, i.e. clicking an ad, landing on a lengthy form, filling it out, creates friction that leads to drop-offs. A study shows that the majority of people (81%) have abandoned an online form after beginning to fill it out.
2. Delayed follow-ups: Timing matters in marketing. And customers expect it. If they don’t get a response from a company within an hour of submitting their details, they lose interest or move on to a competitor. A research, as recent as 2021, shows that 57% of first calls happen after a week and conversion rates drop 8X after 5 minutes. Imagine the impact on revenue by losing all these customers.
3. Lack of personalisation: Emails or automated voice bot calls are often generic and one- sided, making it harder to connect with potential customers. This generic approach is out of step with customer expectations. McKinsey has reported that 71% of consumers they interviewed expect personalised interactions from brands. The same study showed that 76% of customers feel frustrated when companies fail to deliver personalised interactions.
4. Inaccurate first-party data: This is the data a company collects directly from the user. But often, the details entered are incorrect or incomplete. It could be because users are impatient or unwilling to share personal information. This results in unreliable data, making lead nurturing more difficult. It’s no wonder when Gartner suggests that 63% of marketing leaders struggle with personalisation, largely due to inaccurate or insufficient customer data.

How Click-to-WhatsApp ads solve these challenges

Conventional channels like emails, lead forms, etc., are struggling to keep up with today’s consumers who expect instant services (like 10-minute grocery deliveries) and personalised experiences (like tailored recommendations from streaming apps.) They are slow, impersonal, and prone to losing people along the way.

Click-to-WhatsApp ads rewrite the rules. They combine the scale of digital advertising with the intimacy of one-on-one conversations by bringing speed, efficiency, and connection to the forefront.

With a single click, CTWA ads let users start a WhatsApp chat with your brand. No landing
pages, no forms. Just a real-time conversation where customers can ask questions, explore offers, and feel heard.

It also impacts the revenue. Tanishq took it up a notch, generating ₹4.1 crore in revenue through CTWA ads. Plus, they hit a 14x ROAS and bagged 9,000 leads across just four cities. Talk about ROI goals!

Here’s how CTWA ads provide a better solution:

1. Instant follow-ups: Automation tools like chatbots ensure that no lead is left waiting. Within seconds of clicking your ad, a user might see, “Hi there! How can we help you today?” Their curiosity is met with an immediate response, their interest alive.
2. Efficient lead qualification: WhatsApp Chatbots can welcome leads, ask the right questions to qualify them, and instantly share key details about your product or pricing, streamlining the process and keeping the momentum alive.
3. Personalisation at scale: Conventional methods treat customers like data points. CTWA ads treat them like humans. Instead of generic emails, your team can engage in real, two-way conversations, building trust along the way.
4. Seamless journeys: CTWA ads remove unnecessary steps, reducing drop-offs. Customers  your brand in their favourite app, making the experience easy and familiar.
5. Accurate first-party data: Conversations on WhatsApp use the customer’s real phone number, ensuring reliable and complete information. This eliminates fake or incomplete details, providing high-quality data for future.

Customer Engagement Strategies

The most common engagement channels brands use are email, SMS, push notifications, and website chatbots. And they are all saturated. Also, the way users interact and behave has fundamentally changed. So, they don’t find value in these communication methods.

Challenges with conventional engagement approach

1. Impersonal communication

   While companies segment users based on many criteria, emails and SMS campaigns still end up being generic. Today, people want connection and value, not canned templates. And sending individual emails is not viable for a company.

2. Low engagement rates

   The average email open rate is around 20-38%. For push notifications, it is 4%. If people don’t open your messages and see what you have to offer, they aren’t going to engage with it either.

3. Messages lost in spam or ignored Bulk communication, be it emails, SMS, or push notifications, risk being labelled spam. This is proved by a 2023 study that reported that spam emails constituted 46.8% of total global emails.

4. Minimal real-time interaction Most conventional channels were meant for people who had time. However, today customers want everything in real-time, which channels like website chatbots and emails cannot provide. When people don’t get an immediate response, it frustrates them and decreases the likelihood of conversion.

How CTWA ads solve these challenges

Great engagement starts by meeting people where they are. WhatsApp, with its intuitive design and universal familiarity, is where billions of people already spend their time. Click-to-WhatsApp Ads tap into this, turning a rigid, transactional process into a natural, conversational experience.

The brilliance of CTWA ads isn’t just in what they do—it’s in how they feel. They don’t feel like marketing; they feel like a conversation. Almost akin to talking to friends or family.

Titan achieved impressive customer engagement with CTWA ads, driving a 25% cart conversion rate. From 8 million ad views, over 500 customers added watches to their carts—all through a seamless WhatsApp chat!

Here’s what makes CTWA ads so powerful for customer engagement:

1. Real-time, personalised interaction

   Click-to-WhatsApp Ads allow users to talk to the brand immediately by taking them directly to a WhatsApp chat. There are no intermediary steps. This real-time interaction keeps users engaged.

2. Higher engagement rates

   WhatsApp offers a more personal way of communication. People spend a lot of time on it to chat with their family and friends. Therefore, it has an open rate of 98%. So, when a brand starts a conversation there, there is a higher chance of the customer reading the  and engaging with the brand.

   Brands can also send interactive content in the form of buttons, images, videos, and more on WhatsApp. This, when compared to the static email or SMS messages, makes CTWA ads more engaging.

3. Instant resolutions for better conversions

   Customers hate waiting. By using chatbots and live agents, CTWA ads remove the wait time and resolve customer questions instantly.

Customer Retention Strategies

We all know that retaining customers is important and cheaper than acquiring them. To engage with inactive users, businesses run re-engagement campaigns. For existing customers, they build loyalty programs. For this, they send reminders and surveys on email or SMS, which don’t deliver.

Challenges with these approaches

Conventional customer retention campaigns fail because they are slow, generic, and poorly timed, making it harder to re-engage customers when it matters most. They:

• Don’t encourage users to take action, as they lack urgency, are generic and templatised.
• Add friction by sending communication on email and SMS, channels that customers barely engage with.
• Yield low returns despite spending a lot on retargeting ads.

How CTWA Ads solve these challenges

Conventional retention strategies reduce customers to metrics: loyalty points, surveys, and emails. CTWA ads rewrite the script, focusing on real conversations over numbers.

With immediacy, personalisation, and dynamic communication, CTWA ads transform retention into real-time, two-way conversations that feel natural and engaging.

1. Creating urgency through instant re-engagement with timely personalised offers

CTWA ads create personalised, real-time re engagement experiences by:

• Replacing generic email with a WhatsApp message that’s direct and timely.
• Giving users a reason to act now instead of giving them time to act later.

For example, a brand identifies a customer who dropped off after a few messages exchanges post ad click. They send a contextual WhatsApp message in the same thread along the lines of: “Hi [Name]! Your favourite travel destination misses you. Here’s a 24-hour exclusive discount just for you.” Such time-sensitive offers spark immediate interest and drives conversions.

2. Cost-effective retention through WhatsApp

WhatsApp offers a free 24-hour window in user-initiated conversations. So, if you time your follow ups / nudges, CTWA ads prove to be a more affordable, personalised way to reconnect.

3. Gathering feedback in real time

Retention isn’t just about selling more. It’s about listening. CTWA ads let you gather feedback naturally through WhatsApp conversations.

For instance, as soon as a customer places an order after landing on the chat via ad click, a food delivery service messages a user: “How was your last meal? We’d love your feedback. And here’s 20% off your next order.” The feedback makes customers feel heard, and the discount motivates their return.

Conclusion

Click-to-WhatsApp Ads streamline the entire customer journey – from acquisition to retention. By removing obstacles that increase the users’ cognitive load like complex lead forms, confusing apps/websites, slow responses and generic messaging.

Scaling the impact of ad spends has now become effortless with CTWA ads. And businesses can be more creative with their messaging. Overall, delivering personalised experiences that drive better results.

If you are done struggling with average performing conventional ad and messaging channels and want to see improved results across every touchpoint in your conversion funnel, it’s time to explore CTWA ads.