Create WhatsApp Templates

You can create WhatsApp templates from scratch or by copying SMS content library templates from the Recruiting Content Library. When a template is created from scratch, you need to provide the corresponding translations by editing the template.

When you create WhatsApp templates by copying SMS content templates, all existing content library items that are used for messaging purposes and have SMS content in them will be considered. If a content library item has any translations, WhatsApp templates will be created in each of those languages. The WhatsApp templates are also automatically associated with the content library items from which they were copied.

Copying SMS content templates to create WhatsApp templates should be a one-time activity. After you do this once, the Copy SMS Content Templates menu item won’t be visible on the UI. However, if you need to do this action again, you can set the profile option, ORA_IRC_SMS_TEMPLATES_CONTENT_COPIED_TO_WHATSAPP to N. This will enable the menu item. However, we don’t recommend doing this multiple times because duplicate WhatsApp templates will exist and you’ll have to manually deactivate the older versions.

WhatsApp templates must follow the WhatsApp business policy of not using promotional, spam, or misleading content. You can only use plain text in the message. However, you can use tokens for variables like candidate name, job title, department, and so on.

Note: All templates that you create are associated with your WhatsApp Business Account.

1. In the Setup and Maintenance work area, go to:
   • Offering: Recruiting and Candidate Experience
   • Functional Area: Recruiting and Candidate Experience Management
2. Select All Tasks from the Show list and then click the WhatsApp Notification Template Library task.
3. On the WhatsApp Message Templates page, choose from:
   • Click Create Template to create a template from scratch. Then, go to step 4.
   • On the More Actions menu (shown as three dots) shown next to the page header, select Copy SMS Content Templates. A confirmation dialog message is shown. Once you confirm, the WhatsApp templates get automatically created and are listed on the WhatsApp Message Templates page in Draft status with the current creation date.
4. Enter basic details when creating a template from scratch:
   1. Enter a template display name.
   2. Enter the template code. This code is sent to Meta and should be as named per their guidelines. So it should be in English and start with a lowercase letter. The remaining characters can be lowercase letters, numbers, or underscores. It can’t contain any special characters or uppercase letters.
   3. Select a WhatsApp message category that applies to the type of message, whether marketing, utility, or authentication.
   4. Associate the template with a content library category. The template that you want to use for starting a conversation with a candidate must be associated with the WhatsApp Conversation Starter category.
5. Create the message content:
   1. Insert tokens, as required. The type of tokens that are displayed depend on the content library category that you select. The maximum number of unique tokens you can use is 15. For the WhatsApp Conversation Starter template, you must insert the MessageBody token.
   2. Enter the message content in the Template Message field. You can’t build complex logic into the message content, for example conditional statements, as per Meta guidelines. The maximum number of characters you can enter is 1024, including token names.
      Note: If you’ve selected the WhatsApp Message Category as Authentication, you won’t be able to insert tokens or edit the Template Message field.
6. Click Save.
7. After the template is successfully created, you can view it on the WhatsApp Message Templates page.

What to do next

Add translations to the template, if required.