Instagram and Facebook ads to WhatsApp: how to follow the results

How do you track Instagram and Facebook ads that lead to WhatsApp?

There are two common kinds of ad. In the first, the ad sends the person to your site or page, where there is a WhatsApp button. In the second, the ad opens the chat directly, using a destination address that you provide.

In both cases, the ads manager shows impressions and clicks on the ad, but that is not the same as a click on the WhatsApp button. WhatsClicks helps precisely with that part: it counts how many people tapped the button or the link that leads to your number.

So the ideal is to think in two stages. First, the ad needs to be seen and clicked. Then, the person needs to tap WhatsApp. Each stage has its own number, and comparing the two shows where people drop off along the way.

Screen and option names in ads managers change often. Look for fields like destination, address or ad link.

Which link should you put in the ad?

If the ad opens WhatsApp directly, use the WhatsClicks link as the destination address instead of a wa.me link, when the ads manager allows a free link. If the ad leads to your site, keep the page's WhatsApp button pointing to the WhatsClicks link.

Before and after, in an example:

• Before: https://wa.me/15551234567?text=I%20saw%20your%20ad
• After: https://whatsclicks.com/w/abc123?src=ad-fb

Number and code are examples. Some ad formats require a phone number and do not accept a free link. In that case, send the ad to a page on your site with the tagged button.

How to tag each campaign in the WhatsClicks link

The tag is what separates one ad from another. Use &src= or ?src= to give a name to each campaign, audience or creative. And use ?p= when the ad leads to a specific page on your site.

Examples:

• Instagram ad, promotion campaign: https://whatsclicks.com/w/abc123?src=ad-insta-promo
• Facebook ad, same campaign: https://whatsclicks.com/w/abc123?src=ad-fb-promo
• Ad that leads to a page on the site: https://whatsclicks.com/w/abc123?p=/promo&src=ad-insta

How to read the numbers in the dashboard

In the Summary, the By button table shows the clicks for each tag, and the By page table shows the clicks per destination page. You can filter by period, from Today up to 3 years, and compare with the previous period, seeing the green or red arrow with the change in %.

A teaching example: if, in one week, the Instagram ad registered 120 clicks in the dashboard and the Facebook ad registered 60, that tells you more people tapped WhatsApp through the first one. It does not tell you which of the two brought more sales.

It is also worth looking at the device. Social media ads are mostly seen on phones, and the dashboard shows the split between phone, tablet and computer. If many computer clicks show up, maybe the ad is being shown in a placement you did not expect.

Another useful point is the time of day. The bar chart by hour and the heatmap show when the clicks happen. If most of them come at night and your service only works during the day, you know where you are losing conversations, and you can adjust the ad schedule or the hours of whoever replies.

How to combine clicks and ad spend

To find out how much each WhatsApp click costs, divide the amount spent on the campaign by the number of clicks recorded in the dashboard. It is a simple calculation that you do with the numbers from your ads manager and from WhatsClicks.

For example: if a campaign spent 100 and the dashboard counted 50 clicks, each click cost 2. The values are just an illustration. You can export the data as CSV or save a PDF report to keep the comparison between campaigns.

Do this calculation per campaign and not only in total. A campaign may look expensive in the ads manager and still have the lowest cost per WhatsApp click. Only by comparing the tags do you find that out.

The counter measures clicks, not closed conversations. To know about sales, note which conversations turned into an order.

Common mistakes when tracking ads

One last piece of care: let the campaign run long enough before deciding. A few clicks in a single day say little, but a week or a month already shows a more reliable trend.

• Using the same link, with no tag, on every ad.
• Changing the tag name in the middle of a campaign, which breaks the comparison.
• Comparing periods that are too short and drawing hasty conclusions.
• Forgetting that the owner's click also counts, including in tests.
• Mixing up a click on the ad with a click on the WhatsApp button.