Every template has one of three categories: marketing, utility or authentication. Meta uses the category to set the price of each message, to decide who can turn it off, and to review the template. Choosing the right one avoids rejections and surprise costs.
Why it exists
Section titled “Why it exists”WhatsApp wants customers to trust messages from businesses. A message the customer is waiting for, like an order update, is different from a sale announcement. The category tells Meta which kind of message it is.
- Marketing is anything that promotes your business: offers, sales, new
arrivals, invitations, or “we miss you” messages. Blue Lotus Fashion’s
diwali_offeris a marketing template. - Utility is about something the customer already did or asked for: an order confirmed or shipped, a payment reminder, a change to a booking.
- Authentication is a one-time code that lets a customer sign in or confirm who they are.
Why the category matters
Section titled “Why the category matters”Price. Meta charges for each template message delivered. The rate depends on the category and the customer’s country. Marketing costs the most. See How campaign pricing works.
Opt-out. Customers can stop marketing messages from your business in WhatsApp. Soosh then leaves them out of marketing campaigns. Utility and authentication messages still reach them. See Marketing opt-out.
Review. Meta checks that the wording fits the category. An order update that also promotes a sale is marketing, and Meta rejects it as utility or moves it to marketing. See Template approval.
How it works in Soosh
Section titled “How it works in Soosh”You choose the category when you create a template, under What are you sending?. Soosh describes each one: Marketing for offers, launches, invitations and news, Utility for order updates, reminders and account alerts, and Authentication for one-time codes to sign in or verify.
The category shows as a badge next to each template in Campaigns > Message templates (opens Soosh in a new tab). When you add people to a campaign, the Estimated cost says which kind of messages you’re paying for, like “for 120 marketing messages”.
Once Meta approves a template, its category is fixed. That’s Meta’s rule, and Soosh locks the choice. To use a different category, create a new template.
When Meta changes the category
Section titled “When Meta changes the category”Meta can move a template to another category, usually from utility to marketing. It can do this when it reviews the template, or later, after a notice. When the change is done, Meta tells Soosh and the badge changes. Soosh also picks up the new category when you click Sync from Meta.
Soosh doesn’t send you an alert when this happens. From then on, the template is treated as marketing everywhere: it costs the marketing rate, and customers who opted out of marketing are skipped.
What it means for you
Section titled “What it means for you”- Be honest about the category. Calling a promotion “utility” doesn’t make it cheaper. It gets rejected, or moved to marketing.
- Keep utility messages to the point. An order update for Priya should talk about her order, not this week’s sale.
- Send offers separately. Send the order update as utility, and the offer as a marketing campaign to the people who want it.
- Check the badges now and then. If a template moved to marketing, your campaigns with it cost more and reach fewer people.