WhatsApp Hosted Embedded Signup Flow

DK Sah April 01, 2025 21:57

Objective

The article discusses about Hosted Embedded Signup (ES) Flow for WhatsApp, an onboarding UI powered by Vonage, which will enable Vonage's Partners (or "Tech Providers") to onboard clients without having to create or configure or host an ES flow themselves.

Background

In simple terms, what are Tech Providers?

Meta has started formally identifying partners of BSPs like Vonage; to bring them "in the fold", or make them a part of their distribution channel of messaging services.
As a part of this formal-identification effort, these partners are being called "Tech Providers", and they are being encouraged to go through a Tech Provider (TP) Enrolment process.
While these Tech Providers are essentially working with BSPs like Vonage, they are also being encouraged to connect directly with Meta if they want to.

What does it take to be a Tech Provider with Meta and Vonage?

For this, Meta needs partners to go through an enrolment process called Tech Provider Enrolment. This takes care of:

Business Verification - Getting all business, legal and privacy details from said Tech Providers to Meta and verifying their Business Manager (BM) with Meta
App creation - Create an app with Meta which will store all relevant permissions for Tech Provider to connect with Meta and Vonage
App Review and Access verification - Authenticate the usage of their app(s) and ensure it has the relevant permissions to connect with Meta and BSP(s)
Multi-partner Solution - Creating this is a way for Meta to identify which Tech Provider (i.e., which BM, App) is working with which BSP, and what are the terms and conditions of such a shared working arrangement, including the permissions with each party. This Multi-party Solution is identified by a Solution ID.

Why is an Embedded Signup (ES) Flow hosted by Vonage needed?

After getting onboarded with Meta as a Tech Provider, Vonage Partners will need to have a way to onboard WhatsApp numbers of their clients. One of the ways in which BSPs enable this for their customers is to develop and configure an "Embedded Signup Flow" with Meta.

While Meta's expectation was that every Tech Provider will be able to develop an ES flow of their own and let your clients use it, it was very soon realised that many Partners have trouble building their own ES experience. Often they don’t have the experience, ability or desire to prioritise building such an integration.

Hence Meta had to enable 2 kinds of ES flows:

- ES Flow that a Tech Provider integrates with Meta, surfaces on their own webpage/UI for clients, and manages it end-to-end
  - - Called the Integrated ES Flow
    - This flow is difficult to build and manage.
    - High investment by Tech Provider with possibly low ROI
- ES Flow that is Hosted by a BSP like Vonage and manages it end-to-end, which a Tech Provider makes use of for onboarding clients' WhatsApp numbers
  - - Called the Hosted ES Flow
    - Easy to use by TP and Client
    - No investment by TP, and High ROI

Note: The Embedded Signup Flow in Vonage Customer Dashboard (External accounts > WhatsApp) is the primary ES Flow developed for number onboardings, but only Partners or Direct clients can access this. As the need was for the clients of Partners to access the ES flow themselves which they could not do on Customer Dashboard, we needed to host this flow on an external webpage which Partners' clients can access. Hence called the Hosted ES Flow.

How does Hosted Embedded Signup (ES) Flow UI work?

Hosted ES Flow - Process <KB link coming soon>

Hosted ES Flow - Partner URL API Ref <doc link coming soon>

Hosted ES Flow - User Guide <doc link coming soon>

References

Tech Provider - Meta Doc

Tech Provider Enrolment - Meta Doc

Embedded Signup - Meta Doc

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