Send invitations from your own WhatsApp Business number

Before you start

• About an hour, and admin access to your organisation's Facebook Business Portfolio.
• A phone number that is NOT currently active on WhatsApp or WhatsApp Business. Meta will not accept a number already registered to a personal WhatsApp account unless you delete that account first.
• Access to that number by SMS or voice call, to receive a verification code.
• A Facebook account that is an admin of your organisation's Business Portfolio (formerly Business Manager).
• Your business documents — Meta asks for them during business verification: a certificate of incorporation, a utility bill or bank statement in the business name, and the business address.
• A public privacy policy URL.

Step by step

1. 1

   Open your Business Portfolio

   Go to business.facebook.com and sign in. If your organisation already has a portfolio, make sure you are an admin of it — not just an employee. If it does not, create one using the organisation's legal name, because that name is what Meta verifies against your documents later.

   Creating a second portfolio when your organisation already has one is the single most common wasted afternoon here. Verification is per portfolio, so you would be starting a queue you did not need to join.

2. 2

   Complete business verification

   In Business Settings, open Security Centre and start business verification. Meta asks for your legal name, address, phone number and website, then documents proving them. Everything must match: the name on the certificate, the name on the utility bill and the name you typed all have to be the same string.

   This is the step with the real waiting in it — usually a day or two, sometimes longer. It is also the one you cannot rush, so start it first and do the rest while it queues.

3. 3

   Create a Meta app with the WhatsApp use case

   At developers.facebook.com, open the App Dashboard and click Create App. Give it a name and an email, choose the “Connect with customers through WhatsApp” use case, and attach it to the business portfolio from step 1. Meta drops you on the Quickstart page when it is done.

4. 4

   Connect a WhatsApp Business account and copy its ID

   Click “Start using the API” to reach the API Setup page, then select an existing WhatsApp Business account or create one. Once connected, the WhatsApp Business Account ID is shown on that panel. Copy it.

   Gives you: WhatsApp Business Account ID

   If you created a new portfolio during app creation, Meta may have made a WhatsApp Business account for you already. Check the panel before creating a second one.

5. 5

   Add your sending number and copy the phone number ID

   Still on API Setup, add the business phone number you want invitations to come from and verify it with the code Meta sends. Two values appear: the number itself, and a long numeric Phone Number ID beneath it. Celeva needs both.

   Gives you: Phone number ID / The sending number

   The Phone Number ID is not the phone number. It is a long string of digits with no country code and no plus sign, and pasting the phone number into that box is the most common reason a connection fails verification.

6. 6

   Set the display name people will see

   In WhatsApp Manager, set the display name for the number. Meta reviews it and requires it to relate clearly to your business. Once approved this is the name shown on the recipient's phone.

   Gives you: Display name

   Meta may approve a different name from the one you asked for. Celeva shows you the name Meta actually holds when you connect, so check it matches what you expect.

7. 7

   Create a system user and generate a permanent token

   In Business Settings, open System users and add one — give it a clear name like “Celeva sending”. Select it, click Assign assets, add your app with Manage app under Full control, and add your WhatsApp account with Manage WhatsApp Business accounts under Full control. Then click Generate token and grant it three permissions: business_management, whatsapp_business_messaging and whatsapp_business_management.

   Gives you: Permanent access token

   The token on the API Setup page expires in 24 hours. Only a system user token is permanent, and Meta shows it exactly once — copy it straight into Celeva, because there is no way to read it back afterwards.

8. 8

   Create and submit the invitation template

   In WhatsApp Manager, open Message templates and create one in the UTILITY category. An invitation is the first message in a conversation, and WhatsApp only allows a business to open one with a template it has approved. Your template must have exactly five variables, in this order: {{1}} guest name, {{2}} the Moment's title, {{3}} when, {{4}} where, {{5}} the invitation link.

   Gives you: Approved template names

   The order is not cosmetic — Celeva fills the gaps by position, so a template whose {{3}} is the venue will send people the date where the address should be. Submit it early: approval is usually minutes but can take up to 24 hours.

9. 9

   Copy your app secret

   Back in the Meta App Dashboard, open App settings → Basic and click Show beside App secret. Celeva uses it to prove that delivery receipts and replies really came from WhatsApp rather than from somebody pretending to be WhatsApp — it is a signing key, not a second password, and Celeva never sends with it.

   Gives you: App secret

   Optional, and worth doing. Without it sending works normally, but every message stays at “Accepted by WhatsApp” forever and replies never reach your Celeva screen, because Celeva refuses callbacks it cannot verify rather than trusting them.

10. 10

    Paste the values into Celeva and press Connect

    Open your Moment, go to Celeva Reach, then Registration & channels, and choose WhatsApp as the medium. Enter the phone number ID, the WhatsApp Business Account ID, the sending number, the display name, the access token, the app secret and your template name, tick the authorisation box, and press Connect.

    Connect does three things before it saves: checks the token against Meta, fetches your template to confirm it is approved and has exactly five variables, and switches on delivery updates. Anything wrong is reported on this screen rather than halfway through a send to four hundred people.

11. 11

    Send yourself a test

    Once Celeva has approved the registration, open the Guests tab on your Moment and use “Test WhatsApp with your own number”. It sends one message on your approved template to a number you type, and shows exactly what WhatsApp said back — including Meta's own wording and the trace ID their support team asks for.

    Do this before your first real send. Everything up to here can look correct and still fail on the first message, and one test costs one message.