BookMyShow one of the first to use WhatsApp officially; to deliver tickets via texts

BookMyShow is one of the first Indian online brand to participate in the WhatsApp business pilot. As part of this test, BookMyShow has made WhatsApp a default ticket confirmation channel for all its users.

This means that users who book tickets on BookMyShow will now receive a message on WhatsApp with the confirmation text or an M-ticket (mobile ticket) QR Code, along with an email. WhatsApp began operations with businesses recently. Now businesses can have an official WhatsApp account that comes with green verified badge next to its name.

Ravdeep Chawla, Head of Product, BookMyShow said, "At BookMyShow, we are constantly taking measures to enhance our users' experience on our platforms. Keeping up with their changing preferences and habits, we decided to integrate BookMyShow with WhatsApp for its pilot. WhatsApp has definitely become a preferred mode of communication for millions of people in our country and we could identify tremendous value in making it a default ticket confirmation channel. We have already started rolling out this feature and over the course of next few weeks, we aim to scale it to cover our entire user base." 

This new business model introduced by WhatsApp will be the only paid service the Instant messaging application will use. Earlier, the company also stopped taking annual fees from its subscribers. The founders also did not want to sell ads on the application.

This new use will be mutually beneficial to both businesses and consumers as they can interact with them only when they want to. The user can also send texts asking the respective company to stop texting them on the platform.