WhatsApp Vice President Chris Daniels has made some clarifications concerning the monetisation of the platform.
“We are going to be putting ads in ‘Status’. That is going to be primary monetisation mode for the company as well as an opportunity for businesses to reach people on WhatsApp,” the company’s Vice President, Chris Daniels said.
Although Daniels did not specify when the new feature will be released.
See More: WhatsApp is Working on New Features to Improve Chat and Notifications
WhatsApp’s “Status” feature allows users to share text, photos, videos and animated GIFs that disappear after 24 hours. The advertisements would be powered by Facebook’s advertising system and would be aimed at helping users understand and participate in businesses using the messaging app.
Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg’s goal to monetise WhatsApp has forced the social media messaging service’s co-founders to leave the company.
One of them, Brian Acton, told Forbes recently that Zuckerberg was in a rush to make money from the messaging service and undermine elements of its encryption technology. “Targeted advertising is what makes me unhappy,” Acton said.
Four years after its acquisition by Facebook for $19 billion, WhatsApp, which now has over 1.5 billion users (against Facebook’s 2.3 billion), will reportedly carry targeted ads from 2019 – on a platform that has been ad-free till date.
