The vocabulary, explained.

Plain-English definitions of the WhatsApp Business API, AI agents, Click-to-WhatsApp ads, server-side tracking, the CRM platforms we deploy, and the compliance terms behind them. 78 terms and growing.

All AI Ads CRM Compliance Metrics Tracking WhatsApp
A B C D E F G H I K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Z

A

Ads

Advantage+ campaign

Meta's automated campaign type that hands more decisions (audience, placement, creative selection) to its machine-learning stack. Less control, often better results once seeded with conversions.

AI

AI agent

An LLM-powered conversation agent trained on your business knowledge base, designed to answer customer enquiries, qualify leads, and escalate to humans only when needed.

Tracking

Attribution window

The time period within which a conversion is credited back to a specific ad click or view. Different platforms use different defaults; the wrong setting can radically distort which campaigns look profitable.

WhatsApp

Authentication template

A WhatsApp template specifically for sending one-time passwords (OTPs) and login verification codes. Tightly scoped, with strict formatting rules from Meta.

B

WhatsApp

Broadcast list segmentation

Splitting your contact database into smaller, targeted groups based on behaviour or attributes, so each broadcast reaches only the people most likely to engage.

WhatsApp

Business Solution Provider (BSP)

A Meta-approved company that provides businesses with access to the WhatsApp Business API, plus the inbox software and tools to actually use it. respond.io and GoHighLevel are BSPs.

C

Metrics

CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost)

The total amount spent to acquire one new paying customer, usually calculated by dividing total acquisition spend (ads + sales team + tools) by new customers won in the same period.

Metrics

Churn rate

The percentage of customers who stop being customers in a given period. The single most important retention metric for subscription businesses; a major input to LTV calculations.

Ads

Click-to-WhatsApp ads (CTWA)

Meta ads that, when tapped, open a WhatsApp conversation with the advertiser instead of sending the user to a landing page.

AI

Context window (LLM)

The maximum amount of text (measured in tokens) an LLM can consider in a single conversation. The hard ceiling on how much knowledge base, history, and current message the model can hold at once.

WhatsApp

Conversation window (24h, 72h)

The free messaging period that opens when a customer messages your business first (24 hours) or taps a Click-to-WhatsApp ad (72 hours). Outside this window, business-initiated messages cost a template fee.

Ads

Conversion campaign

A Meta or Google ad campaign optimised against a specific conversion event (purchase, lead, booking) rather than clicks or views. The right default for any business with a measurable outcome.

Metrics

Conversion rate

The percentage of visitors, leads, or contacts who complete a defined action: a sign-up, a purchase, a booking, a reply. The simplest funnel-health metric.

Tracking

Conversions API (Meta CAPI)

Meta's server-to-server tracking endpoint that sends real conversion events directly to Facebook, bypassing browser blockers, ad blockers, and iOS privacy restrictions.

Ads

Custom audience

A list of specific people uploaded to Meta or built from your pixel and Conversions API signal. Used to retarget existing customers, suppress them from acquisition, or seed lookalike audience generation.

D

Compliance

Data residency

The geographic location where customer data is physically stored. Increasingly a regulatory requirement (especially in finance, healthcare, and government) and an enterprise procurement gate.

WhatsApp

Display name

The business name that appears at the top of every WhatsApp chat with your customers. Set once during WhatsApp Business API setup, must match your registered business, and is approved by Meta.

Compliance

DNC Registry (Singapore Do Not Call)

Singapore's Do Not Call Registry. A list of phone numbers whose owners have opted out of marketing messages. Sending marketing WhatsApps or SMS to a registered number without prior consent is a PDPA breach.

Compliance

DPA (Data Processing Agreement)

A contract between a data controller (your business) and a data processor (a vendor handling personal data on your behalf). Required by GDPR and recommended under PDPA. Defines who is liable for what.

CRM

Drip sequence

A pre-built series of automated messages sent to a contact at fixed intervals after a trigger event. The standard way to nurture leads who are not ready to buy yet.

E

Compliance

Encryption at rest

Storing data in an encrypted form on disk, so even if the storage media is stolen or copied, the data cannot be read without the encryption keys. The standard for any system holding customer data.

Compliance

End-to-end encryption

A scheme where messages are encrypted on the sender's device and only decrypted on the recipient's device, so no intermediary (including the messaging platform) can read them in transit. WhatsApp's default for consumer chats.

F

AI

Function calling

A capability that lets an LLM-powered AI agent call out to external tools (booking system, CRM, calculator, search) instead of just generating text. The bridge between the model and the real world.

Metrics

Funnel

The sequence of stages a prospective customer moves through from first awareness to closed sale. Visualised as a funnel because volume drops at each stage.

G

Tracking

GA4 (Google Analytics 4)

Google's current web analytics product, replacing Universal Analytics. Event-based, privacy-first, cross-device, with built-in BigQuery export for serious analysis.

Compliance

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)

The EU's data protection regulation. Applies to any business handling personal data of EU residents, even if the business itself is outside the EU.

CRM

GoHighLevel

An all-in-one platform combining CRM, sales pipelines, funnels, email, SMS, and WhatsApp in a single tool. A good fit for businesses that want one system instead of five.

Tracking

Google Tag Manager (GTM)

A free Google product that lets non-engineers add and update tracking scripts (Meta Pixel, GA4, conversion tags) on a website through a UI, without redeploying code.

AI

Guardrails (AI)

Rules and constraints that prevent an AI agent from going off-script: refusing certain topics, escalating sensitive cases, never quoting unverified facts. The safety layer around production AI deployments.

H

AI

Hallucination

When an AI model generates content that sounds plausible but is factually wrong. The single biggest risk in deploying AI agents to real customers without grounding.

AI

Handover (AI to human)

When an AI agent passes a conversation to a human team member. The reliability of handover is what makes AI agents safe to deploy on real customers.

CRM

HubSpot

A mid-market CRM and marketing automation platform. Easier than Salesforce, deeper than GoHighLevel. Strong for B2B teams running content marketing, email, and sales pipelines together.

I

Compliance

ISO 27001

An international standard for information security management. Certification means an independent auditor has verified that the organisation has the right systems, controls, and processes to protect data.

K

AI

Knowledge base

The structured set of business-specific documents and facts an AI agent draws on to answer customer questions. Accuracy and freshness of the knowledge base directly determine accuracy of the agent.

L

Ads

Lead form ad

A Meta ad format where the user fills out a form inside Facebook or Instagram without leaving the platform. Cheaper per-lead than landing-page ads, but historically lower lead quality. Often beaten by Click-to-WhatsApp.

CRM

Lead scoring

A numeric score assigned to a lead based on their attributes and behaviour, used to prioritise which leads the sales team should call first.

CRM

Lifecycle stage

A label assigned to each contact in your CRM marking how far along they are in the customer journey: lead, marketing-qualified, sales-qualified, opportunity, customer, evangelist.

AI

LLM (large language model)

The class of AI models (GPT-4, Claude, Gemini, Llama) that power modern chatbots and AI agents. Trained on internet-scale text to predict likely next words.

Ads

Lookalike audience

A Meta-generated audience of new people who statistically resemble a seed audience you provide (often your best customers). The most powerful tool for finding new buyers who behave like your existing ones.

Metrics

LTV (Lifetime Value)

The total revenue a single customer generates across the full duration of their relationship with your business. Often shortened to LTV; sometimes called CLV (Customer Lifetime Value).

M

CRM

Make.com

A no-code automation platform (formerly Integromat) that connects apps and APIs through visual workflows. The middle layer in many marketing stacks where the heavy custom logic lives.

WhatsApp

Marketing template

A pre-approved WhatsApp message used to start a marketing conversation outside an active window. Promotions, offers, broadcast campaigns. The most expensive of the three template categories.

WhatsApp

Message status

The five states a WhatsApp message moves through: sent, delivered, read, replied, failed. Visible to the sender as the familiar one-tick / two-tick / blue-tick indicators.

WhatsApp

Messaging tier

The daily cap on how many unique users your WhatsApp Business number can initiate conversations with. Tiers are 250, 1k, 10k, 100k, and unlimited. Earned by maintaining a Green quality rating.

WhatsApp

Meta Business Manager

Meta's central admin console for managing Facebook pages, Instagram accounts, WhatsApp Business Accounts, ad accounts, pixels, and team access. Where every onboarding to the WhatsApp Business API actually happens.

Tracking

Meta Pixel

A JavaScript snippet that fires from a webpage to tell Meta about visitor behaviour: page views, clicks, purchases. The browser-side counterpart to the Conversions API. Increasingly unreliable on its own.

N

CRM

Nurture sequence

A long-running series of messages designed to build relationship and trust with a lead who is not yet ready to buy. Distinct from a drip sequence in tone: nurture is conversational and educational, drip is more transactional.

O

Compliance

Opt-in

The customer's explicit, recorded permission for your business to message them on WhatsApp. Required by Meta and by most data-protection laws. The foundation of every legal broadcast list.

P

Compliance

PDPA (Personal Data Protection Act)

Singapore's data protection law, governing how businesses collect, use, disclose, and protect personal data. Comparable in spirit to the EU's GDPR, applied to Singapore-resident data subjects.

WhatsApp

Phone number verification

The Meta process of confirming that a business legitimately controls the phone number it wants to use on the WhatsApp Business API. The first onboarding step and a common bottleneck.

CRM

Pipeline stage

A position in your sales pipeline: where an opportunity sits between first contact and closed-won. Used for forecasting, sales-team prioritisation, and identifying where deals get stuck.

AI

Prompt

The text input given to an LLM that shapes its response. The whole craft of working with LLMs lives in writing good prompts.

Q

WhatsApp

Quality rating

Meta's traffic-light score (Green, Yellow, Red) for your WhatsApp Business phone number, calculated from how recipients react to your messages over the past 7 days. Influences how many messages you can send per day.

R

AI

RAG (retrieval-augmented generation)

An AI architecture where the model retrieves relevant documents from a knowledge base before generating an answer. The standard way to ground LLM responses in real, current business facts.

CRM

respond.io

A messaging-first business platform built around WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, and SMS. Strong at high-volume conversation operations and AI-agent workflows. Zelix is a Certified Strategy Partner.

Ads

Retargeting

Showing ads to people who have already interacted with your brand (visited the site, added to cart, opened a chat) rather than to cold audiences. Cheaper, higher-converting, but capped by audience size.

Ads

ROAS (return on ad spend)

Revenue generated divided by ad spend. The most common ad-performance KPI, but easy to mislead with if attribution windows or revenue recognition are not held constant.

S

CRM

Salesforce

The largest enterprise CRM. Powerful, customisable, and complex. The default choice for mid-market and enterprise sales teams; usually overkill for SMEs.

Tracking

Server-side tracking

Sending conversion events from your server directly to ad platforms, instead of relying on browser scripts that get blocked by privacy settings, ad blockers, and iOS restrictions.

Metrics

Show rate

The percentage of booked appointments that the customer actually attends. Critical for service businesses; often where revenue leaks happen.

Compliance

SOC 2

An American security audit framework focused on five trust principles: security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, privacy. Type II reports cover operational evidence over time.

AI

System prompt

The persistent set of instructions an AI agent gets at the start of every conversation: who it is, what tone to use, what rules to follow. The character sheet for the agent.

T

AI

Temperature (LLM)

A setting on an LLM that controls how varied or predictable its responses are. Lower values produce focused, deterministic answers; higher values produce more creative, surprising ones.

WhatsApp

Template variables

Placeholders inside an approved WhatsApp template (like {{1}} or {{name}}) that get replaced at send time with personalised values. The mechanism that makes a single template usable for thousands of personalised sends.

Tracking

TikTok Lower Funnel Events

TikTok's server-to-server conversion tracking, the equivalent of Meta's CAPI, sending real lead and purchase events directly to TikTok's ad platform.

AI

Token (LLM)

The unit LLMs use to count and process text. Roughly equivalent to a sub-word: about 4 characters or three-quarters of an English word. Costs and context-window limits are measured in tokens.

WhatsApp

Two-step verification

A six-digit PIN that protects your WhatsApp Business API number from being moved to a different account or device. Mandatory on the API and recommended on the regular WhatsApp Business app.

U

WhatsApp

Utility template

A pre-approved WhatsApp message for transactional updates: appointment reminders, order confirmations, shipping notifications. Cheaper than marketing templates.

Tracking

UTM parameter

A query string appended to a URL (utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign, etc.) that lets analytics tools attribute the visitor to a specific ad, email, or campaign source.

V

WhatsApp

Verified business (green tick)

The green checkmark badge next to your business name in WhatsApp, awarded by Meta to notable brands that prove their identity. Visual signal that the account is genuinely the business it claims to be.

W

WhatsApp

WABA (WhatsApp Business Account)

The Meta-managed business account that owns your WhatsApp phone number, display name, message templates, and pricing tier. The container for everything WhatsApp-API-related.

CRM

Webhook

A real-time HTTP callback from one system to another, triggered by an event. The most common way to connect WhatsApp platforms, CRMs, and AI workflows together.

WhatsApp

WhatsApp Business API

The programmatic interface Meta provides for businesses to send and receive WhatsApp messages at scale, with multi-user inboxes, automation, and AI agents.

WhatsApp

WhatsApp Business app

Meta's free mobile app for small businesses with a single phone, single user, and basic features. The simpler cousin of the WhatsApp Business API.

WhatsApp

WhatsApp Catalog

A native product catalog inside WhatsApp Business, letting customers browse items, see prices, and add to cart without leaving the chat. The foundation of WhatsApp Commerce.

WhatsApp

WhatsApp Commerce

The end-to-end shopping flow inside WhatsApp: catalog browsing, cart, checkout, payment confirmation. Built on top of WhatsApp Catalog plus payment integrations.

WhatsApp

WhatsApp Flow

Interactive forms that run inside a WhatsApp message, letting users complete bookings, sign-ups, or product configuration without leaving the chat. Multi-screen, branchable, native-feeling.

Z

CRM

Zapier

A no-code automation platform connecting thousands of apps through simple trigger-action workflows. The most user-friendly entry point to marketing automation; less powerful than Make.com for complex logic.