WhatsApp to show ads in Status from next year

WhatsApp has undoubtedly a massive user base in most of the developing countries such as India. The company however still needs to find out the means with which it can make money out of its huge user base. Now, the company is working on introducing some new features that will allow the company to generate higher revenue streams.

WhatsApp is working towards monetizing its business and in order to do so, the company will finally be switching to an ad-based format for the general masses. This decision led to the fall out between the Facebook, and the company's co-founder, Jan Koum, and Brian Acton, which resulted in their resignation from the company which they have started almost a decade ago.

Some reports from the WSJ suggest that the WhatsApp will begin showing ads in its 'Status' feature starting from next year. This will similar to the Facebook's image-sharing platform Instagram. Instagram currently shows ads in its 'Stories' to generate the revenues. The report further suggests that around 450 million people currently use WhatsApp Status as compared to 400 million users of Instagram stories.

Also read, WhatsApp payments service on hold as the platform awaits government's approval

It is being further reported that the ads in the WhatsApp Status will be backed by Facebook's advertising system. This is similar to the ads that appear on the Instagram Stories. Matt Idema, WhatsApp's COO mentioned that the company is looking towards implementing the features from Instagram that will make the whole experience better for ever user concerned on WhatsApp. He further added that "We've seen it working well on Instagram and so we're learning a lot from that".

See also, WhatsApp rolls out group voice and video calling: Here's how it works

The company has further revealed that starting today; it will be charging the big organizations that use its services to interact with the users. With the newly-adopted business model, the company has started charging companies like Uber and others to send their WhatsApp messages along with update and notifications to the consumers.

WhatsApp has further said that it has started off with approximately 100 companies, however, it expects to increase the scale of operations moving forward. The company had introduced WhatsApp Business last year which was aimed at the corporates that want to use the platform in order to connect with their customers. We are not sure whether this will affect the user experience in any way; however, we need to wait to see the practical application of the ads and how much it benefits the company in terms of revenue.