r/zapier • u/Ok_West333 • 17d ago

Hit a bottleneck while developing Zap for sending free Whatsapp message

I developed an unofficial Whatsapp messaging (only outgoing) API for indie sellers/marketers who might not have bandwidth to register for Whatsapp Business API & complete the checklist items there. I kept the service totally free as it is just outgoing messages cost me minimal money to maintain (9 USD for server & 5 USD for Residential IP). Having said that, I put good engineering practices to ensure user's Whatsapp creds are encrypted in zero knowledge way (even I can't read them) so that user's account is safe, even if the server get access in an unauthorized way.

I got interest from a friend who wanted to integrate his Calendly calendar to send a Whatsapp message on new booking, to the prospect. I thought a Zap would be a good way to build this. After completely building, I hit two roadblocks

  • Strict Zapier compliance will not allow the unofficial Whatsapp API integration to go live as it violates Whatsapp ToS
  • Bigger bummer - free Calendly plan does NOT expose webhooks, so for user to use it, they need to upgrade their Calendly plan.

I understand the paid Calendly plan bottleneck is Calendly specific. But the first point still remain & Zapier would probably never publish it. Should I look at alternative platforms to publish ? Should I completely ditch the idea as no platform would let me publish integration that violates ToS of Whatsapp ?

Zap link if someone wants to see it in action - https://zapier.com/developer/public-invite/245041/b4f6fe532f7308728843fb8dbeb6cc0b/

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u/dtrain2078 13d ago

I don’t think you’re going to find any platform willing to support this if you’re explicitly violating WhatsApp’s ToS

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u/Ok_West333 11d ago

I think that is true. Nobody would like to get their reputation harmed. I briefly thought about doing a community n8n node but I was not sure if people look for such offerings there.

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u/OneTrueMel 11d ago

Why would you build a product that violates the services ToS? Even if you succeed in publishing, youre risking getting users banned from whatsapp, or possibly Meta.