Create a template

WhatsApp won't let you message a customer with free text out of nowhere — every business-initiated send runs on a template Meta has reviewed and approved beforehand, which is why the builder at Campaigns → Your Templates → New Template asks for so much before you write a word. Template Name is the template's permanent identifier, so it accepts lowercase letters, numbers and underscores only — no spaces, no capitals. Category — Marketing, Utility or Authentication — tells Meta what kind of message this is, and it shapes both the review you get and how the rest of the builder behaves. Pick a Language too; a name and a language are the only two fields needed to save a draft, and the live preview beside the form tracks everything you type.

With Marketing selected, Select Marketing template offers four layouts, and the choice reshapes the rest of the form rather than just restyling it. Standard is a plain text-and-buttons message and covers most sends; Catalog attaches products from your connected catalog so people can browse them inside the chat; Carousel (PRO) puts several swipeable cards into one message, each card carrying its own image or video and its own buttons; Limited time offers (PRO) builds the message around an offer with a visible expiry and allows only an image or video header, or none at all. The PRO layouts stay locked until you upgrade your plan. Choosing Catalog with no catalog connected opens the Connect, share, sell - your way! dialog, whose Setup Catalog button hands you off to Commerce → Catalog — set that up first, see What is a catalog?.

Campaign title is the optional header sitting above the message: choose None, Text (capped at 60 characters), or Image, Video or Document, which take a Media URL or an Upload Media file from your disk. Body is the message itself — up to 1024 characters, with emoji, formatting and a link tool in the toolbar — and it's where variables go, each one needing a sample under Sample Content so the preview and Meta's reviewers see a realistic message; Variables and buttons covers those in full. Footer takes 60 characters and arrives pre-filled with Powered by WPAUTOAI, but a footer cannot contain variables — a placeholder there blocks Save and submit. If the blank body is intimidating, the AI Copywriter link on the Body header row opens AI Campaign Copywriter: describe the campaign, pick a Tone, then Generate — Use this drops the copy into the body (and into the footer when it wrote one), and the button becomes Regenerate if you want another take.

WPAUTOAI checks the body against Meta's messaging policy as you type, and the amber Meta policy check panel appears beneath the body only when it actually finds a violation — no panel means nothing was flagged. When it does appear it spells out what would fail review, which is worth reading rather than guessing at, since a rejection from Meta costs you a whole review cycle. An unresolved violation disables Save and submit outright — a flagged template simply cannot be sent to Meta. Save as draft keeps working throughout, so you can park awkward wording and come back to it later.

Save as draft stores the template privately in your own account and leaves it fully editable; a draft is never submitted on its own — it sits there until you return and submit it, so nothing left as a draft will ever reach a customer. Save and submit sends it to Meta for review, where it sits as Pending until a reviewer accepts or rejects it — approval is Meta's call, not WPAUTOAI's, and there is no way to hurry it along. Only Approved templates can be used in a campaign, so a Pending or Draft one won't even appear in the list when you go to build a send. Track where each one stands on Your templates.