Glossary — WhatsApp bot and lead automation terms

WABA, BSP, MQL, BYOK, RAG and 30+ more terms. A practical reference for the industry's vocabulary.

Channel & WhatsApp

24-hour window

After a customer messages you on WhatsApp, you have 24 hours to send free-form replies. Beyond 24h, only approved templates.

BSP (Business Solution Provider)

A Meta-approved intermediary that gives businesses access to WhatsApp Business API.

CTWA (Click-to-WhatsApp Ads)

Facebook/Instagram ad format that routes clicks directly into a WhatsApp conversation.

Omnichannel

A customer experiencing the same conversation seamlessly across WhatsApp, Instagram, web chat and other channels.

Template message

WhatsApp message format that can be sent outside the 24-hour window — must be pre-approved by Meta.

WhatsApp Business Account

An account created under Meta Business Manager — required to use WhatsApp Business API.

WhatsApp Business API (WABA)

WhatsApp's programmable API for businesses. Supports bot replies, multi-agent, broadcast and template messages.

Marketing & Leads

Broadcast

Sending the same message (template) to many customers at once.

Handoff

Transferring a bot conversation to a human sales/support rep.

Lead

A potential customer who has shown interest in your product or service but hasn't yet purchased.

Lead scoring

Assigning each lead a 0-100 score based on behavior and profile signals.

MQL (Marketing Qualified Lead)

Marketing-qualified — interest exists but not sales-ready yet.

Opt-in

Customer's explicit consent to receive marketing messages.

PQL (Product Qualified Lead)

Has experienced the product and seen value — used free trial, became an active user.

SQL (Sales Qualified Lead)

Sales-validated — budget, need and timeline confirmed, ready for a sales call.

AI

Embeddings

Mathematical vector representation of text — similar texts get similar vectors.

Hallucination

When an LLM generates information that isn't real — made-up prices, stock, customer names.

LLM (Large Language Model)

AI model trained on massive text corpora; can converse in natural language.

RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation)

LLM retrieves relevant documents from a knowledge base before generating its reply.

Semantic search

Search by meaning similarity rather than keyword match.

Tool use

LLM's ability to call functions/APIs in addition to generating text.

Compliance & GDPR

Data residency

Which country's servers physically store the data.

Explicit consent

The heart of GDPR/KVKK — user's clear, freely given consent to process personal data.

KVKK / GDPR

Turkey's data protection law (6698, 2016) — Turkish counterpart of GDPR.

Right to erasure

Customer's right to demand deletion of their personal data. GDPR/KVKK allow 24-72 hours.

Operations

Agent

Human staff member who manages conversations the bot transferred.

BYOK (Bring Your Own Key)

Bring your own LLM API key (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google). Costs go directly to the provider.

Self-host

Running the software on your own server instead of the SaaS provider's.

Webhook

An HTTP POST from one system to another when an event occurs — real-time integration.