WhatsApp shows you nearby stores to chat with them

Everything seems to indicate that the famous a program From The WhatsApp The Google Maps challenge has begun, and it starts showing you nearby stores for you to text you with them.

That’s right, the search for nearby stores is taking its first steps, although at the moment it is only in Brazil.

It is also that WhatsApp promises to keep Privacy When the feature is available worldwide.

The popular WhatsApp platform has started posting the function to find nearby small businesses among the few users.

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The most popular messaging app promised this novelty in September as part of its strategy to turn WhatsApp into a shopping platform and act as a link between consumers and businesses as Google Maps already does.

This is how the head of WhatsApp, Will Cathcart, announced the launch of this new functionality.

They chose the city of São Paulo in Brazil to start this change, as it is “home to millions of small businesses,” Cathcart explained.

It should be noted that this new guide for businesses within WhatsApp is still in the development and testing phase.

However, the announcement indicates that the novelty will be released worldwide in the coming months.

It promises to make it easier to connect with nearby businesses without giving up each user’s privacy.

Above the initial wall of conversations, the magnifying glass for WhatsApp allows you to search among photos, files, and other items that have been sent or received.

A directory of nearby businesses will be added to this section, where restaurants, food stores or clothing stores can be searched for you to connect with, as shown in this WABetaInfo image.

Thus, the Meta messaging app seeks to compete with other services such as Google Maps or TripAdvisor that provide this information, with the addition of the ability to chat with these companies.

If you want to eat pizza for dinner, for example, by searching this new directory, you can locate nearby restaurants to book a table or have the order sent home via chat.

It is worth noting that this functionality is in addition to the other functions that the messaging application is developing at the same time to achieve this goal of serving as a consumer platform.

Once you locate the nearest bakery or decor store, WhatsApp seeks to ensure that what is ordered can also be paid through its application thanks to a payment system similar to Bizum.

However, neither of these jobs are available yet for other countries in the world.

WhatsApp officials are publishing this news in different countries to test its usefulness.

In addition to collecting a large number of companies that want to appear in the directory, to allow payments, the app must reach agreements with major banks to work with them as Bizum already does.