What Happened
Two more brands have jumped on the bandwagon of conversational commerce to better serve their customers on messaging apps. Restaurant chain TGI Fridays recently struck a partnership with chatbot startup Conversable to roll out a service chatbot on Facebook Messenger that can help customers find the nearest TGI Fridays and take reservations at select locations, a first in the casual dining industry.
Upmarket beverage brand Dirty Lemon, on the other hand, is using an SMS-based system to power its new customer experience. The company worked with cloud communications startup Twilio to create the infrastructure for handling all customer interactions through texting. They are using Stripe to process payments. Customers can text the brand in natural language and see all their needs, from product inquiries to reordering, fulfilled without leaving the chat.
What Brands Need To Do
As we pointed out in our Medium post on branded chatbots, they serve as a great tool for handling basic customer service and goal-oriented tasks. The rise of conversational commerce points to changing consumer behavior on mobile and a shift in brand-customer interaction. A recent study found that most consumers now prefer to use messaging to interact with businesses rather than calling. Therefore, other brands should take note and start developing a strategy for conversational commerce.
The Lab has extensive knowledge about building consumer-facing chatbots. If you’re interested in reaching your audience on messaging apps, please contact our Client Services Director Samantha Holland ([email protected]) for more information or to schedule a visit to the Lab.
Sources: PR Newswire & Fast Company
