Real Time Chatbot Use Case Studies

In the previous article here, we have highlighted the reasons why people implemented chat bots on their websites and how businesses have benefited from using them.  In this article, we shall place the spotlight on 3 real-world chatbots use across various industries and how they help to reaping value for their parent companies. From streamlined operations to improved customer engagement, the following case study examples are worth your time to read if you’ve ever considered leveraging chatbot technology for your business.

For each example below, we shall break it down to company description, chatbot design & purpose, value proposition (tangible business results) and key takeaways to consider when thinking how to apply the technology to your own company or business.

1) ServerFreak Technologies

Company description: A leading Malaysian web hosting company which has been established since year 2003. Affordable hosting plans coupled with superb after-sales support have seen the company constantly ranked among the top 3 web hosting companies in Malaysia.

How Chatbots Being Used?

The newly updated ServerFreak website have incorporated live chatbot on their main website at www.serverfreak.com  . Visitors or clients can post their sales/technical questions live and the chatbot will provide immediate and relevant answer.

The chatbots can also navigate potential clients or visitors to different hosting plans based on their hosting requirement.

The chatbot can handle multiple requests at one time and their backend staff can also take over the chat session depending on the type of question being asked as seen from the screenshot below. The chatbot is also linked to their Facebook fan page so anyone who is online in Facebook can drop their messages through Facebook messenger.

Value Proposition:

Time saving.  Chatbots offer direct response to the visitors while saving the time for their staff to handle more important request.  Once a question is posted, the bots can give generic response and at the same time the staff has the option to answer or pass it to other relevant department to answer the visitor’s request. Instead of opening support ticket and expecting a delayed response for the ticket reply, the visitors can now enjoy immediate response either through the bot or real-time human response.

Boost sales revenue.  Not many competitors offer chat bot live support on their main website. The use of chat bots have boosted ServerFreak’s annual sales revenue by up to 25%, with majority of the new clients migrating from their competitor over to ServerFreak. Speedy response coupled with excellent technical support is what attracts them to move over to ServerFreak.

Key takeaways:

We’re expecting most, if not all hosting companies in Malaysia to leverage the use of chatbots on their websites. Hosting companies may consider using chatbots to perform the following tasks:

1. Train chatbots to give answer to Frequently Asked Questions (F.A.Q) and reserve human capital for more complicated demands such as troubleshooting technical matters.
2. Is there a way to train the chatbots to replace sales staff from answering sales related questions? This helps to save the cost of hiring new sales employee and providing training for them.

2) H & M Chatbot

Company Description:  H&M is a well-known fashion company in the world and have a massive appeal especially among the youths who wish to update their own wardrobe and stay tuned to new trends.

How chatbots being used?

The chatbots implemented by H&M is designed to guide their mobile visitors to navigate their search through outfit possibilities and guide you to the online store areas that align with your purchase desires.

The H&M chatbots rely on the following information and act accordingly based on the visitor’s input.

• Gender and favourite style
• Suggest outfits and calculate the total price for all items
• Like or dislike the suggested outfit. The chatbot will suggest different outfit if you dislike the previously suggested outfit.
• If you like the suggested outfit, the chatbot will evoke 4 options below:

1. Shop : Brings you directly to their H&M Internet Shop.
2. Save : Archive your outfit
3. Share : via social networks or by other means e.g. email
4. Next outfit : offers new outfit/style suggestion

Value Proposition:

H&M’s outstanding sales performance in the past 12 months together with its recent announcement to launch an eCommerce presence in India, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, along with the launch of Afound Digital Marketplace in Stockholm Sweden, appear to signify positive results for its chatbot implementation (though direct correlations are unavailable on its website).
Source: H&M Full Year Report

Key takeaways:

Times are changing. Businesses are taking advantage of new technology to engage younger audiences with their products and services.

H&M are adopting chatbot technology as part of their “mobile-centric” approach to reaching consumers, particularly youths who uses social media daily and 80% of that time spent is via mobile phone. We can see more and more retailers will be experimenting with chatbots on their online store in the near future.

3) Domino’s Pizza

Company Description:  Domino’s Pizza is a popular worldwide brand for pizza delivery service. This American restaurant chain is also famous in Malaysia and other international markets.  This company aims to become the best pizza delivery company in the world.

How chatbots being used?

“DOM the pizzabot” is designed by the company to serve their customers. DOM the pizzabot is a Facebook Messenger bot and all the users need to do is to type “PIZZA” and send it to DOM via Messenger. DOM will then list orders within seconds from the full menu available. The customer proceeds to choose from the menu or make a custom pizza. DOM the pizzabot will guide them through the list of possible options and offer suggestions.

Apart from placing orders based on DOM’s suggestions, users can also place their orders through Easy Order for faster order processing the next time they use the chatbot, and they can click on a link sent by Dom to track their orders.

Value Proposition:

In order to capitalize on Facebook Messenger’s massive 1 billion active users, Domino’s Pizza introduced this chatbot ahead of the Super Bowl event back in 2017.  The marketing lead of the company, Nick Dutch admitted the use of chatbots as their company’s PR tool during a Marketing Week interview:

A successful goal of this kind of platform will be to make our current customers’ lives easier, which doesn’t necessarily translate to a huge surge in sales but an improvement in experience and as a result sentiment towards the brand, which is a longer-term benefit.

Key takeaways:

Big companies constantly keep themselves updated of the latest technology in order to improve their marketing and sales campaigns. Domino’s Pizza is taking advantage of all channels, including smart devices. In this way, whether consumers are using Messenger or watching their smart TVs, this company’s products will remain accessible to their consumers. Smart move by Domino’s Pizza!

Conclusion

Based on the 3 case studies above, there is no doubt that the use of chatbots is getting more popular nowadays as the technology develops.  The bots or AI can be trained to offer customers with an intelligent and responsive conversation. Another added advantage of using chatbots is the reduced risk of imperfect service caused by moody employee as such employees will be replaced by the stable and high quality customer care provided by chatbots.  However, such substitution is not yet feasible today due to the fact that Bot AI is not 100% developed perfectly enough to replace human interaction. This means if your customers’ questions fall outside of the bot’s parameters, the chatbots won’t be able to help. So, more test and trials are required to fix this issue before we can have a top quality chatbot with the highest degree of automation that delivers inch perfect human-like response.

Hopefully once that issue is resolved in the future, we shall see the actual realization of “Skynet” as often seen in the blockbuster Terminator films.