Great customer experience is not only a way to ensure that your business treats your customers well but also ensures that you attract and retain customers in the long run and your business scales great heights.
Given that customer retention and loyalty is at the core of any service-based business, it is paramount for restaurants to fulfill and exceed expectations when it comes to guest service. Everything from running marketing campaigns, their website to online and offline services is a means to attaining the very goal of impeccable service. However, be it ordering food, making a
reservation or even getting recommendations, it is impossible for service staff to meet everyone’s standards consistently which can result in a negative brand image for the restaurant.
Conversational agents, better known as ‘chatbots’, are being inculcated by restaurants and other businesses to help provide impeccable customer service and stand strong in the face of rising competition. Chatbots can be programmed to carry out a myriad of tasks ranging from answering FAQs, making a reservation, ordering food or processing payment. Let us have a look at the scenarios where chatbots are proving to be beneficial to the restaurant industry.
Orders and Reservations
Managing reservations becomes a lot easier with chatbots. With chatbots, your customers no longer need to make a call to reserve a table, wait for staff to attend to them or wait in line for tables to free up.
Chatbots can be easily connected to the database/software of your restaurant so that all the reservations and available time-slots can be updated automatically without any manual intervention. What’s more, a chatbot can also be deployed across multiple channels like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, mobile application along with your website, so that they can order from your restaurant without leaving the platform they are at. This increases user’s interaction with the chatbot thereby increasing your brand engagement.
FAQs and Menu Offerings
While the staff focuses on preparing and serving food, chatbots can engage with the customers by answering questions related to open and close times, reward points or whether the restaurant is open on a public holiday. The use cases of chatbot in restaurants rely heavily on the kind of experience restaurants want to offer their visitors.
Often it so happens that in a bigger menu, some good dishes end up being ignored by the customers. Chatbots can really prove to be beneficial in such a scenario where they can present your menu in a visually attractive and conversational way, while also learning about customer preferences to offer better recommendations.
Promotional Offers and Deals
Chatbots can broadcast special offers and deals on your website and social media channels. A chatbot can also send promotional alerts to those on your mailing list so that your customers and prospects are updated on the new deals offered by you.
Using machine learning and deep learning algorithms, chatbots can identify your regular customers and bring them back for repeat business through new deals and offers sent via SMS or Facebook Messenger reminders.
Personalized Recommendations
Bots can also serve as an intelligence gathering tool which assists a restaurant in understanding their customers. With customer contact details, past orders, the preferred method of payment, etc. — the chatbot in a restaurant can not only personalize a customer’s experience but also reward loyal customers in order to increase repeat business — all through a well-designed chatbot conversation.
Reviews and Feedback
The importance of online reviews in the internet era cannot be neglected. According to a study, 90% of consumers read online reviews before visiting a business. And 88% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
But the process of getting your customers to drop a review for you is difficult, time-consuming and somewhat intrusive. Chatbots can come in really handy in situations where human intervention can be deemed negative. Chatbots can automatically send reminders to your customers urging them to write reviews and submit ratings for your services. Chatbots are, hence, a non-intrusive and a better way of collecting feedback from customers.
Businesses across verticals are recognizing the tangible benefits that a chatbot entails. Restaurants that take the leap in incorporating chatbots will be sure to see a growing customer base and more cost-effectiveness which will ultimately be conducive to overall growth and revenue generation.
WotNot is a chatbot development platform that allows you to focus on what matters. With WotNot’s exceptional journey, you can experience the restaurant bot tailor-made for your business in just 3 easy steps. All you need to do is:
1. Enter Your Website: All you need to do is enter the name of your website where you want to deliver one-on-one conversational experience.
2. Select Template: Select from the range of 15 templates for which you need the chatbot (in this case the restaurant template).
3. Preview Chatbot: You heard that right! Before making a decision, you get to preview the bot for free.
WotNot makes implementing chatbot in your organization a breeze! Go ahead and sign up for the 30-day FREE trial here.
Experience the chatbot!
