The end of the pandemic: is your customer service ready?

Although the number of Covid infections in the Netherlands has never been higher, there is a slow but steady sigh of relief. “The end of the pandemic is in sight, Covid-19 will become a seasonal flu”, the headlines read (source). A starting signal that many entrepreneurs had been waiting an extremely long time for. And not only the entrepreneurs, incidentally. After Prime Minister Rutte announced the easing of restrictions, the Dutch flocked to pubs, restaurants and cinemas. “A reservation? Tonight? I'm booked to the rafters!” said the owner of the restaurant round the corner from me.

The long-awaited rush

The phone is ringing off the hook, reservation systems are under pressure and staff in the hospitality and culture sectors are working overtime. Entrepreneurs are bracing themselves for the long-awaited rush: extra stock, extra manpower, extra measures to meet government rules. You would almost forget customer service, wouldn't you?

The chatbot offers a helping hand

Fortunately the chatbot can help during the rush, by taking over many customer service tasks! To paint a more concrete picture of this, we have put together a few examples below of entrepreneurs who use Watermelon's AI chatbot.

Example 1: chatbot Kittie lets Kitcentrum.nl skip the frequently asked questions

“When you give the same answer to a question thirty times a day, at some point you think: this has to change.” Felix, e-commerce manager at Kitcentrum.nl, had already been put to the test by the rush that came with Covid. During the lockdown, after all, the Dutch took up DIY en masse. “We went looking for a way to automate our customer service: a chatbot, in other words. Chatbot Kittie now holds over 600 conversations a month!”

How does this help you?

A chatbot can answer frequently asked questions automatically. Think of questions such as: “Can I make a reservation?”, “Do I need to have had the booster jab for a spot on the terrace?”, “Can two households reserve seats together at the cinema?” Thanks to artificial intelligence, the chatbot can recognise various phrasings of a question and then give the right answer. That saves time again!

Example 2: HunterDouglas's chatbot Lilly brings in leads

Chatbot Lilly gives customers the information they need about the various types of Luxaflex® that HunterDouglas sells. You can also ask questions about use, indicate that you want to buy the product, request a call back or download the brochure. “That way Lilly provides a bridge from online to the physical shop,” says Julie, online campaign manager at HunterDouglas.

How does this help you?

By setting up conversations in a particular way, the chatbot can turn website visitors into physical visitors too. When the chatbot offers a helping hand, the website visitor will move to reservation or purchase more quickly. Thanks to webhooks, incidentally, the chatbot can also enter that reservation into your system automatically; no employee has to get involved there either.

Want to know more?

Then download the whitepaper about successful chatbots. In it we give even more examples of chatbots, including statistics. That way you get a clear picture of the chatbot in practice.