The use of chatbots in US e-commerce is now the norm, and all well-known companies operate chatbots. For those who are interested in the chatbot environment there, here some examples of how certain popular companies are using them.
Domino’s Pizza – The largest pizza delivery chain in the US with more than 10,000 stores in 60 countries.
Domino’s Pizza’s chatbot began accepting orders via Twitter in the spring of 2015 and has since been added to a variety of emerging platforms, including Apple TV, Google Home, Amazon Echo, SMS, Samsung smart TVs and smart watches. The service, which allows customers to easily order from anywhere while viewing the full menu via a chatbot, has helped establish the brand as a national food in the US.
Burberry – The world’s leading British fashion brand with a history of over 150 years.
Burberry’s chatbot features a “Burberry Maze” – a maze based on a classic English garden. Click on the left and right emojis to navigate through the maze on the chat screen to find the key pieces from a season’s collection. Completing the maze will lead you to Burberry’s showroom, which looks as if you are appearing in a photoshoot. The aim is to increase customer engagement by deliberately reducing the items featured in the bot.
TripAdvisor – The world’s most viewed travel review site with a focus on rating hotels, restaurants, and transportation, with price comparison options of each.
TripAdvisor’s chatbot provides personalized recommendations from over 500 million reviews of restaurants, tourist attractions, hotels and more from around the world. For example, if you are looking for a restaurant, the chatbot will not only provide location information and opening times, but will also give recommendations for the menu, photos of the food and prices. Incorporating high performance natural language processing, the chatbot understands the meaning of the words entered by the user during the conversation and aims to provide useful information in replies.
SEPHORA – A cosmetics specialty store that operates more than 400 stores in North America, and is an affiliate of LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest fashion company.
SEPHORA’s chatbot is available in Kik Messenger, a free instant messaging app for mobile phones, and recommends products tailored to you as if you were talking to a store employee. While SEPHORA’s physical stores feature a wide range of products that customers can freely try out beyond brand boundaries, the chatbot is also designed to play videos of each product, allowing users to purchase products as if they were actually going to the store.
Common examples of use
In the above examples, we can see that each company is aiming to create a chatbot that does not deviate from its brand characteristics. Popular restaurants are striving to attract more users by allowing them to order on any device, while companies whose income is derived from offering a diverse line of wares are building chatbots to provide more information in a more accessible form. Luxury brands will strive to enhance their brands with limited content, even if it means reducing the number of products they offer.
What about your company? To get the most out of your chatbot investment, we recommend branding your product and building it according to your corporate vision.
Author: Kazuya.S