An interesting case study – a Whatsapp responder.
Our client employs about 600 people, more than half of whom travel a lot, all over the world. There are regular issues from flight changes to hotel accommodation, Air BnB and other fairly usual issues, but serious for a person landing in a new city.
These staff often need assistance at all times of the day and night and weekends.
The client has set up a dedicated number for Whatsapp and allocates a different employee consultant each day and on weekends to manage the incoming Whatsapps and help solve problems.
As you may expect many of the issues are standard or repeated problems. One of the common issues is “What is the security code to get into my Air BnB.”
The client’s main objective is to be able to solve these travel issues as fast as possible.
Our solution: we have set up a second Whatsapp number that responds automatically and instantly to any incoming query, day or night. The Whatsapp responder has access to the very large database of frequently asked questions, which is regularly updated.
The Whatsapp responder now replies within 15 seconds beating even the best human reaction!
The first Whatsapp number is still in use for the odd occasion where the responder cannot answer so a person still manages those Whatsapps but their workload will be vastly reduced. We estimate that initially it will halve. As the client grows and would have needed more employee consultants to manage issues, their Whatsapp responder will take more and more load off them.
Obviously the responder is AI powered allowing the staff member to describe his issue rather than only choose from a menu and it gives a proper and empathetic response. At all times it can hand off the conversation to the person managing the other Whatsapp line so the staff will always have the support they require.
Cost?
Cost was not a factor, but speed and accuracy of response was.
Cost turned out to be about 5% of an average admin assistant’s salary. Bear in mind the responder works 24 hours per day, every day and can scale up to respond to thousands of queries.