Angela Skowronek

Industries

Customer Stories

<p>You already know that Messenger bots are powerful tools to help businesses increase sales and automate support. Now, there are two new use cases to add to the list: chatbots as tools for freelancer job training and economic development. 💹</p>
<p>Our story begins in a small country in West Africa called The Gambia, which has a population of just over two million. <a href="https://theodora.com/wfbcurrent/gambia_the/gambia_the_economy.html">Three-quarters</a> of those citizens rely on agriculture for their livelihood. So when unpredictable events like droughts impact the output of that industry, the country’s entire economy is at risk. To help diversify the Gambian economy and build up other sectors, international organizations have set up certain programs—and one of them runs on chatbots.</p>
<p>In 2018, the International Trade Centre (ITC) planned one such initiative. The ITC is a global agency linked to the World Trade Organization, the United Nations, and the European Union, and one of their objectives is to promote economic growth in certain countries. They came up with a plan for The Gambia and partnered with a Danish marketing agency called <a href="https://www.growthbond.co/#lp-pom-block-2030">GrowthBond</a> to implement it in 2018.</p>
<p>GrowthBond is a member of <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/3882031-chatfuel-for-agencies-and-creators#:~:text=We%20also%20offer%20an%20Enterprise%20plan">Chatfuel’s Premium Agency program.</a> We spoke to their CEO, Ferdinand Kjærulff, to find out how his team used a Chatfuel bot to help promote and organize this unique project.</p>
<h2>A plan to empower Gambian young people and small businesses</h2>
<p>Kjærulff explained that the ITC identified a two-pronged problem in the Gambian business world. First, most small- and medium-sized businesses in Gambia don’t have the resources to harness the power of modern digital marketing. Very few have in-house talent with enough experience in the digital marketing space, and not many have room in their budget to hire outside help either.</p>
<p>Second, young people in Gambia lack opportunities to break into the world of digital marketing work. It’s nearly impossible to be competitive in the international freelance market without proper training, experience, and a strong portfolio. So with no local certifications, internships, or similar programs available to Gambians, their chances of breaking into the freelance marketing world were slim.</p>
<p>That’s where GrowthBond came in. They worked with the ITC to create a program to equip young Gambians with in-demand marketing skills. Then, they granted ITC funding to SMBs in the country so they could afford to hire the newly trained freelancers. That way, the businesses could get free marketing and the freelancers could gain experience—a perfect win-win! 🏆</p>
<h2>The six-step program (chatbots included!)</h2>
<p>Over a period of six months, GrowthBond was responsible for “the selection, training, and supervision of the digital marketing students, as well as digital marketing consulting and local mentorship.” Here’s an overview of how the program they developed worked:</p>
<p><strong>#1. Lead generation via Facebook ads 👋</strong> The first order of business was to spread the word about the program to promising young Gambians. GrowthBond set up Facebook ad campaigns advertising their digital-marketing training program for aspiring freelancers.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb142fdeab67_image.png" alt="facebook ads sample" height="1023" width="1600" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAALklEQVR4nGOQEBc5d+7CuXPnNm/ewiAqJvbx48erV68eOHCAQVtb6w4YHD12DACdphcAmEyMwAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>A sampling of the Facebook ads GrowthBond ran to get students for their new program.</figcaption></figure>
<p><strong>#2.</strong> <strong>Lead qualification via chatbot ✅</strong> Of course, not every Gambian Facebook user would be the right fit for the program. So those who <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/create-click-to-messenger-ads-to-drive-traffic-to-your-bot">clicked the ads</a> were redirected to Messenger. There, a chatbot that GrowthBond set up asked them lead-qualification questions to find out if they were eligible to participate. The group that made it through this round was whittled down even more after that with an in-depth questionnaire GrowthBond sent them next.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb3b26deab20_image-1.png" alt="messenger chatbot" height="354" width="422" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAALElEQVR4nGPYu3tvbmaWkaHx/PnzGbKycoWFxVVUVLy9vRn+g4GHh0dpSQkAOkoQ4yUfaZ0AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>GrowthBond set up a chatbot to qualify leads for the training program.</figcaption></figure>
<p><strong>#3. Course reminders via chatbot 🔔</strong> The students who applied and were approved then received messages via chatbot with important information about the training courses, including reminders and helpful hints.</p>
<p><strong>#4. Online training 👩🏻‍💻</strong>The students could go through some of the freelancer training at their own pace in Thinkific. For the rest, GrowthBond hired two local mentors to run live trainings on Facebook. They reminded students about the trainings via chatbot and via email.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbd481deab5b_image-2.png" alt="conversation rates" height="234" width="678" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAABCAIAAAB2XpiaAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAFUlEQVR4nGN48vz53r37opISjKwtADY5Bqx6B/GPAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>Stats for one of the live trainings GrowthBond's local mentors held for students on Facebook</figcaption></figure>
<p><strong>#5. Email outreach ✉️</strong> To get local SMBs on board with the project, GrowthBond reached out to many via email. They offered these businesses $50 USD in Facebook ad credits, plus $200 USD worth of freelancer work to help get them set up.</p>
<p><strong>#6. A Facebook group and in-person meetings 👥</strong> GrowthBond also created a Facebook group for students who completed the course. They shared extra tips and advice there for their budding freelancers. The group also served as a place where the students could get feedback on their pitches and profiles, and share their success stories. In addition, the local mentors GrowthBond hired held in-person meetups where students could get support and input on their work.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb4b2fdeab5d_image-3.png" alt="chatbots for freelancers" height="1067" width="1600" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAL0lEQVR4nGNQ01D7/fsPBwMDDw8ngxwDg5muVqSPjaaSDENVaFh7fkZ6YvTa+VMBv5wLCphlHakAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>One of the in-person advice and feedback sessions GrowthBond set up for its students</figcaption></figure>
<p>Once the students finished the training and gained experience working for the SMBs, they were ready to launch their careers as freelance marketers. The GrowthBond team continued to support the students for the first two months of their new adventure, to help them put what they’d learned into practice. 🙌</p>
<h2>The role of Messenger bots in the training program</h2>
<p>GrowthBond’s training program focused more on the basics of Facebook advertising than <a href="https://youtu.be/D4n6VLQHE5U">the basics of chatbot building</a>. However, they did use Messenger bots to promote their program at different stages along the way. As a result, many students got their first exposure to chatbots. Plus, the bots helped the program grow and assisted the students in staying on track. GrowthBond used their Messenger bot for:</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p><strong>Lead generation</strong>. To generate leads and get students to apply for their freelance training program, GrowthBond ran a series of Facebook ads. They were <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/create-click-to-messenger-ads-to-drive-traffic-to-your-bot">click-to-Messenger ads</a>, which meant that users were directed to a Messenger chatbot after clicking the CTA.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Lead qualification</strong>. Then, the marketing agency took advantage of a chatbot’s back-and-forth, conversational style to gather more information about program applicants. Based on the user’s answers to the questions, the bot could automatically approve qualifying students to move to the next round. It then saved the responses from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNBeoGF90PY">qualified leads</a> as attributes, and <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/2708726-export-data-from-chatfuel-to-google-sheets">exported them to a Google Sheet</a> automatically so the GrowthBond team could easily access the information.</p>
</li>
<li>
<p><strong>Reminders</strong>. Once students were enrolled in the program, the GrowthBond agency used a chatbot to keep them on track with their studies. This program ran in 2018, well before Facebook’s 2020 policy changes. So although GrowthBond used a sequence of messages then to remind students about upcoming live classes, there are still several ways an agency could do this with a bot now. You could still set up a sequence that engages students daily, to keep reopening the 24-hour contact window. You could have students sign up for <a href="https://youtu.be/vTwdLHar6pI">One-Time Notifications</a> to remind them about the classes. Or, you could use <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/sponsored-messages-guide-to-reengaging-chatbot-subscribers">sponsored messages</a> to send reminders and other important course info.</p>
</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb6d09deab69_image-4.png" alt="chatbots for recruitment" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/AJ+fn42Oj3h9f/P09QDo6Ojv7esADxyttb4An5+fWVpaMDIznJ6fvJcU+ldDL54AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>GrowthBond used a Messenger chatbot to generate and qualify leads, and to send students reminders about their coursework.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>Success stories from GrowthBond’s freelancer training program</h2>
<p>GrowthBond got 370 applicants for their freelance marketing program initially. Of those, 180 showed up to the first online course sessions. From that group, GrowthBond chose 50 of the most promising candidates to move forward. Out of that group, 30 completed the course and started working as freelancers.</p>
<p>10 of them are currently generating revenue, “and are expected to make it as online freelancers,” according to Kjærulff. Considering that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_Internet_users">less than 20%</a> of Gambians are internet users (compared to over 75% of Americans), these numbers represent a great start.</p>
<p>One of the program’s top success stories is a young man named Bakary Fatty, who earned $515 in freelance income during the program. His story “proves that, with proper education and motivation, anyone can reach his or her targets,” Kjærulff says.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb0bfbdeab64_image-5.png" alt="chatbots for freelancers" height="1165" width="1058" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAAECAIAAAAmkwkpAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAP0lEQVR4nAE0AMv/AMDY7rLR3rrI3Ii+4gBXsN87UVZJQz/A7v8AXbTgFyo2BQMWwOH3AKXS9vj7//b0/63N8hp0H4CScc9KAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<p>To keep the program alive even after its six-month span, GrowthBond ran Facebook ads to companies in Africa to promote the services of these freelancers. After receiving interest from 130 companies, they turned off the campaign and got to work connecting them with students from the program. “We expect to continue receiving a constant flow of companies lined up to hire freelancers in the future,” says Kjærulff.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb1a2cdeab21_image-6.png" alt="facebook ad copy" height="459" width="402" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAAECAIAAAAmkwkpAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAP0lEQVR4nAE0AMv/AMLK5uvr6/v7+v///wC5uK2trrCvsbbc39wAMjk4FRQaAwAObXR4AEdSWQ8PFA0ME3+FiU6GGSTkDfY2AAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>GrowthBond continued to run ads after the program was over to get more opportunities for the freelancers to build experience.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The power of Messenger bots for education and training</h2>
<p>This story serves as a timely reminder that chatbots are <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/chatbots-for-universities">powerful tools for education</a>. And while Messenger bots have always been <a href="https://academy.ied.eu/blog/elearning-digital-media">effective learning tools</a>, their potential is even clearer during this global pandemic. Bots can help people build new skills from the safety of their own homes, whether those skills will help them complete a degree, explore a new field, or learn to bring in money remotely as a freelancer. It also reminds us that agencies and nonprofits will continue to be crucial players in how we recover and rebuild pieces of the economy that COVID-19 has damaged.</p>
<p>👔 <strong>Businesses:</strong> Start <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com">building a Messenger bot for free</a> to keep your customers informed, automate tasks, generate revenue, and more.</p>
<p>💼 <strong>Marketing agencies:</strong> <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/3882031-chatfuel-for-agencies-and-creators#:~:text=We%20also%20offer%20an%20Enterprise%20plan">Book a demo</a> with us to learn more about how our<a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/3882031-chatfuel-for-agencies-and-creators">Premium Agency program</a> can empower you to exceed client expectations and make a difference, like GrowthBond did.</p>
<p>💙 <strong>Nonprofits:</strong> Learn <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/9-reasons-your-nonprofit-needs-a-chatbot">how your org can benefit from a bot</a>, then get information on our <a href="https://chatfuel.intercom-clicks.com/via/e?ob=ztQDpK3PbBuSXQ9E9J2xuj%2FY46kabynWNpmbS699JLJ7FlFGf5hjsBuwd25s1ieveLsx10ajwhwHIguNgyVgT7irAeOFbbjiHJTaw4y8meU%3D&h=2f7945ea5a3937b3ceac168b68622d1194f4d4f7-mca3oa0n_26925251929">Bots for Good program</a>, designed to support the nonprofit organizations that support all of us.</p>
<p><em>Learn more about what Chatfuel is doing to help businesses during the coronavirus pandemic.</em></p>

Here are two new use cases for what chatbots can do: They can be tools for freelancer job training and economic development.

How This Marketing Agency Used a Bot to Help Empower Freelancers and Small Businesses

Mary Rybakova

<p>The goal of any fitness business is to help people stay healthy by providing three things:</p>
<ol>
<li>guidance 📝</li>
<li>motivation 💥</li>
<li>a sense of community 👥</li>
</ol>
<p>But the coronavirus pandemic has forced gyms, boxing clubs, yoga studios, and CrossFit boxes around the world to close their doors for the time being. As a fitness-business owner, how can you continue to achieve your goal without a physical space?</p>
<p>After all, there’s no lack of demand right now. Many people are feeling stir-crazy at home, and look to physical fitness for stress relief and health more than ever. So how can you continue to provide these three elements to your members at a distance?</p>
<p>The clear answer is to shift to an online model for now. But what’s the easiest way to convert your gym or studio into a digital operation—without investing lots of time or money?</p>
<p>An elegant solution to this challenge is the Facebook Messenger chatbot. Bots can offer the guidance, motivation, and sense of community your members are missing right now. Best of all, Messenger chatbots are <a href="https://youtu.be/D4n6VLQHE5U">easy to build with Chatfuel</a> — no coding knowledge or previous experience required.</p>
<p>Let’s start by diving into the specifics of what a chatbot can do for your fitness business during these times, and what it can offer your members.</p>
<h2>#1. A chatbot can keep your community informed</h2>
<p>Your first task as a gym owner or marketer in the times of coronavirus is to keep your community up to date. Information and regulations for businesses during this time change often. It’s up to you to keep members informed on how your gym or studio is affected.</p>
<p>Here’s the good news: Building a gym bot that shares this kind of information and <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/chatbot-for-customer-service">answers FAQs</a> is easy. Plus, updating it whenever you need to takes seconds! Here’s a quick tutorial on how to create a bot like this.👇</p>
<figure><iframe allowfullscreen src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/A499Eeq9Lq8"></iframe></figure>
<p>Make sure to put the most pressing, relevant information front and center in your bot. Don’t start out with <em>About us</em> information that details how your gym was founded. That’s not the information most people are looking for right now.</p>
<p>Instead, they want to know if you’re open, when you’ll reopen if not, and what you can offer them in the meantime. Put these details first; don’t make users have to dig to find them. Make your bot a hub for the most up-to-date information about your business right now, and highlight how the latest changes affect members.</p>
<h2>#2. A chatbot can provide personalized workouts for users</h2>
<p>Get this: Consumers are <a href="https://hbr.org/2018/01/ads-that-dont-overstep?autocomplete=true">40% more likely</a> to view items that are recommended based on personal information that they’ve shared with a brand. It stands to reason, then, that gym members will be more likely to actually do the at-home workouts you share if they’re personalized to them. A chatbot makes it easy for your fitness business to offer this type of customization.</p>
<p>The key is conversation. It’s how chatbots communicate with users, via back-and-forth chat. It’s also how your bot can gather information about a user’s needs or preferences in order to make custom recommendations.</p>
<p>It doesn’t have to be complicated to build out this type of functionality, either. Here’s an example of how you could set up a personal trainer chatbot to recommend custom workouts for users:</p>
<ul>
<li>Add a bank of a few key movements to your bot, given in manageable increments, like 10 shuttle sprints, 50 jump ropes, 25 burpees, and 20 push-ups, for example. Create a gallery with videos showing how to do each one.</li>
<li>Set up your bot to quiz the user about their preferences for the day’s workout (like duration, equipment they have available, etc.).</li>
<li>Based on their responses, the bot can create a workout for the user, made up of the different movements you’ve given it to work with.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb5f3adeab59_Why-Gyms-and-Fitness-Studios-Should-Be-Using-Messenger-Bots-Right-Now.png" alt="chatbots for gyms" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/ALW1tra5u05OTQ8ODQDk5eXL09lzdHVcYGQAxcXFqKuryszP9ff4kZMWlUJJHegAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<p>You can equip your bot to put together workouts for users based on their desired duration and the equipment they have on hand.</p>
<p>You could do the same thing with yoga poses or boxing sequences, too—whatever movements your gym or fitness center specializes in. It’s minimal work for you and maximum benefit for your users. This is just one of many ways you could use a gym bot to share your online workouts. You could also:</p>
<p>📆 Create a gallery with one card for each day of the week, and have the respective button link to a full video workout for that day.</p>
<p>🧘🏽‍♀️Ask users what benefit they want that day (relaxation, energy, stress relief, etc.) and have the bot send them instructions for a yoga flow that will help them achieve it.</p>
<p>There’s lots of room for creativity when it comes to sharing workouts via chatbot. Think about what format would best serve your users, and go from there.</p>
<h2>#3. A chatbot can help you run contests and promotions to boost engagement</h2>
<p>One element gym-goers are missing most right now is the sense of community your business provided when it was fully open. Use a chatbot to help promote community engagement still, even while your members can’t physically gather together. It can help with:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Contests.</strong> You could encourage users to log their workouts in the bot. Your bot can save them as attributes. Then, you’ll be able to easily find who had the fastest time or the most reps for that day, and reward them with a gift card or some merch. Or, you could use the logs to track who is most consistent in their workouts over a month, and give them a prize and a social-media shoutout.</li>
<li><strong>User-generated content.</strong> Your bot could ask users to submit photos of themselves, their workout space, or the makeshift weights they’re using to do your exercises at home. It’s an easy way to gather user-generated content to feature on your social media to boost community morale and motivation.</li>
<li><strong>Giveaways.</strong> If you’d like the added bonus of gaining new bot subscribers, you could run a giveaway on your Facebook page. Create a post on your business page announcing a giveaway of a prize, instructing users to comment to enter. Set up the <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/how-to-turn-facebook-post-commenters-into-customers">Comments Autoreply feature</a> so your bot will automatically reply to every entrant. It can start conversations with those who don’t win, encouraging them to check out its other resources on Messenger.</li>
</ul>
<h2>#4. A chatbot can sell your merchandise</h2>
<p>Does your gym or fitness studio sells merchandise like workout clothing, fitness equipment, or supplements? A chatbot can help you maintain this revenue stream during the pandemic (and beyond!). If your gym isn’t set up to sell online yet, check out this quick-start <a href="https://www.oberlo.com/blog/how-i-launched-my-ecommerce-store-in-less-than-30-minutes">guide to opening an ecommerce store.</a> Once your gym has an online shop ready to go, here are a few ways a bot can help boost its sales:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Answer questions about products.</strong> This is where a chatbot’s handy FAQ function comes into play again. You can equip your Messenger bot to answer questions about everything from apparel sizing to shipping costs and times. If a customer is hesitant to buy because they have a question, the bot can answer it and close the deal.</li>
<li><strong>Recommend products.</strong> Through the same question-and-answer style, a bot can gather information about a user’s needs or preferences. Then, it can recommend products that would be the best match. If you sell protein powder, for example, the bot could ask users how many grams of protein they want per serving, what flavor they prefer, etc. Then, it could show relevant products with links to purchase on your store website.</li>
</ul>
<figure><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/RSi6QWd0Sek?feature=oembed" allowfullscreen></iframe></figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Send abandoned-cart reminders.</strong> If a user adds one of your products to their cart but leaves without buying, your Messenger chatbot can send them a gentle reminder. It’s important to not be too aggressive with these, especially in these times. But a quick message that simply asks the user if they have questions or offers a discount can go a long way. Use our Cart Reminders plugin to set up these automatic messages in minutes.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Other benefits of using a chatbot for your gym or yoga studio</h2>
<p>Now you know what a chatbot can help your gym or fitness center achieve. Here are a few other reasons why using chatbots for fitness brands is a wise move during this time:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>They’re easy to build</strong>. As we mentioned before, you don’t need any special skills or experience to build a fitness chatbot with Chatfuel. Our platform is user friendly, and we offer tons of support resources to help you on your way (listed in the last section of this post).</li>
<li><strong>They’re part of the Facebook ecosystem</strong>. Facebook Messenger has over a billion users, so it’s safe to say that most of your fitness clients will be familiar with the interface. That means there will be no learning curve for them to get value from your chatbot, and no need for them to install a separate app. It also means you can get more users to your bot <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/create-click-to-messenger-ads-to-drive-traffic-to-your-bot">with Facebook ads</a>, if desired.</li>
<li><strong>They can be your business’s central hub.</strong> A Messenger chatbot can become a one-stop shop for all information related to your business during the pandemic (and after!). You can equip it with all relevant information for members, so they know that it’s the place to go when they have a question or want an update about your business. Plus, you’ll be able to instantly update information yourself—no need to contact your developer, as you may have to for changes to your website.</li>
<li><strong>They can help you achieve your business goals.</strong> Bots can help you provide guidance, motivation, and a sense of community to your members, as we discussed. But they can also help you keep up engagement and even revenue during these times to keep your business afloat.</li>
</ul>
<h2>Examples of fitness chatbots powered by Chatfuel</h2>
<p><strong>Boosty.Coach</strong>, platform for finding live workouts</p>
<ul>
<li>Boosty is a French website that makes it easy for fitness enthusiasts to find workout videos and live coaching sessions to follow at home. They’ve generously made their platform free for the duration of quarantine. 💙 Their workout chatbot guides the user through the process of finding the right video for them, whether it’s about exercise, meditation, or nutrition. The bot makes it easy for users to find workouts and other fitness information that suits them.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbb804deab57_Messenger-chatbot-for-fitness-Boosty-Coach.png" alt="chatbots for coaching" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/AF5cV15eXeXm5////wAkFgAZDACZoqvIyckAhYSEcXFxyMnK6urqbzsUcut0LRkAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<p><strong>Planet Fitness,</strong> national chain of fitness centers</p>
<ul>
<li>In the times of COVID-19, Planet Fitness’s Messenger chatbot provides only the most crucial information for members. That includes FAQs about gym closures, and information about the online workouts they’re offering. The exercises aren’t available in the bot itself, in this case. However, users can click a button and will be directed to the gym’s Facebook page where they can join in on live, guided exercises.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb5adcdeab5c_Planet-Fitness--national-chain-of-fitness-centers_Chatbot-for-gym-and-workout.png" alt="chatbots for fitness" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/ACIjIwwRFNXW1v///wBGR0c3PUFXXmKrq60AUVFSQUVHqqqr19fXK04RAGy34pIAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<h2>How to build a Messenger bot for your fitness business</h2>
<p>To help you learn how to build a gym chatbot, we’ve collected some resources for you. Your first step is to sign up for a <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com">free Chatfuel account</a>. Then, get acquainted with our platform and some bot-building basics:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMA97c2a6Mw">Connect your Facebook page</a> to Chatfuel</li>
<li><a href="https://youtu.be/D4n6VLQHE5U">Build your first chatbot</a> in three minutes</li>
<li>Use a template to <a href="https://youtu.be/A499Eeq9Lq8">set up a bot to answer FAQs</a></li>
</ul>
<p>You’ll find quick-start tips and advice on our blog, too. Check out how to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Avoid the most common chatbot mistakes</li>
<li>Make sure your bot complies with Messenger policies</li>
<li>Use built-in stats to monitor your bot’s performance</li>
</ul>
<p>Finally, we recommend that bot-builders of all levels join <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel">our Facebook community</a>, where you can get advice, find inspiration, and ask questions.</p>

What's the easiest way to convert your gym or studio into a digital operation during COVID without investing lots of time/money? Chatbots!

Why Gyms Should Be Using Messenger Bots During the Pandemic

<h2>The Brand</h2>
<p>What’s the one ultra-valuable resource that all insurance brokers and real estate agents depend on? High-intent, high-quality leads, and ideally at an affordable price. Tacobot is a US-based chatbot agency that helps small, local businesses of these types get exactly that.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb4710dead50_Insurance agency case study Tacobot.png" loading="lazy" alt="" height="1458" width="1651" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAAECAIAAAAmkwkpAAAACXBIWXMAABCcAAAQnAEmzTo0AAAAP0lEQVR4nAE0AMv/ABcWFoiIh+/w8Obn6ABcXFpwb27BwcGOkJIAbm5uiYiIt7e3kJKXAMHBwdzd3t3e4d7e38yeHoNa5O2YAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<h2>The Problem</h2>
<p>Every insurance company or real estate business needs a regular influx of leads. Major national brands can afford billboards, TV commercials, direct mail, and other pricey strategies to get them. So how can a local company with a fraction of the sales and marketing budget generate leads?</p>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/Tacobot-106871984030519">Tacobot</a> co-founder CJ Hutsenpiller, most turn to lead vendors. These are groups that scrape lead information from <a href="#">web-traffic sources</a> and sell the data to businesses. “The problem with that, ” he explains, “is that the leads are low intent, high priced, and often sold to multiple agencies at once.”</p>
<p>Hutsenpiller always kept a lookout for marketing solutions to this problem. One afternoon, he was watching a Facebook <a href="https://youtu.be/wiErqy5qMaU">video ad</a> where the host was selling a book. She told viewers to comment to receive a free sample of the first chapter. “I commented, ” he says, “half-expecting to never hear anything. But to my surprise, their bot immediately started communicating with me. I knew right away that I could use this in the insurance space.” As he puts it, <strong>he stumbled on chatbots as a new service for his clients</strong> by “complete dumb luck!”</p>
<h2>The Solution</h2>
<p>Tacobot offers cheaper way to get higher quality leads than the vendors Hutsenpiller described. His agency provides <strong>pre-built lead-generation chatbots</strong> for clients. “In order to be successful in generating business in the insurance field, you must do more to win a client’s trust, ” he says. “There’s something to be said for the power of being able to have a conversation with a prospect—and that’s what bots allow our clients to do. Immediately when a user enters the funnel, the bot can start building a relationship with them using conversation.”</p>
<p>Tacobot’s carefully designed chatbots help clients start these meaningful conversations with prospects. The chatbot marketing agency’s clients can pay for subscription-based access to a bot “skill, ” as Hutsenpiller calls them. They can choose one or more of the following skills, or functions:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Quoting tool for life insurance 👤</strong>This bot skill generates life-insurance quotes for prospects right in Facebook Messenger. If the user wants to purchase the policy, one click will take them to a pre-filled web application.</li>
<li><strong>Quoting tool for home/auto insurance 🚗</strong>The user simply has to answer a few questions. Then the bot pulls information from third-party sources. It combines it with the user’s responses and generates a quote.</li>
<li><strong>Rent calculator 🧮</strong>This bot skill is designed for mortgage and real estate professionals. First, it captures how much the user currently pays in rent. Then, it converts it to an estimate of a mortgage payment that amount could sustain. Finally, it’ll show matching house listings in the user’s area.</li>
<li><strong>Home-value calculator</strong> 🏠 Real estate businesses can also select this chatbot skill. It’ll give prospective home sellers an estimate on the value of their property.</li>
</ul>
<p>And of course, the chatbots will capture user information for each of the leads that it chats with. That way, the businesses can pursue them personally.</p>
<p>Tacobot also has <a href="https://www.messenger.com/t/106871984030519">their own chatbot</a>. It lets clients preview different skills so they can see how each one works. The client can then purchase the skill (s) of their choice right within the bot (see screenshot below). From there, Tacobot chatbot development agency will customize the bot for the client’s business. Then they launch it, and teach the clients how to access it in Chatfuel. Tacobot also runs a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/728962607577492">Facebook support group</a>. They use it to answer questions, and to share strategies to help clients <a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/how-to-create-messenger-ads-on-facebook/">push traffic to their bots</a>.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbf0bddeab2b_Marketing-Agency-Uses-Messenger-Bots-to-Win-High-Intent--Low-Cost-Leads-for-Clients---4.png" alt="Messenger bot to help sell their chatbot services to clients" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/AJaXmIOHiwYHByMjJACdnp10eHnCw8Tw8fIAlJWUc3R0ysvL4+LiUZQUUe+p6s4AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>Tacobot takes advantage of the free Pro bot that comes with their <a href="https://try.chatfuel.com/agency" target="_blank">Premium Agency plan</a>. They use their own Messenger bot to help sell their chatbot services to clients.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Recipe</h2>
<p>The Tacobot team relies on these Chatfuel features the most to build effective bots for their clients:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/735122-json-api"><strong>JSON API</strong></a>. Once a chatbot <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjxhyddugaA&feature=youtu.be">gathers a lead’s information</a>, it has to make it available to the client. From there, the client can pursue the leads personally. Tacobot’s smaller clients use the Notify Admin Via Email or <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/2708726-save-to-google-sheets">Send to Google Sheets</a>for this. But for larger or more advanced clients, Tacobot <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/posts/json-api-examples">uses JSON</a> to send the details to the client’s CRM directly and automatically. Hutsenpiller says they’ve <a href="https://www.jotform.com/what-is-crm/">integrated with CRMs</a> like Salesforce, BoomTown, JotForm, Mailchimp, and Agency Elephant this way.</li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbfcdadeab4a_s_241729DC75347BB40AF8249DA4AB84EE9B074520F04DDD3B346A73A08958BAFA_1586222445084_image.png" alt="JSON API allows your bot to pull and display data" height="1362" width="1380" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAAECAIAAAAmkwkpAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAOklEQVR4nGNwdXOrq2/o7O7et28fQ2FhcVh0fHF5jaSKNkNBQeGihQt6+/plVHUYbt2+PQEMtm7ZBAA/ghexbSvpAgAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>The JSON API allows your bot to pull and display data from an external source, or to send data to an external source.</figcaption></figure>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/908868-sequences"><strong>Sequences</strong></a>. This Chatfuel feature lets you schedule follow-up messages from your bot. Sequences are a key component in each of the four bot skills. Let’s say a user starts going through the flow for the rent calculator, or another skill Tacobot chatbots offer. But, halfway through, they get distracted and abandon the process. Tacobot ensures the user will later receive a sequence of messages that remind them to come back and finish the flow. (These messages are sent within the 24-hour window outlined in Facebook’s Messenger policies.)</li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb0daddeab46_Marketing-Agency-Uses-Messenger-Bots-to-Win-High-Intent--Low-Cost-Leads-for-Clients-2-1.png" alt="Tacobot chatbots are equipped with Sequences" height="788" width="940" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAKklEQVR4nGN4DwYPwYBBVVmlva1t3dq1e3bvZqioqDp69OjJEydOnjgBAAXXGYVXNPoNAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>Tacobot chatbots are equipped with Sequences to follow up with users who don’t finish the bot’s questionnaire.</figcaption></figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Attributes</strong>. User attributes are like tags. They identify a certain preference or characteristic of a bot user. You can create as many custom attributes as you want based on what’s useful for your business. Tacobot clients using the home-insurance quoting skill could have their bot save every user’s zip code as an attribute, for example. The bots can do this automatically via the Save User Input plugin. That way, the client can sort leads by area to assign them to different agents, or to <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575719-targeted-messenger-ads">create retargeting ads</a>. They’ll be able to easily sort their leads into segments based on this (or any other attribute) in the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575151-people-tab"><em>People</em> tab</a>.</li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb2dbadeab3f_Marketing-Agency-Uses-Messenger-Bots-to-Win-High-Intent--Low-Cost-Leads-for-Clients-3.png" alt="save user attributes in Chatfuel chatbots" height="301" width="607" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsSAAALEgHS3X78AAAAJUlEQVR4nAEaAOX/AC8vLsjIyN/f3t/f3gAfHyDIyMjOzc3NzMu8LQ+fYKywqQAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>The Save User Input plugin is one way to save user attributes in Chatfuel.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Results</h2>
<p>“The insurance space as a whole is behind when it comes to anything technology-related—especially digital marketing strategies, ” Hutsenpiller tells us. That’s likely why Tacobot’s chatbots have become the tool of choice for local insurance and real estate businesses in 41 US states. Prospective clients take notice when they hear how Tacobot uses the accessible, affordable technology of Messenger bots to achieve such impressive results.</p>
<p>Tacobot’s clients come from all over the country and from a few different industries. As a result, metrics for their bots vary. But Hutsenpiller says that clients who follow his team’s guidance can expect metrics like these:</p>
<ul>
<li>$2-5 per high-quality insurance lead</li>
<li>Less than $10 per high-intent real estate lead</li>
<li>$0.10 per conversation</li>
</ul>
<p>For insurance clients, that’s “drastically cheaper than what they can get with a lead vendor, ” he explains. “Real estate and mortgage are a little harder because of Facebook’s new special ad-category targeting rules, ” he tells us, “but we still generate those for less than $10 each.” Plus, the Chatfuel interface is easy for both the Tacobot team and its clients to use.</p>
<p>“I’ve built bots on both major platforms, ” explains Hutsenpiller, “and I find the structure of Chatfuel to be much easier to use. I also have always gotten great support from the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel/">Chatfuel Community on Facebook</a>, and from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1_z5c5UnMJ0waRJ8Bx1cFg">the videos by Andrew Demeter</a>—who is an amazing asset to the company.”</p>
<h2>Your agency can “lead” clients to success with Messenger bots</h2>
<p>If your marketing agency doesn’t yet offer chatbots as a service, now’s the time to consider it. In these difficult times, meaningful conversations are more important than ever. <a href="https://try.chatfuel.com/agency">Request a demo</a> for our robust Premium Agency plan today. Then you can start using Messenger bots to help your clients have authentic interactions with their audiences.</p>
<p><em>See how else Chatfuel agency partners are using chatbots to achieve incredible results for their clients. Or, learn</em><a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/chatbot-contest-students/"><em>how they’re giving back</em></a><em>to the community. If you’re building bots for healthcare clients that need to share important information about COVID-19, find resources here.</em></p>

Tacobot is a chatbot marketing agency that helps small, local businesses get high-intent, high-quality leads at an affordable price.

Marketing Agency Uses Messenger Bots to Deliver High-Quality Leads for Clients

<p>A great product attracts people. And it the support team gets more overwhelmed with a high customer flow. When it comes to e-commerce, the pressure might be even higher because consumers can quickly ask a question and expect a quick response. And if they don’t get it, most likely, they’ll leave. No matter how great the product is.</p>
<p><a href="https://shop.3dmats.com">3D Mats</a> is a Taiwanese e-commerce retailer that faced this problem. They design and sell car accessories such as floor mats, sunshades, and roof racks, focusing on constantly innovating and releasing high-quality items for their customers. Looking for a solution, 3D Mats hired GoSky AI agency to build a chatbot for their brand. The bot produced such excellent results for 3D Mats that it won second prize in our 2019 E-commerce Chatbot Competition. Here are a few metrics:</p>
<ul>
<li>The yearly average return on ad spend (ROAS) blasts to 999%.</li>
<li>47% of customers purchase other recommended products.</li>
<li>The repurchase rate has climbed to 30%.</li>
</ul>
<p>Let’s have a look at their journey.</p>
<h2>Busy support team, ineffective both marketing and ads</h2>
<p>The 3D Mats support agents spent most of their time answering repetitive common questions. For example, consumers asked about the products, delivery details, and other things that are called FAQs. Of course, answering those is essential, but that meant less time to respond to more complex inquiries, plus longer waiting time for all customers.</p>
<p>Despite communicating with consumers a lot, the 3D Mats team didn’t have a good feel for who their ideal customer was. So, it was hard for them to market effectively. Not understanding their target audience meant their Facebook ads weren’t too successful. Their retargeting ads were getting pricey, even though they weren’t doing much to increase sales for their store.</p>
<p>All these problems took the 3D Mats team to the point where they needed an innovative but inexpensive solution. So, they decided to try automation.</p>
<h2>One chatbot solves three problems</h2>
<p>Initially, the GoSky team realized that all these problems were connected. So, they set up a strategy for solving them all and implemented it in their chatbot for 3D Mats. “Chatfuel Dashboard is very stable and trust-worthy. It brings an enjoyable user experience to the bot builder and the bot users, ” Dora Tseng from GoSky AI explains why they chose Chatfuel for this and other projects.</p>
<p>Let’s look at how the GoSky team broke down the task into three steps and used powerful Chatfuel tools and plugins for each problem.</p>
<h3>1. Automating FAQs and product recommendation</h3>
<p>3D Mats shared that most of the FAQs they receive from the comments. So, the GoSky team used a Comments Autoreply feature in their Chatfuel automation. A chatbot can send a private message to all commenters or only those who used a specific keyword in their comment. This rule can be applied to all posts or only particular ones. If you already use Chatfuel automation, you can set the Comments Autoreply feature and check the FAQ templates in your <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com">Dashboard</a>.</p>
<h3>2. Understanding the audience</h3>
<p><a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/create-click-to-messenger-ads-to-drive-traffic-to-your-bot">Click-to-Messenger ads</a>. Tseng calls this feature and chatbots “a perfect match because they lead right to the chatbot, avoiding necessary redirect.” GoSky AI used bot links to make this process even smoother. For example, when users click a product ad, a link takes them to that part of the bot containing information about that product. That way, users find what they need in one click, so conversion rates increase.</p>
<p><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/2708726-export-data-from-chatfuel-to-google-sheets">Save to Google Sheets plugin.</a> The 3D Mats chatbot quizzes users about their car and needs. It automatically exports their answers to a Google Sheet. A human agent then checks the responses, finds the right product for the user’s car, and sends them the store link to it via Live Chat. The GoSky team plans to automate the whole product recommendation process to save even more time.</p>
<h3>3. Improving the ad campaigns</h3>
<p><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575719-how-to-create-facebook-and-instagram-ads">Lookalike audiences</a>. On Facebook, you can target new people who are most likely to be interested in your ad — and most likely to convert. Chatfuel users have access to this data in the People tab. They can export it to Facebook and use it in their ads.</p>
<p>A/B Test plugin. GoSky AI used this feature for the brand’s holiday campaign to find the most effective way to send a promo code to users. They tried three options: sending it immediately, sending it later via <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/908868-sequences">sequences</a>, and sharing it with a countdown timer. The results showed that the Sequence flow worked best, as it got them the most conversions. They used that method for all future users and <strong>increased monthly sales by 29%</strong>!</p>
<h2>Beyond expectations</h2>
<p>Eventually, the 3D Mats team had much more time because the automation was now instantly responding to common questions. Once a Chatfuel bot starts a conversation with a new user, it saves their profile information in the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575151-people-tab">People tab</a>. The more new users the 3D Mats chatbot interacted with, the more data the team had to analyze. That insight allowed them to solve their second problem. Eventually, 3D Mats was able to run better ads and produce more relevant content, helping solve the third problem. The bot GoSky built help solved 3D Mats’ problems and accomplish their goals:</p>
<ol>
<li>The chatbot’s FAQs function and quiz feature have <strong>reduced repetitive inquiries by 70%</strong>. Once they automate the entire process, GoSky estimates that number will jump to 95%! The 3D Mats support team already has much more time to spend on other tasks, and that time will only increase.</li>
<li>Suggesting products has been a super effective function of the bot, too. 47% of customers now also purchase other recommended products. 3D Mats’ <strong>repurchase rate has climbed to 30%</strong>. The bot personalizes the service and <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/customer-loyalty-chatbot">keeps customers coming back</a>.</li>
<li>The audience data that the 3D Mats chatbot gathered gave their Facebook ad performance a significant boost. Their yearly average return on ad spend <strong>(ROAS) is now 999%</strong>.</li>
</ol>
<figure><img alt="Return on Ad Spend " src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb5734deaaf0_Marketing-Agencies.png" height="505" width="2048" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAABCAIAAAB2XpiaAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAFUlEQVR4nGNQUFNZtHTl46fPMrNzASPxBkrGkAJUAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>The GoSky team achieved a yearly average ROAS of 999% for their client 3D Mats.<br></figcaption></figure>
<h2>Grow e-commerce conversion rate</h2>
<p>With Chatfuel, you can answer FAQs, learn your target audience better, improve your ads, and more. Automation will help you save time to focus on the things that need your attention most while your automation communicates with your customers 24/7. <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com">Sign up for free</a> today to access the Chatfuel powerful tools and features. No technical knowledge or previous experience is required.</p>

This agency used a bot to help an ecommerce brand reduce 70% of repetitive customer inquiries, increase sales, and achieve ROAS of 999%!

Agency gets 999% ROAS for e-commerce client using Messenger bot

<h2>The Brand</h2>
<p>Photobooth Deluxe is a German company founded by Jürgen Mayr. This entrepreneur began his career as a wedding photographer, but decided he wanted to do things a bit differently than others in the industry.</p>
<p>Years ago, Mayr began to notice the rise in popularity of photo booths for weddings in Asia and the US. He got a friend to build him a prototype, and in 2013, he started building his own. From then on, many of his fellow wedding photographers who saw them wanted one for their own businesses.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb8667deaad4_Group-200.png" alt="" height="1123" width="2000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAABYlAAAWJQFJUiTwAAAAI0lEQVR4nGOIjEma0tL+5evX48ePM/Dx8tnb2q1avSY7KwsApv0MDRFf9D4AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<p>Since then, Mayr has built and sold 500 photo-booth systems across Europe—but that’s not the key source of his income today. Instead, it’s supplies (the specialized ink and paper for the photo booths) that he sells regularly to past clients. The Messenger bot he built now handles all these transactions—and he won first prize in Chatfuel’s <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel/permalink/671349200060490/">2019 Ecommerce Bot Competition</a> for it!</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb9bb2deaacd_s_E94EDFE1957187F517D4D300CB15AA0D29801DDC594C3127C861988DB02FE829_1578528032351_jurgen2.jpeg" alt="" height="1080" width="1920" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAI0lEQVR4nGNgUGmY8OF/3pX/DCoNDAy63emn/6ef/s+g2w0Al6IL22U/LRsAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>Jürgen Mayr, founder and CEO of Photobooth Deluxe, won first prize in Chatfuel's Ecommerce Chatbot Competition in 2019.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Problem</h2>
<p>Pre-chatbot, the procedure for reordering these supplies wasn’t easy for Mayr or his clients. Taking down their information via phone and email to send to the drop-shipper was tedious, and took 10–20 minutes each time. Plus, orders could only be processed when Mayr was available. If he were on vacation or at an event, for example, the orders wouldn’t be shipped until days later when he had time to submit them.</p>
<p>95% of his clients are on Facebook. So when he heard about chatbots, he knew he had to see if one could help him streamline the process. “The goal, ” Mayr explains, “was to enable my clients to order supply materials without my physical presence.”</p>
<h2>The Solution</h2>
<p>Mayr held the common misconception that you need coding knowledge to build a Messenger chatbot, so he turned to a freelancer for help. But when the end result didn’t turn out well, he decided to take the project on himself. One Friday morning, he set out to build a chatbot with Chatfuel by Sunday night. “If I can get it done in time, great. If not, I’ll treat it as a good experience and know that chatbots aren’t for me, ” Mayr says.</p>
<p>He started with a sea of sticky notes on his wall to help him plan the bot’s flow. It’s a great illustration of his advice for other bot builders, which is that <a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/expert-tips-to-avoid-the-5-most-common-chatbot-mistakes/">planning is crucial</a>. 90% of the work—<a href="https://youtu.be/HX-zA-DkPaU">mapping out a logical flow</a>—happens before you even log into Chatfuel. And then once you do: “Do something, and test it, tweak it, and test it again!” says Mayr.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbfceddeaad0_s_69FD23A4E00C4123535B3918306363A3896757D94D8A603F7DAFA44C713BC98E_1578445925350_d3cf0223-f202-46ff-a7fa-f9591929784c-original.jpeg" alt="" height="2000" width="3000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/ALOPY//4g8WvdRcAAAC2lVr/7X/ZrWeymGsAm35/6sqcxKuLRjckmDsUVcbhSsAAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<p><a href="https://m.me/photoboothdeluxe?fbclid=IwAR34-hj67Lw-jkpdMvWXJFhVFNLC6HkLjZ-aUM7cEbuqor6RO25GZ7xs1EE">The bot he built</a>and fine-tuned then does exactly what he wanted it to. It gathers all the order, shipping, and payment information from first-time clients, and notifies the drop-shipper to ship. For repeat customers, all past information is saved, and the reorder process takes just two taps.</p>
<p>“So if I’m on vacation for two weeks, for example, my clients can still order, they can still get their materials/supplies. When I come back home, all I have to do is write the invoices, ” says Mayr. 🏝️</p>
<h2>The Recipe</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“Don’t build a bot a bot to serve you as a vendor; build a bot to serve your clients” — Jürgen Mayr, <a href="https://www.photobooth-deluxe.de/en/">Photobooth Deluxe</a> founder</p>
</blockquote>
<p>These are a few of the features and plugins Mayr used to build his super-effective Messenger chatbot:</p>
<ul>
<li>**User attributes.**Mayr uses this Chatfuel feature to keep track of how much each of his clients have spent with him in total. He set an attribute to populate with the total amount, which updates automatically each time an order is placed. Using attributes also gives him the option to <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575719-targeted-messenger-ads">create custom and Lookalike Audiences</a> for <a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/sponsored-messages-101-a-complete-guide-to-reengaging-chatbot-subscribers/">sponsored messages</a> and other Facebook ads, so he can target his most valuable customers (or find prospects similar to them). <em>You can now use Segment Sync to send subscriber data for these audiences to Facebook in one click.</em></li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb92abdeaac6_s_E94EDFE1957187F517D4D300CB15AA0D29801DDC594C3127C861988DB02FE829_1578529813492_image.png" alt="" height="748" width="1384" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAI0lEQVR4nGPw8PC4cuXKpo0bb1y/zmBjZfn//39hAf7YmBgAtmMM4uXDczwAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<ul>
<li>**Notify Admin via Email plugin.**Each time a client orders through Mayr’s chatbot, it instantly sends an email to him for his records. It also sends one to his drop-shipper, so they can package and ship the order right away.</li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb1440deaada_s_69FD23A4E00C4123535B3918306363A3896757D94D8A603F7DAFA44C713BC98E_1578447618597_send+email.png" alt="" height="804" width="1478" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAABYlAAAWJQFJUiTwAAAAI0lEQVR4nGNwc/eIiYqrra09dOgQg7SEpL+3/7v37549ewYAhRMMWdktHpgAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/sponsored-messages-101-a-complete-guide-to-reengaging-chatbot-subscribers/"><strong>Sponsored messages</strong></a>. After a customer places an order, Mayr’s bot asks if they’d like to receive a supply check-in notification in 30 days. Now that Facebook’s policies have changed, he plans to use sponsored messages to send these, which simply ask if the client needs to reorder. Mayr says his customers often forget to stock up on supplies otherwise, so these reminders are helpful for them and bring in more revenue for him. <em>You can now use our native ads integration to easily set up sponsored messages for your Facebook chatbot.</em></li>
</ul>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb6c7edeaaee_Group-202.png" alt="" height="1123" width="2000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAABYlAAAWJQFJUiTwAAAAIklEQVR4nGP4//9/bl7etm3b/v//z/D//38jY+P4+HggBwDnLhEVeWd5AgAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Third-party API</strong>. The next update Mayr has planned for his bot involves an API from the shipping company he uses. He’s going to connect Chatfuel to it via Zapier or <a href="https://www.integromat.com/en/integrations/chatfuel">Integromat</a>. That way, the bot can automatically message customers with a tracking number, so they can keep tabs on their shipment. “Always keep the client well informed, and make it easy for him to order, ” advises Mayr.</li>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/735122-json-api"><strong>JSON API</strong></a>. It occasionally happened that new-order emails would be missed by the drop-shipper, or would end up in their spam folders. To solve this issue, Mayr <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/posts/json-api-examples">used the JSON API</a> to integrate <a href="https://www.twilio.com/">Twilio</a>. His drop-shipping company now receives an SMS text triggered by the bot, so they know to look out for a new-order email.</li>
</ul>
<figure><div><iframe allowfullscreen frameborder="0" scrolling="no" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/fnjvvHS5LK4"></iframe></div></figure>
<p>He also encourages other bot builders to seek feedback before launching. 🗣 “Maybe ask a couple of friends to test it. Ask them to be very, very critical with the bot. Ask if there were any steps where they didn’t know what to do, because that means you have to do better there.” And always design with the customer or end user in mind, he adds. “Don’t build a bot to serve you as a vendor; build a bot to serve your clients.”</p>
<h2>The Results</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“The quality and ease of service is more important to [my clients] than getting the lowest price” –Jürgen Mayr, Photobooth Deluxe founder</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Since he implemented the bot, Mayr has <strong>automated over $100,000 in revenue</strong> with his Messenger chatbot. “It’s quite amazing, ” admits Mayr, “because it’s almost hands-free. I don’t have to do a lot. I have to write the invoice at the end; that’s it.” And he’s even working to automate that final step: He’s already asked his invoicing company to consider adding an API for their service.</p>
<p>Mayr also notes that he gets more sales because the ordering process via bot is so simple. Normally clients shop around to check prices with different vendors before ordering photo-booth supplies, he explains. “But I make it so easy for them to reorder, so it doesn’t matter if a certain item is a few euros more.” His clients order anyway, because “the quality and ease of service is more important to them than getting the lowest price.”</p>
<h2>Build a picture-perfect bot for your brand 📸</h2>
<p>“Chatfuel is amazing. It’s fun to work with, and you don’t have to have developer skills. You can do a lot just with a logical mind, ” says Mayr. He studied economics and tax law himself, which illustrates that building a Chatfuel Messenger bot without a coding background is completely possible. “If you really need a developer for some advanced functionality, ” he adds, “you can probably find someone in the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel/">Chatfuel community</a>. You can do almost everything yourself though; the sky or your brain is the limit!”</p>
<figure><div><iframe allowfullscreen frameborder="0" scrolling="no" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9OrT7PgypPs"></iframe></div></figure>
<blockquote>
<p>“Chatfuel is amazing. It’s fun to work with, and you don’t have to have developer skills. You can do a lot just with a logical mind”  –Jürgen Mayr, Photobooth Deluxe founder</p>
</blockquote>
<p><a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com"><em>Sign up with Chatfuel</em></a><em>for free today—no coding skills, previous experience, or credit card required.</em></p>

Discover how this photo-booth entrepreneur used a Messenger chatbot to bring in revenue on autopilot.

Ecommerce Entrepreneur Uses Chatfuel Bot to Automate Over $100,000 in Sales

Use cases

<h2>The Brand</h2>
<p>DECEN Muebles Infantiles is an ecommerce children’s furniture brand based in Mexico. They craft beautiful, high-quality cribs and cradles by hand for sale online. Their mission is to design and build pieces that are safe, sturdy, beautiful, and environmentally sustainable.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb2b8adeaa63_s_53434E21F45E5522012C6D0FFC6EEBDB22A4CCD50236155995B5AC37C5DB3BC2_1575937008688_cama.gif" alt="DECEN® Baby Brand Generates 80% of Total Sales With Messenger Bot" height="720" width="1080" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>DECEN Muebles Infantiles sells unique, handcrafted baby furniture.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Problem</h2>
<p><a href="https://decen.com.mx">DECEN’s</a> small team had too many tasks on their plate. They were pleased to be getting more customers than ever, but their Messenger inbox was overflowing with inquiries. The company’s founder Omar Cortes started searching for solutions:</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>“I was already looking for a couple people to join the team just for answering inquiries. Then I found Chatfuel.”</strong> –Omar Cortes, founder</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The Solution</h2>
<p>“I logged into Chatfuel with my Facebook account, ” Cortes continues, “and I had my own chatbot working by the end of the day.” The bot he built acts as a first line of defense for customer support, but works as a sales funnel and content-marketing opportunity too. It’s designed to:</p>
<p>📝 provide answers to common questions</p>
<p>🔍 let users browse products right within Messenger</p>
<p>🤱🏻 share useful content related to babies and their care</p>
<p>Cortes has used the bot for various successful campaigns to boost sales, generate leads, and increase brand awareness and <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/customer-loyalty-chatbot">customer loyalty</a>, too. DECEN’s results from their chatbot were so impressive, they won Chatfuel’s 2017 bot competition! 🏆</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>“I logged into Chatfuel with my Facebook account and I had my own chatbot working by the end of the day.”</strong> –Omar Cortes, founder</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The Recipe</h2>
<p>“I’ve tried other chatbot platforms and I still find Chatfuel the most useful, reliable, and easy to work with, ” says Cortes. To get the impressive results that helped them grow their brand, the DECEN team used these Chatfuel functions and features:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/chatbot-for-customer-service"><strong>FAQs</strong></a>. The DECEN team built <a href="https://youtu.be/A499Eeq9Lq8">an FAQ functionality</a> into their chatbot so it could help with customer inquiries. They included the most common questions plus informative answers, and made them easy to identify with emoji. <em>‍</em></li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb7a45deaaa7_Decen-Mueble.png" alt="FAQ functionality into their chatbot" height="1106" width="2000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAABCcAAAQnAEmzTo0AAAAI0lEQVR4nGNgcNJr3L9++bNLDEqCDAyeJhve3j7w9wWDsRIAhqEK4fbxK64AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/how-to-turn-facebook-post-commenters-into-customers"><strong>Comments Autoreply</strong></a>. DECEN created a post on their Facebook page to announce a giveaway of one of their most popular cribs. To enter, expectant mothers simply had to comment with the month their baby was due. The bot automatically messaged all commenters, engaging even those who didn’t win.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb46f6deaaac_0*B0HoIUUdm1tRSw1Q.png" alt="Facebook giveaway" height="663" width="1000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAMElEQVR4nGPQUDNXkDVMTip89vwlg66KuRQjf1J4zNdf/xmMjNyEuOQ9XAI+ff4OAPXUDjKwQdwSAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>The Facebook giveaway post DECEN Muebles Infantiles used to gain qualified leads and increase sales</figcaption></figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Gallery cards.</strong> The furniture pieces DECEN sells are beautiful, so they took advantage of the aesthetics of their products in their chatbot. The team used gallery cards to display eye-catching images of different products, and included details and a link to shop for or share each one.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbaafddeaab6_0*asXEPqExZmzXFnAR.png" alt="The gallery cards you'll find in the bot" height="404" width="1000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAI0lEQVR4nGOwt7eTkhTjZmCwtjRk+P3r95fPnx4/evD/728AbIoNG1QzSKQAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>The gallery cards you'll find in the bot for DECEN Muebles Infantiles</figcaption></figure>
<ul>
<li><strong>Disable user input.</strong> A <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/hidden-benefits-of-chatbots">lesser-known Chatfuel feature</a> is the ability to disable the composer, which means users won’t be able to send free-text input. It’s a good option for bots that don’t use <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/828883-keywords">AI</a> or the User Input plugin. Because that way, users won’t trigger the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/4413516-default-answers">Default Answer</a> message (usually something like <em>Sorry, I didn’t get that)</em>, which may distract them and prevent them from converting.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb1765deaab9_0*sxTnlqAbMc5yruHw.png" alt="Allow User Input” slider in the Configure Tab of your bot dashboard." height="484" width="1000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAJUlEQVR4nAEaAOX/AFlZWcDAwDUvLGBcWwCfn5/JyMi7vb3m5+eanw4SHusWAQAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"><figcaption><em>Disable the composer by clicking the green “Allow User Input” slider in the Configure Tab of your bot dashboard.</em></figcaption></figure>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>“I’ve tried other chatbot platforms and I still find Chatfuel the most useful, reliable, and easy to work with.”</strong> –Omar Cortes, founder</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>The Results</h2>
<p>The original goal for the DECEN chatbot was simply to save the support team time and increase efficiency. As <strong>the bot now handles 98% of customer inquiries</strong>, it’s been a major success—but that’s not all it did for the brand. It also helped them:</p>
<p><strong>📈 Increase sales</strong>. Cortes used to focus his sales efforts on expo shows, but he now uses Chatfuel as a 24/7/365 ecommerce solution. “Today, 80% of total sales come from the bot, ” he shares.</p>
<p><strong>📧 Get more warm leads.</strong> Remember the Facebook-post giveaway DECEN did? It doubled monthly sales, generated nearly 4,000 qualified leads, and — thanks to the <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/json-api-examples">JSON API plugin</a> — added another 1,000 subscribers to the brand’s MailChimp list!</p>
<p><strong>❤️ Gain social proof.</strong> The campaign had another benefit, too. The bot messaged entrants who didn’t win, asking them to leave a review. The result was over 100 glowing reviews in just a few days, which “allowed me to sell easily, ” says Cortes.</p>
<p>Business is booming now, so much so that DECEN has just opened their first physical store. However, ecommerce will remain a strong focus for the brand.</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>“I think I have successfully found a great path to sell anything online using Chatfuel, creative content, and an ecommerce site.”</strong> –Omar Cortes, founder</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Rockabye chatbot 🎶 🍼</h2>
<p>Ready to start supercharging results for your ecommerce store? <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com"><strong>Get started with Chatfuel</strong></a> today. Learn to build your first bot <a href="https://youtu.be/D4n6VLQHE5U">in three minutes</a>, and join <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel">our Facebook community</a> for advice and inspiration. When you’re ready for more bot users and priority support, <a href="https://chatfuel.com/pricing">upgrade to Pro</a>. <em>Run <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/6-reasons-marketing-agencies-should-offer-chatbot-services">a marketing agency</a></em>? Check out the perks of <em><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/3882031-chatfuel-for-agencies-and-creators#:~:text=We%20also%20offer%20an%20Enterprise%20plan">our Premium Agency plan</a></em>.</p>

This ecommerce brand built a chatbot to save time and respond instantly to customers—and it ended up boosting sales too.

DECEN® Baby Brand Generates 80% of Total Sales With a Messenger Bot

<h2>The brand</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.hellofresh.com">HelloFresh</a> is a creative solution for those tired of eating out at restaurants but don’t have the time or know-how to plan and cook meals from scratch. This subscription-box service delivers fresh ingredients to your door and instructions to transform them into delicious meals. HelloFresh helps people enjoy healthy, home-cooked food without the hassle of meal planning and grocery shopping.</p>
<h2>The problem</h2>
<p>HelloFresh the US faced two main problems:</p>
<ol>
<li>They needed at least one customer-service agent to monitor incoming Facebook messages round the clock, just to keep up.<strong>‍</strong></li>
<li><strong>Slow response times.</strong> It took their support team between six and twelve hours to get through all the necessary steps to resolve a customer issue from one of these messages.</li>
</ol>
<p>Their customer-care team was overworked and could never get ahead. In addition, customers themselves were getting frustrated with the long wait times.</p>
<h2>The solution</h2>
<p>In 2017 HelloFresh team started exploring chatbots to improve customer support and engagement. And so, the idea for Freddy the Messenger bot was born. “Within just a few days, I created Freddy out the <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/chatbot-for-customer-service">customer service bot</a> framework,” explains Alex Curtis, Senior Associate on the HelloFresh Social Media Team.</p>
<p>Here’s what the HelloFresh team taught bot Freddy to do:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Reply to users.</strong> For Black Friday 2017 and 2018, the team created Facebook promo posts with riddles and questions. Freddy would <a href="https://youtu.be/j_s1FoC6HTM">automatically respond via Messenger</a> to all users who gave a correct answer and send them a promo code. In 2018, this campaign had <strong>a 64% conversion rate</strong> — meaning that over half of users who received the code used it to place an order!</li>
<li><strong>Recommend music.</strong> HelloFresh calls it Get Grooving: when the bot suggests a playlist to match the meal kit the user will be cooking that evening.</li>
<li><strong>Share seasonal tips</strong> and blog content around the holidays. They call it their Holiday Hotline, and it’s yet another way to create a unique, helpful experience for prospects and customers.</li>
</ul>
<h2>The recipe</h2>
<p>Freddy has been a hit with HelloFresh prospects and customers — and, their support team has benefited in a big way. To do it, they used these Chatfuel features:</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Comments Autoreply.</strong> Freddy automatically messaged people who commented on HelloFresh’s page posts. Once the user responds to Freddy’s first message, they become a reachable bot user. This feature was key in several of HelloFresh’s Facebook campaigns.</li>
<li><strong>Quick Replies.</strong> That way, users can tap suggested topics instead of having to type. Quick Replies make for a seamless user experience and help keep the conversation on track.</li>
<li><strong>Gallery cards</strong>. HelloFresh incorporated gallery cards in their bot, using plenty of bright, colorful graphics to catch a user’s eye.</li>
</ul>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/622f6b4374ab511d641dd504_HelloFresh Freddy chatbot.png" loading="lazy" alt="HelloFresh chatbot example" height="1168" width="2080" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAJUlEQVR4nAEaAOX/AIp/c765t/n7/tLS0gAiDABTTEfe4OGmnJfFuA6fF3mKNAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></figure>
<h2>The results</h2>
<p>In 2018, HelloFresh’s average response time to customer inquiries was five hours. In 2019, it dropped dramatically to one hour and 11 minutes. That’s a <strong>76% decrease</strong> in response times, even though they got <strong>47% more</strong> messages on Messenger overall.</p>
<p>“With our bot, a customer conversation that used to take six to 12 hours now takes just a few minutes to address and sometimes to resolve entirely,” says Curtis. The support team gets more time to deal with complex inquiries instead of answering the same routine ones repeatedly.</p>
<p>Customer satisfaction has increased with the quicker service, and Freddy is creating a positive impression for users in other ways, too. Chatting with the bot is instant, interactive, fun, and helpful, and it makes HelloFresh stand out from the competition.</p>
<p>“Chatfuel streamlined how we handle customer-service inquiries on social media. It lets us provide an incredible experience for our fans that you don’t get anywhere else in the industry. On top of all that, it was easy enough for us to learn without extensive training or experience.”, Curtis shares.</p>
<h2>A fresh take on customer support and engagement</h2>
<p>Now that you’ve got a taste for the success a chatbot can bring you, it’s time to build a Messenger bot for your own business. <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com">Sign up</a> today to get started.</p>

HelloFresh reduces response time with Chatfuel. Quick Replies make for a seamless user experience and help keep the conversation on track.

HelloFresh creates customer service chatbot with Chatfuel

Bojana Vojnović

<h2>The Brand</h2>
<p>Festival <a href="https://www.facebook.com/openairberg/">Open Air Berg-Birwinken</a> is an outdoor rock-music festival in Switzerland. It features local bands, and has been happening every summer for the last six years. Their marketing team of five is responsible for selling enough tickets each year to cover costs and turn a profit.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbe994deaa93_s_92B7EDD01A0AFA38C4205C10C37AF5E548EF836AE92EBC841A155974D7B4C27D_1573577448541_36235940_1698576080256311_6160562658291482624_o.jpeg" alt="Music Festival Cuts Cost per Lead by 7x With Chatfuel Bot" height="1365" width="2048" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAL0lEQVR4nGPw8PAt6F5kaqQX5hHKIMHAML+iND8iWFNek0GBX2pNR9f/N2f1laUB4OIMXhOMP9EAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>Festival Open Air Berg-Birwinken is a local music festival in Switzerland.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Problem</h2>
<p>In past years, the festival’s marketing strategy focused on offline marketing to sell tickets—like putting up posters and distributing flyers in towns near the venue. But this method was expensive, time consuming, and had low ROI.</p>
<p>So for the 2018 festival, its co-organizer <a href="https://manuelkrapf.ch/">Manuel Krapf</a> decided to set more aggressive goals and find a new way to reach them. He wanted to:</p>
<ol>
<li>increase festival attendance</li>
<li>lower marketing costs and improve ROI</li>
<li>make use of their small but loyal fan base of attendees who go every year.</li>
</ol>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb57e7deaa8f_s_92B7EDD01A0AFA38C4205C10C37AF5E548EF836AE92EBC841A155974D7B4C27D_1573166773556_57267734_2114445418669373_3489793341841735680_n.jpeg" alt="Music Festival Cuts Cost per Lead by 7x With Chatfuel Bot" height="960" width="960" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAAECAIAAAAmkwkpAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAPUlEQVR4nGMIk+TpDbS/vqi/0cOcYVVN0rFlUxY3F6xrSGVQVVP4+ePjn7/fc3LTGBj4+X1Dgt18vBnY2QFGghTLskASAwAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></div></figure>
<h2>The Solution</h2>
<p>Manuel and his team knew they had to try something new to turn things around for the festival. Their first order of business was to take their festival marketing plan online.</p>
<p>After a few unsuccessful email, YouTube, and Facebook ad campaigns, they started looking into chatbots. Manuel first became interested in chatbots because “You can segment people, and get more engagement than via email. It’s a more fun way to do things, and it’s cheap to get people to your bot, especially if you’re working with Facebook ads.”</p>
<p>Manuel and his team reached out to bot expert Balint Pataki, from <a href="#">Chatbot Tutorial</a>, for advice. Balint helped them build a bot that functioned both as a referral system and a ticketing system for the music festival. Here’s how it worked:</p>
<ol>
<li>Facebook video ads would take new users right to the bot.</li>
<li>Once there, they’d be offered a free, one-day ticket to the festival.</li>
<li>Then, the bot would ask if they wanted to give three free tickets to friends to earn themselves a free, four-day pass. (If not, the user was still offered the four-day ticket for a discounted price.)</li>
<li>The bot kept track of the referrals so it would know when to award the extra free tickets, and to whom. It sent them via SMS message.</li>
<li>To get into the festival, attendees showed the tickets on their smartphones.</li>
</ol>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbf662deaa9a_welcom-1.png" alt="Music Festival Cuts Cost per Lead by 7x With Chatfuel Bot" height="1106" width="2000" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAABCcAAAQnAEmzTo0AAAAJUlEQVR4nAEaAOX/AODg4MfIyg4NFWNmbADx8vPK0NR6en26urzD9Q9EKvCG4QAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>The festival's bot acted as both a referral system and a ticketing system.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>The Recipe</h2>
<p>Balint and the festival’s marketing team used the following Chatfuel features to create their successful bot:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/how-to-create-ads-that-click-to-messenger/">**Click-to-Messenger ads. **</a>Engaging, video-based ads enticed users into clicking, which directed them straight to the festival’s Messenger bot.</li>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/1575719-targeted-messenger-ads"><strong>Lookalike audiences.</strong></a>****After gathering full lead information from users who interacted with their bot, the festival’s marketing team used it for future retargeting with Facebook Lookalike audiences. That way, their ads could reach new prospects similar to the customers who had already bought tickets.</li>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/2742834-chatfuel-zapier-integration">**Zapier integration. **</a>The team used Zapier to integrate Google Sheets with their bot, so they could track users and referrals. Once a user subscribed, their information was sent via Zapier to a sheet. A second sheet tracked their referral IDs, so users were notified via bot as soon as one of their referrals confirmed their ticket.</li>
<li><a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/955973-broadcasting"><strong>Reengage messages</strong></a>. They also used Reengage messages to notify users when the friends they referred signed up for a ticket. The message would send automatically once the friend confirmed their ticket, and included the block name or ID so the original user knew which friend claimed a ticket. <em>Learn more about</em><a href="https://blog.chatfuel.com/how-to-make-sure-your-chatbot-is-compliant-with-facebook-policies/"><em>Facebook’s rules</em></a><em>for messaging subscribers.</em></li>
<li>**User attributes.**With this feature, the bot could automatically create festival entry tickets customized with the person’s name, ticket ID, and the dates for which their pass was valid.</li>
</ul>
<h2>The Results</h2>
<p>The video campaign to direct users to the festival’s chatbot went viral, and they gained almost 3,000 new subscribers. They <strong>grew the total number of attendees by 25%</strong> by utilizing the power of their existing, loyal user base, as planned.</p>
<p>Their <strong>cost per lead dropped to $0.44 compared to $3-4 in previous years—a 7x reduction</strong>. The much-lower CPL plus the larger turnout meant revenue of around $35 per attendee, with only $1.60 in costs for each.</p>
<p>The music-festival bot also saved the marketing team lots of time. They didn’t have to plaster nearby towns with posters, nor did they have to print, package, and mail individual tickets to anyone who bought one.</p>
<p>Plus, the boost in attendees meant a better atmosphere for everyone. According to Manuel, the line to get in was long, and the parking lots and campsites were full and buzzing with activity and excitement. Thanks to their ticketing and referral chatbot, the Festival Open Air Berg-Birwinken team was able to provide a better experience for their festival-goers than ever before.</p>
<figure><div><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb4074deaa98_s_92B7EDD01A0AFA38C4205C10C37AF5E548EF836AE92EBC841A155974D7B4C27D_1573166651935_DSC_8207-min.jpeg" alt="Music Festival Cuts Cost per Lead by 7x With Chatfuel Bot" height="2560" width="3840" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/ACsAMlIATtVfu//I/wBQAErRUaH/ov//sf8AdxNQLQAfojVq/5HSTx4SKMESBR4AAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"></div><figcaption>2018’s festival was more successful than ever, thanks to a Chatfuel Messenger bot</figcaption></figure>
<h2>Feel the music of a Messenger bot🎶</h2>
<p>Creating a bot to achieve incredible results has never been easier.<a href="https://chatfuel.com/">Try Chatfuel</a> for free today: no coding skills or special knowledge required! Don’t forget to join our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/chatfuel/">Facebook community</a> for support and advice from chatbot creators worldwide. Happy bot building!</p>

Learn how this Swiss music festival used a Messenger bot and got 25% more attendees and higher revenue per festival-goer as a result!

Music Festival Cuts Cost per Lead by 7x With Chatfuel Bot

<p>Emilien Nizon has been lecturing at leading business schools in France and abroad for six years, some of which include KEDGE in Marseille, Audencia in Nantes, and Skema in Paris. He has also served as a consultant to help other educators improve student experience and satisfaction.</p>
<p>Nizon came up with the idea to implement a Messenger chatbot to act as a course companion for 2,000+ of his master’s program students. What began as a small experiment turned into a powerful tool that revolutionized student learning outcomes and satisfaction levels.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Conversational learning via bots represents an entirely new chapter in the evolution of how we educate young people.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>We’re excited to share Emilien’s chatbot use case to illustrate how bots can be used for more than just business applications. Here’s his story.</p>
<h2>Where did you get the idea to incorporate technology into your classes?</h2>
<p>I built my career as a product manager, working in diverse industries from music streaming to e-commerce and travel. For the past six years, however, I’ve been a university lecturer at leading business schools here in France and abroad. I also do consulting work with educators to help improve student experience and satisfaction, a topic I’m highly passionate about.</p>
<p>I’ve had thousands of students pass through my classes over the last several years, and my aim is always to find ways to better facilitate their learning. Over time, I began to notice that the more interactive I made my classes, the more my students would enjoy and absorb the material. I suspected that incorporating technology was the way forward with this, so I decided to run an experiment. I donned my product-manager hat and planned an A/B test to quantify my observation and see where it led.</p>
<p>I kept a normal classroom environment with the control group of students, allowing them to participate by raising their hand or taking quizzes on paper at the end of a lecture. With the test group of students, however, I encouraged the use of a mobile service to ask questions and take the quizzes instead. It was a simple test, but the results clearly showed that both satisfaction and participation levels were higher in the test group. I knew I was on to something—so that’s when I decided to <a href="https://chatfuel.com/blog/chatbot-names">build a bot and to name it</a> Ed.</p>
<h2>What is Ed, and how does it work?</h2>
<p>I knew I wanted to make my classes more interactive and impactful using technology, and chatbots had appeared on my radar as a potential way to do that. I didn’t know of anyone who was already using a bot as a teaching tool, so I decided to try creating one myself. In March 2017, I set out to build the first version of Ed, a chatbot designed to act as an aid and course companion for my students.</p>
<p>Drawing from my past experience as a product manager, I first built an MVP (minimum viable product) version of Ed as test. It was only able to recognize a few basic words, and it offered just two main functions.</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Live chat.</strong> First, Ed allowed students to chat with me directly thanks to the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/849315-live-chat"><em>Live Chat plugin</em></a>. I found this feature particularly handy for communicating with shy students who may not have approached me otherwise.</li>
<li><strong>Presentation feedback.</strong> I also equipped the bot to share my feedback on each student’s final presentation, so they could access it quickly and easily within Messenger.</li>
</ol>
<p>Then in January 2018, I introduced a new, 18-hour program called <em>User Research</em> at SKEMA in France. I saw the opportunity to push my simple bot further—to integrate it into the coursework and to introduce two more features:</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Class resources.</strong> One additional feature I implemented was to have the chatbot share documents and articles referenced in class, so students could access them any time. I used the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/828883-keywords"><em>Set Up AI tab</em></a> in Chatfuel (which now lives under the <em>Automation</em> tab) to allow students to enter keywords and receive relevant resources in return.</li>
<li><strong>Push notifications.</strong> Using the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/955973-reengage-tab"><em>Reengage tab</em></a> in Chatfuel, I created inspirational messages (“Today is presentation day—good luck!”), instructions and reminders (“Don’t forget: Log into your course portal to submit your assignment by midnight”), or alerts (“Your presentation feedback is ready! Tap to view.”)</li>
</ol>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb1637deaa36_s_D828ABE2DD7A4FD572A22162A6737EA653BC97CD982E08E31A787559131DE45A_1566752375600_0.png" alt="push notification" height="696" width="567" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAMAAAAECAIAAADETxJQAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAM0lEQVR4nAEoANf/AGpqagICAmJiYgCvyegAN3YAGlUA5fD/0f//gZ6+AN/k7JzW/1uEq0fJFBGe8czBAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>Ed notifying a student that their presentation feedback is available.</figcaption></figure>
<h2>How did you measure if the updated version of Ed was a success or not?</h2>
<p>A few months after releasing the <a href="https://www.messenger.com/t/YourEdBot">new version of Ed</a>, the product manager in me knew I needed to gather data to decide whether it was helping or hindering my students. Did they all have Messenger, so they could access the bot in the first place? Were they actually using Ed and finding it beneficial, or was it seen as a cumbersome and unhelpful add-on?</p>
<p>My personal experiences with bots as a user in the past were often disappointing, as they generally seemed to add more complexity to a task, not less. I wanted to make sure Ed wasn’t causing this same issue for students.</p>
<p>Though my students seemed to be benefiting from the bot, I wanted hard data to know for sure. To gauge whether Ed was making an impact, and whether it was worth further development, I sent out the following questions in a web survey:</p>
<ul>
<li><em>How satisfied were you with Ed, the educational chatbot?</em></li>
<li><em>Did you find that interacting with Ed during class improved your educational experience?</em></li>
<li><em>Would you appreciate seeing chatbots used in more classes?</em></li>
</ul>
<p>I released a link to this simple survey to everyone who had experienced Ed so far—over 1,200 international students from various business schools where I lectured. The results came in quickly, and they were astounding.</p>
<h2>How did students rate their experience with Ed?</h2>
<p>Within a few hours, 737 students responded to the survey—and the results were overwhelmingly positive! 99% of respondents declared being satisfied with Ed, and 62% of those reported being “very satisfied.”</p>
<p>Nearly 90% of students said they found that interacting with Ed improved their educational experience. Most interestingly, an incredible 98% shared that they’d like to see chatbots used in more classes, with 63% of those expressing interest in having chatbots incorporated into <em>all</em> of their classes.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bba9e1deaa4c_s_D828ABE2DD7A4FD572A22162A6737EA653BC97CD982E08E31A787559131DE45A_1566752541951_0+1.png" alt="Chatbot survey results" height="266" width="1223" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAABCAIAAAB2XpiaAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAFUlEQVR4nGOQ1HMqrJuUUzfx0cf/AB53BlhV+IYCAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>The results from the survey I sent about Ed's effectiveness</figcaption></figure>
<blockquote>
<p><em>“Nearly 90% of students said they found that interacting with Ed improved their educational experience. Most incredibly, 98% shared that they’d like to see chatbots used in more classes […]”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>The students’ responses proved that Ed was a worthwhile project, and <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/838404-tracking-performance">the data gathered about it</a> from Chatfuel did too. When students were given the option for in-class participation via bot, the interactivity rate was almost 100%. Plus, 100% of messages Ed sent to students at any time were read, and 90% of those were viewed within one hour. The data showed me that messages from a bot promote astronomically higher rates of interaction and engagement, especially when compared to traditional, tech-free lectures or email messages.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“<em>Plus, 100% of messages Ed sent to students at any time were read, and 90% within one hour.”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<h2>How else has Ed impacted you and your students?</h2>
<p>Chatbots are a new and exciting type of technology, and they spark the curiosity of my students. The fact they can receive helpful information instantly with a few taps allows them to become more engaged, active participants in their education, rather than passively reading static emails or listening to lectures without taking part. Thanks to Ed, our classroom sessions have become more dynamic and the students’ final presentations have even improved in quality. So not only are my students enjoying their educational experience more with the bot, but they’re getting more out of it, too.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bbbc47deaa4f_s_D828ABE2DD7A4FD572A22162A6737EA653BC97CD982E08E31A787559131DE45A_1566333990296_DYuPLK8X0AIxj1B.jpeg" alt="Students enjoy improved learning outcomes with technology" height="2391" width="3777" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAIAAAA7ljmRAAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAMklEQVR4nAEnANj/AIZeN+fU1P/37LaDXABROSGhmJyWjIAnAAAATyEG/8Cn/+PA/7SJiG4UJRLsjqgAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>My students have enjoyed vastly improved learning outcomes thanks to technology in the classroom.</figcaption></figure>
<p>It isn’t just my students who benefit from Ed, either; after its implementation, I found that I spent less time answering student emails. They began submitting their questions through the bot instead, which allowed me to answer more quickly and from anywhere — if needed.</p>
<p>Overall, I’ve been able to see a measurable impact on student satisfaction rates and educational outcomes, which are my key metrics. Because of Ed, students are now more involved, and have an easier time comprehending course content. As a result, they’re able to apply the concepts they’ve learned more successfully, and they report higher levels of course satisfaction too. They’re getting more out of their education and they realize it, which has always been my central goal as a lecturer.</p>
<blockquote>
<p><em>“Overall, I’ve been able to see a measurable impact on student satisfaction rates and educational outcomes, which are my key metrics.”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Now, students in my classes get to know Ed just as they get to know me! Within the first ten minutes of the very first class, I introduce them to Ed and explain how it functions as a constantly available course companion. I also guide them through the steps to add Ed to Messenger, as many of them have never added a chatbot there. The process is seamless, and it allows me to set my students up for success immediately.</p>
<h2>Why did you choose Chatfuel to build your bot?</h2>
<p>When I set out to build the first version of Ed, I had benchmarked a few different chatbot solutions. Chatfuel, however, immediately stood out as the most reliable and fully loaded. Testing it out and seeing that I could have a functioning bot in five minutes was what really won me over.</p>
<p>My priorities in searching for the right bot-building platform were stability and a great end-user experience, and Chatfuel delivered on both. Testing the first version of Ed live in class after just a few clicks was easy for me and exciting for my students. That’s when I knew Chatfuel was the right choice for this project. The fact that I can make changes to my bot in Chatfuel and deploy them instantly is important to me too. I can adapt quickly and modify the bot experience on the fly, which allows me to constantly iterate and improve the chatbot for my students.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“<em>Testing [Chatfuel] out and seeing that I could have a functioning bot in five minutes was what really won me over.”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Which Chatfuel features have been most important to Ed’s success?</h2>
<p>User attributes is probably the feature that’s been most crucial. These customizable tags let me provide the right content to students at the right time. For example, I can set up an attribute for which school a user attends and which program they’re in.</p>
<p>I also use attributes to reflect a student’s progress in the course. That way, they’re able to “unlock” content as they move forward, which game-ifies the experience to make it even more engaging. Essentially, this feature allows me to easily categorize thousands of students based on their inputs, and have Ed follow up with the appropriate actions. I also look forward to using Ed as a research tool in the future. I’ve been experimenting with the <a href="https://docs.chatfuel.com/en/articles/2708726-export-data-from-chatfuel-to-google-sheets">Google Sheets integration</a>, and plan to use it to aggregate and analyze student responses. It’s just another way Ed will help me learn more about my students’ needs so I can provide an even more personalized and effective learning experience for them.</p>
<h2>Have you worked with any other educational bots?</h2>
<p>I firmly believe that interactivity is key to positive educational outcomes. The world is changing, technology is expanding, and educators now have so many new tools to improve and update the way we teach. I’ve yet to come across others putting chatbots to use in the classroom, which is exactly why I’ve started consulting with schools and educators—to help them push the student experience further.</p>
<h2>What’s next for your work with Ed?</h2>
<p>In addition to the consulting work I do, I’ve also begun sharing my knowledge about bots in a different way. Not only do I provide Ed as a tool for my students to use, but I now teach them how to harness this type of technology themselves, too. A common theme in my coursework is breaking the perception that something is “too hard” or “too different” for students to learn, and I start with my own experiences as a product manager turned lecturer to illustrate this.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“<em>Not only do I provide Ed as a tool for my students to use, but I now teach them how to harness this type of technology themselves too.”</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I like to integrate chatbot building into the coursework itself to show students that they can create bots, too. Not only are they interested in the process, but it gives them an instant confidence boost. Some even go on to make their own bots in the future. I’m proud to be able to demystify this new technology, and show them how much they can do with the right tools.</p>
<p>The potential for even more educational applications of chatbots is thrilling to me. I’ve seen incredible results with Ed so far, and I look forward to creating even more positive outcomes with bots for my students in the future. Conversational learning via bots represents an entirely new chapter in the evolution of how we educate young people. I can’t wait to experiment more with chatbots, and help other educators begin to do the same.</p>
<figure><img src="/cms/static/blog/60afa6a88bd1bb7a75deaa3a_s_D828ABE2DD7A4FD572A22162A6737EA653BC97CD982E08E31A787559131DE45A_1566333881443_student+bots.jpeg" alt="Students giving presentations" height="634" width="1024" blurDataURL="data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAACCAIAAADwyuo0AAAACXBIWXMAAAsTAAALEwEAmpwYAAAAI0lEQVR4nGN4efXQ/5+/rh3YNL2nk0FJmEFamEGOkUGKmQEAwXcKBvIma+gAAAAASUVORK5CYII=" placeholder="blur"><figcaption>My students giving presentations, putting into practice the material Ed helped them learn.</figcaption></figure>
<p><em>Are you an educator or instructor interested in implementing a bot for your students? You’re in the right place! <a href="https://dashboard.chatfuel.com/login"><strong>Getting started with Chatfuel</strong></a> is free, and no programming or coding skills are required. Discover the power of the newest educational tool by building your own bot today!</em></p>

Get inspired by the story of Emilien Nizon: how he boosted student engagement and accelerated their learning with Chatfuel Messenger chatbot