The logistics business requires real-time information to be communicated in the quickest manner possible to your customers, drivers, and delivery executives. But, even if you send the information over to them really quickly, you can’t really be sure that they’re going to read the message on time… unless you’re sending the message over WhatsApp.
WhatsApp messages have an open rate of 99%. So, you can be quite sure that your customers are going to see these messages. But it isn’t really feasible for you to send all these messages manually. Especially when you’re scaling up. That’s where an intelligent WhatsApp chatbot comes in, helping your logistics business broadcast WhatsApp notifications to your customers, drivers, and delivery partners.
What is a logistics Chatbot?
A Logistics Chatbot helps customers engage with the company in real-time, without having to appoint a live agent. It basically acts as a virtual agent and is capable of doing almost anything an agent would do. It also interacts with employees providing real-time order updates, route updates etc, to streamline operations
Why should you use WhatsApp broadcast notifications for your logistics business?
Here are three benefits of using WhatsApp Automated notifications for your logistics and transportation business:
When your customers receive notifications on WhatsApp, they’re far more likely to read them than they are to read an email or an SMS. This means that they won’t miss your message and be taken by surprise if there are any delays or if they aren’t home when their package is delivered.
WhatsApp notifications help you keep your drivers and delivery partners informed with real-time updates about anything happening on their delivery routes, allowing them to use an alternative route to get the packages to your customers faster, with minimal delays.
Making use of automation to send critical information to your customers and your delivery partners reduces the scope of human error and even ensures that the information that you send has a greater degree of accuracy.
10 use-case based WhatsApp broadcast templates for logistics companies
You don’t want your drivers and delivery partners to reach all the way to your customer’s doorstep, only to realize that they aren’t home and can’t collect their package. So, what can you do about that? Pray to the universe that they come back? Use The Force to drag them home?
Unless you’re a Jedi, that just isn’t going to work (just… please don’t be a Sith Lord 🙏🏻 ). But don’t worry, there’s a solution that does not involve mystical powers.
Just shoot a WhatsApp notification over to your customer a day or so before the package is expected to reach them. This allows you to plan and get the order to them at a time when they can actually receive it.
Here’s a message template that you can use for this:
Hi <name>, your package is on its way and should reach you by <time> tomorrow, <date>. Click here to track your order <liink>
What happens when there’s a delay or you’ve missed a delivery? How do your customers find out? Are you sending out emails explaining what happened? Come on, why would you expect them to see those quickly? Chances are that they’d miss the email and spend the next day wondering why their shipment is late.
That risk is mitigated by WhatsApp, where around 99% of messages are opened. So the next time you’re facing a delay, earn some transparency points from your customers by sending them a notification that they’d actually see. Here’s a WhatsApp broadcast template that your logistics company can use for that:
Hi <name>, your package is on its way to you, but we’ve faced a slight delay because of <reason>. Sorry for the delay, it should reach you by <time and date>. Click here to track your order <tracking link>
This goes a little beyond the delivery reminders. Yes, you’re letting them know that their order is going to reach them soon, but you’re also asking if they have any special requests for your delivery partners.
These include things like not ringing the doorbell because someone is sleeping or even leaving the package at the doorstep for contactless delivery.
Here’s a template that you could use for that:
Hi <name>, your package will be delivered by 6:45 pm today. If you have any special requirements, please let us know.
These shouldn’t be too important, right? After all, you literally just handed the package over to them, didn’t you?
Well, wrong, they are important. Why? Because the person whom the package needed to be delivered to might be out somewhere and someone else might have accepted it on their behalf. Now the intended recipient would just be sitting around wherever they are, spending the day wondering when the package will be delivered.
So, just don’t skip on the delivery confirmation notifications. Here’s a template message that you can use for these messages:
Hi <name>. We wanted to confirm that you received your package that was delivered to your address today. Let us know if you haven’t, and we’ll look into it immediately.
If you’re trying to create a great experience for your customers, you need to know how they feel about your services. After making a delivery, you need to collect feedback from your customers, find out what they liked about your service and if there is anything that they’d like you to improve upon. Chose your words carefully though, don’t ask them what they didn’t like. Do that and you’ll be getting them in a negative state of mind.
Frame it in a positive way by asking them what improvements they would like to see. Here’s a template that you could use:
Hi <name>. Hope you’re happy with your delivery.
We’d really appreciate it if you could rate your experience on a scale of 1 to 5 and let us know what you liked about it and if you’d like to see any improvements next time. Thank you!
If you want deliveries to be made in the fastest way possible, you need to monitor your routes and pass real-time information on to your drivers. If you find out that routes are blocked for any reason or are heavily congested with traffic, you need to get this information out to your drivers as quickly as possible so that they can use an alternative route to get the package to your customer in the quickest way possible. Here’s a WhatsApp message template that you can use for this.
Hi <name>. <Street name> was reported to be blocked. Please use <alternative route> for a quicker delivery.
Logistics WhatsApp chatbot best practices-
- Provide Instant replies - Customers are impatient, and hate waiting. And, it’s difficult for you too, to keep replying to all texts at all times. But, a chatbot can converse with your customers at any given time. It will also take care of all the reptitive questions so you don’t have to keep answering them
- Simplify shipment scheduling, tracking and cancellation - With a chatbot, you can simplify all of these tasks, by allowing customers to do all of it on their phones on their preferred medium instead of going out of their way on a completely new website or app.
- Go Omnichannel - You need to be accessible to your customers on their preferred channel. It makes it very easy for your customers to engage with you without going out of the way. Engati’s WhatsApp chatbot allows you to connect to more than 15+ social media apps to go omnichannel.
- Speak your customers language - A lot of bot’s have pre installed robotic messages which customers are certain about. The messages are dry, unappealing and not at all engaging. Personalizing and humanizing your bot’s language will go a long way with your customers.
- Create a customer-centric company culture - Creating a great customer experience is not just your customer service and marketing team’s job. Everyone has to get involved. You need to make customer-centricity a core driving force and a vital value in your organization.
- Improve your employee experience - This might not be obvious, but it’s a vital part of your customer experience. If you don’t create a positive employee experience, you can’t really expect to be able to deliver a great customer experience either. They go hand-in-hand.
Now that you have reaching out to your customers in place, let's talk about how you can get their responses. Something that will not only automate replies for you but also help with lead generation.
WhatsApp Link Generator
Links that you can create using your WhatsApp business number for reaching out to your customers, are WhatsApp links.
You can also add a pre-defined message to your link, so your customers can directly reply without manually typing any specific.
WhatsApp Link Generators help you do exactly this. As the name suggests, WhatsApp link generator is a free tool that’ll help you create WhatsApp chat links for your business. You can use multiple WhatsApp business numbers & reach out to your customers.
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