Pizza Hut engages customers in conversation

Everyone loves to talk about pizza, and Pizza Hut is turning that tendency into a consumer touchpoint.



The pizza chain is partnering with SaaS platform tech company Conversable to launch a new social ordering platform, or "chatbot," to allow for conversational ordering of menu items on Facebook Messenger and Twitter. The platform, which will be available across Pizza Hut social media accounts this fall, allows U.S. customers to chat directly with the Pizza Hut accounts on Facebook Messenger and Twitter to reorder favorite or saved orders. Customers will also be able to get answers to frequently asked questions and receive the latest deals and promotions.



For initial launch, customers will be able to connect their Facebook messaging account to their Pizza Hut account to reduce the information required to order. The menus, deals and promotions offered are specific to each restaurant and there is no extra cost to order through Facebook Messenger or Twitter at participating locations. Once an order is confirmed, Pizza Hut will email the customer a receipt and an order confirmation message will be sent in the Messenger conversation. From there, picking up the order is no different from the traditional online ordering system or calling into the local restaurant.



The Conversable powered-platform allows for Pizza Hut to resolve common requests and self-service through automation and machine learning, which the retailer expects to result in reduced costs and better service.



"The new Pizza Hut social ordering platform is another example of making it easy for our customer to order their favorites from Pizza Hut," said Baron Concors, chief digital officer of Pizza Hut. "We are constantly pursuing ways to simplify our ordering experience. This platform allows our consumers to quickly order or get information where they are already spending a great deal of their time."



Since nobody really goes into a pizza parlor to browse the merchandise, pizza is an ideal vertical for automatic ordering via emerging technology. Domino’s has released a slew of ordering options using mobile and social platforms, and Papa John’s also engages customers via social and mobile channels. Pizza Hut is the first major pizza chain to publicly leverage the updates to the Facebook Messenger chat platform that were announced in April, but surely won’t be the last.