Guzman y Gomez Mexican Kitchen is a casual restaurant with more than 150 locations in Australia, Singapore, Japan, and the United States. Guzman y Gomez (also known as GyG) is known for their fast, friendly service and authentic Mexican cuisine.

Challenge

Guzman y Gomez took orders and communicated with customers primarily by phone, but that dated method quickly proved inadequate with the onset of the pandemic.

As online ordering and delivery requests escalated with COVID-19 lockdowns, Guzman y Gomez found that slow, sporadic communication by phone, email, and SMS created additional burdens for workers trying to adjust to the changes related to communicating with their customers during the pandemic.

In addition, customers needed questions answered about menu items, delivery times, ingredients, and more. All of the answers had to be provided at the moment or they risked losing customers.

“We were relying on manual responses from a very lean workforce, and that wasn’t sustainable,” noted Bell.

In order to quickly accommodate pandemic-related changes, Guzman y Gomez knew they had to:

• Centralize communications using digital channels and automation.

• Reduce their reliance on time-consuming human interaction.

• Reduce or repurpose marketing spend for a digital audience.

• Expand their messaging channels to meet customers at their platforms of choice.

  
  

Solution

With Bird’s guidance and suite of digital automation tools, Guzman y Gomez implemented a comprehensive, centralized digital communications strategy. Bird allowed them to successfully and smoothly integrate all new messaging channels with their existing software. In addition to taking orders and answering questions by phone, team members could rely on the instant communications tools of Google Business Messages, WhatsApp Business, Facebook Messenger, and Instagram messaging to better meet increased demand.

Guzman y Gomez took these steps to support their new digital strategy:

• Added four new communication channels to give customers the option of using their preferred messaging methods

• Consolidated all incoming messages into Bird's Inbox to manage all support tickets in one place

• Implemented automation using Bird’s Flow Builder to enable instantaneous delivery of answers to customers’ questions and increase conversion rates

• Included onboarding and job applicant communications through new digital channels to streamline the hiring process

  
  

In addition, Bird created an intent recognition model to triage incoming messages. The model automatically differentiates between emergencies and run-of-the-mill complaints. High-priority messages are now automatically escalated to the general manager, the head of operations, and the manager of that specific store. This depth of automation, built with Flow Builder, allowed Guzman y Gomez to further reduce their reliance on phone calls and other outdated means of communication.

How it looks

Results

Within days, Guzman y Gomez’s new digital communications strategy began to yield results. By giving customers the ability to communicate via messaging channels, Guzman y Gomez enabled:

• 40% increased sales

• 50% improved CTR

• 34% reduction in marketing spend

• 10X increase in customer-initiated chat conversations

  
  

Bird’s Flow Builder automation enabled instantaneous delivery of answers to customers’ questions. According to Bell: “This dramatically improved conversion rates with our customers, as they have the information they need immediately, therefore significantly increasing our revenue, and therefore profitability."

"Pre-Bird, our communication was slow, clunky and sporadic. With the implementation of Bird, our responsiveness is immediate, seamless and simple."

Josh Bell, Principal and GM