media update’s Aisling McCarthy spoke to Carla Worth, business unit director at Liquorice, about Knorr’s new ‘Dinner on Demand’ chatbot and its features.

Briefly, describe the chatbot in terms of its functions and features.

Every day, multi-tasking people are faced with the daily dilemma … what’s for dinner?

We all know the feeling of staring at a few odd ingredients trying to decide what to whip up. A box of couscous, chicken breasts, and … dried apricots?

As Unilever’s digital partner, Liquorice wanted to make dinner inspiration effortless, while simultaneously delivering the right recipes to consumers, based on the ingredients they already have in their kitchens.

In 2015, we launched the multi-award-winning ‘Instant Inspiration’ service on the Whatsfordinner? website, Facebook, and Twitter. All consumers had to do was post the hashtag #whatsfordinner, plus one or more ingredient names, and an automated response swiftly delivered a suitable recipe featuring these ingredients.

The new ‘Dinner On Demand’ service gives even quicker recipe inspiration, making dinnertime even easier – in fact, as easy as having a quick chat.

Using Facebook Messenger, meal providers tell us what ingredients they have in their cupboard or fridge, and we will respond instantly with a recipe featuring the ingredients they provided. We’ll even deliver your dinner to your door.

‘Dinner on Demand’ is South Africa’s very first recipe suggesting bot. This artificial intelligence technology serves up dinner ideas based on any random ingredients you may find in your pantry or fridge, and it all happens in Facebook Messenger.

To use it, all you have to do is open Facebook Messenger, tell us whatsfordinner?, which ingredients you have at hand, and the automated bot instantly replies with a recipe and an image of the dish. Consumers can immediately request another dinner idea by clicking on the option ‘Show Another Recipe’. There are no limits to how many requests a consumer can send to the bot, and the service operates 24 hours a day.

The bot even offers you food for your mood. Whether you use words or emojis, every ingredient is instantly turned into an opportunity. Sun’s up and shades on? We’ll send you summer dishes that’ll be sure to shine from your dinner table.

When a consumer uses Messenger to interact with the bot, a menu button appears on the left of the typing field, offering several different options, including a contact link, the week’s Whatsfordinner Meal Plan, and a prompt to sign up at the site. 

How long has this chatbot been running for? What has its adoption by the public been like so far?

We have reached close to four million consumers through Facebook advertising and close to 200 000 consumers have engaged with the campaign in some way or another.

‘Dinner on Demand’ has been up and running since October 2016, and we have received incredibly positive responses from our fans.

It’s these responses, and the way our fans are engaging with the bot, that has driven our continued want to innovate the bot and make it the easiest way for our audience to find recipe inspiration for dinner – or any meal for that fact.

What goals have you set for this chatbot? How is this project progressing towards achieving these goals?

With ‘Dinner on Demand’, we wanted to provide our audience with a new, exciting, and interactive way of searching and preparing meals, using what’s already in their cupboard as this prevents wastage and saves money.

To take it a step further, we’ve allowed for the inclusion of in-store promotional activity. We’ve integrated a customised, virtual recipe book that gives consumers the option to have the ingredients from these recipes delivered to their doorstep, in the shortest amount of time. This saves them from even having to go to the shop.

From the responses, we have received and continued engagement from our consumers. ‘Dinner on Demand’ has added value to the meal preparation process, meaning that families can spend more time enjoying dinner together.

In light of your progress and success so far, do you see opportunities to incorporate more bot technology into the brand’s marketing strategy?

We are currently looking at further bot technology integration because we have seen that consumers, particularly millennial consumers, want to be able to engage with a brand directly and receive immediate responses.

Bot technology allows a brand like whatsfordinner? to continually engage with our consumer, giving them on-the-go solutions and ensuring that, no matter where our fans are or what time it is, we are there to help them find the perfect meal for any occasion.

So how does it work? Visit ‘W4Dinner’ on Facebook and click on ‘Message’ to start your conversation in Messenger. Type in your ingredients and in seconds, you’ll be sent a recipe – it’s that easy.
 
For more information, visit www.whatsfordinner.co.za

Want to stay up to date with the latest marketing news? Subscribe to our newsletter.

With chatbots becoming more and more popular worldwide, BotsZA created a bot to solve local problems. The bot, called Kiera, can assist people wanting to find property for sale or rent. Read more in our article, How South African developers are building helpful chatbots.