Taking orders in chat, compared

A customer asks what you have. You send photos and prices, they choose, you ask for the size, the address and the time, and you add up the total. Every order is a conversation, and you type every line of it.

On a busy day, orders sit between other messages. A reply you missed is a sale you missed, and the details of each order live only in that chat.

Some messaging apps let you list products inside the app, which helps customers see what you sell. The order still arrives as a chat: you ask for the address and the time, confirm the total and keep track of it yourself, and there is no order code or page the customer can come back to.

• The whole order in one message: each item with its choices and notes, the total, the payment method, delivery or pickup and when, the customer's name and number, and the address with a map pin.
• A code on every order, short enough to read out on the phone.
• A tracking page for the customer, which follows the order from received to confirmed, ready and completed as you update it with one tap.
• Delivery areas and opening hours on the page, so a customer knows before ordering whether you deliver to them and when you open.
• An alert on your phone for every order, and an email too if you want one, so no order waits unseen.
• Twenty languages: each customer reads your page in theirs.

If you take a few orders a week from people who already know you, chat may be all you need. The time to change is when the same questions arrive every day, when orders get lost between messages, or when you want each order written down without typing it yourself.