What Is Dymos?

Dymos is a subscription-based cloud-hosted SaaS (Software as a Service) for restaurants. It enables restaurant customers to phone ahead pickup and delivery orders.

Dymos is a hybrid of IVR (Interactive Voice Response) and chatbot, or “free-form” approaches. For IVR, Dymos breathes new life into this older technology by leveraging the power of AI. It guides your customers through the process of making orders from your restaurant – orders ranging from the simplest to the most complex. Depending on context, Dymos can also allow un-guided, or “customer-guided” dialogues.

The benefit of this hybrid approach is that the IVR mode, also referred to as “guided experience”, works well for a large percentage of orders. During a Dymos IVR dialogue, the customer is always presented with a set of options. As a rule, during ordering, the number of options is limited to five, where option #5 is “more options. This allows for limited but valuable “menu discovery” on the part of the customer. Nevertheless, not all calls are suited to IVR, and in such cases Dymos uses context to determine that switching modes to “customer-guided”, or free-form chatbot mode is needed.   

Where Did Dymos Come From?

The technology of Dymos has its roots in chatbot-style voice ordering for restaurants. Chatbot ordering at restaurants is an emerging field with a mixed track record. The IVR mode of Dymos is chatbot-like, but with a comprehensive set of built-in constraints that allow it to take orders accurately and efficiently, every time. This fresh approach of Dymos avoids the pitfalls of fully open-ended chatbot-style automated ordering.

How Does It Work?

Option 1: Use call forwarding during your busy hours to forward from your current phone system to the dedicated private phone number that we provide to you. This lets you offload calls to the automated line whenever and for as long as desired. Option 2: We furnish you a phone number that your restaurant can advertise and use for your public-facing “automated ordering line”.

In either scenario, the automated line that we provide to you is a dedicated phone number that uses our cloud service to enable conversations with your customers so they can place orders over the phone. You don’t need to be involved with the call in any way. Once the customer completes and confirms their order, the order is sent to your restaurant so that your kitchen staff (and delivery workers as applicable) can fulfill the order.

The Digital Restaurant Ordering Experience: From Web to Mobile Apps, Tablets and Kiosks and now Back to … Telephone???

In your business, efficiency is a critically important objective for you and for your customers. You understand the tradeoffs involved (you want to retain some aspects of the human element for ordering and fulfillment), but you are eager to use technology to increase efficiency and reduce costs where possible. Dymos has a unique place in the digital experience.

• Often more convenient than a mobile app – when an out-of-store customer is ready to order ahead to the store, there are usually only three options – web, mobile or phone. And for phone, the customer may want a digital-only experience for making their order. Dymos allows that to happen with the convenience that is involved with something as simple as dialing a phone number and choosing numeric options. 
• Efficiency for the customer: somewhat surprisingly – our experience has demonstrated that customers can use Dymos to make an order by phone more quickly than with any competing digital solution.  During a Dymos phone call, (in IVR mode) customers can either press or say a number in order to select an option that has been presented to them. At many of the turns in a dialogue, the customer can even “skip ahead” by pressing a number, once they have gotten the hang of the approach.
• Cost-Effectiveness for the Restaurant – we have subscription tiers to meet your needs and help save you money. We are able to meet your order-taking needs at a fraction of the cost of the competing solutions (in-house employee, call center).  

Customer Demo      Pricing for Restaurants

Quality and Accuracy

Nervous about your new hire forgetting key parts of your menu and/or prices? Are you finding that the call center makes too many mistakes – with delivery addresses and with orders? Dymos ‘s advanced AI capabilities will put you on solid ground. Whereas some chatbot ordering systems attempt to be conversational, at Software Engineering Concepts, Inc, we believe that accuracy of the order and its metadata is paramount. Dymos puts the emphasis on accuracy.

Reliability and Dependability

Is your existing approach reliable? Do order-taking employees call in sick? Does the call center always come through? Are your employees frazzled by having to bounce between phone, oven, make line and front counter? With Dymos you will have 24/7 up-time, and you can confidently encourage your customers to order by phone! 

Completeness

Dymos uses breakthrough advances in the area of menu representation, combined with AI algorithms for dialogue flow. It has full knowledge of your menu and other information about your service establishment such as closing times, etc. Dymos is your intelligent agent to handle all your phone orders!

Timeliness

It’s Friday afternoon – the weekend rush starts soon. Did you remember to convey your specials to the call center? Dymos is always-up-to-date via the secure web-based dashboard we provide to you that allows you to make dynamic menu changes (content, pricing, specials, etc.).

Take Multiple Orders at Once

When your customers dial in to Dymos, Dymos always picks up. Dymos allows multiple, unlimited customer phone orders to take place simultaneously. Your only task is to make sure kitchen staff can fill all those orders! 

Customization/Personalization

Do your order takers remember your customer’s preferences? Dymos does! Personalization is possible for phone customers who desire it, but is optional and can simply be turned off for those customers who don’t want or need this feature.

Overall Effectiveness

How effective is your existing order taking process? Estimates of a comparison that combines quality, reliability, completeness, timeliness, and multiple-order capability:

Call Center

In-house (employees) 

DYMOS (Guided Ordering)

Pricing