During the height of load shedding, GoSolr was battling to keep up with overwhelming national demand. They simply did not have enough people to answer phones or pre-qualify customers wanting to subscribe to their solar service. With the constant, unpredictable changes to load shedding stages, the company was hesitant to hire dozens of staff only to risk sitting with an oversized team if the government suspended load shedding shortly after. They urgently needed a solution that offered flexibility, scalability, and agility, one that could absorb demand spikes without increasing operational costs when demand dropped. Rather.chat partnered with GoSolr to create exactly that: an automated WhatsApp-driven journey that takes over the parts of the process that do not require human intervention, ensuring customers receive fast, seamless support at the most critical stages.

Together, GoSolr and rather.chat have built an intuitive WhatsApp chat experience that allows South Africans to explore, qualify for, and subscribe to renewable energy solutions, specifically solar power. The AI-powered chatbot allows users to request instant quotes, complete a credit check, upload documentation, and sign contracts, all within minutes, directly on WhatsApp.

“Our mission has always been to make – solar, accessible to as many South Africans as possible,” says Thomas Framnes, Chief Experience Officer at GoSolr. “Partnering with rather.chat extends that accessibility, because it creates an opportunity for our customers to begin their solar journey on a conversational platform they already use every day. It’s fast, intuitive, and aligned with how modern consumers want to interact with suppliers today.”

Powered by rather.chat’s AI-driven automation system, GoSolr continues to use its smartbot to redefine how South Africans explore the renewable options available to them. The automated chat journey handles everything from roof sizing to payment guidelines. Behind the scenes, CRM integration ensures each interaction is logged and shared with sales agents at the right moment, helping them focus on ready-to-close customers and improving conversion rates across the board.

The results speak for themselves: since mid-2024, GoSolr has seen more than 25 000 additional users start a conversation and move into the sales funnel/process to see if they qualify for a quote. After filtering for serviceable locations, 70% of leads qualified and 40% of those qualified leads converted into quote requests.

“This partnership shows what’s possible when technology meets purpose,” says Jonathan Elcock, CEO of rather.chat. “GoSolr’s innovative subscription model and our automation tools have come together to remove friction from the solar adoption process. With WhatsApp as the bridge, we’re making sustainable energy in South Africa as simple as sending a message.”

GoSolr’s subscription model, which you can now explore on WhatsApp, provides homeowners and small businesses with solar power, including panels, batteries, and inverters, through an affordable monthly plan that covers installation, monitoring, and maintenance. Combined with rather.chat’s AI-powered smartbot, this model now offers a seamless digital experience from first contact to clean-energy conversion.

By replacing traditional email and SMS communication with AI-powered WhatsApp engagement, GoSolr and rather.chat are demonstrating how local innovation can accelerate South Africa’s energy transition: one conversation at a time.

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South African airlines are being praised for introducing WhatsApp boarding-pass services, but industry leaders warn that the sector must now “aim higher” by adopting fully AI-powered smartbots to keep pace with global aviation trends.

According to Jonathan Elcock, Founder & CEO at rather.chat, current airline bots offer basic convenience but fall short of what travellers increasingly expect.

“South Africans have made it clear that they love using WhatsApp for travel; but today’s implementations stop just short of truly intelligent service,” says Elcock. “A basic bot can send a boarding pass. A smartbot can book flights, accept payments, update passengers in real time, and answer complex questions. That’s the leap the industry needs to make.”

Elcock adds that the real risk is not adopting automation; it’s adopting half of it.

“Many companies celebrate that they’re ‘on WhatsApp,’ but their systems break the moment a customer asks something slightly nuanced. With AI-driven smartbots integrated into CRMs and ticketing systems, the entire passenger journey can live in one secure chat thread: from booking to baggage collection.”

rather.chat notes that markets like Brazil and India already use WhatsApp as a full-service platform for banking, retail, and travel, and says South African consumers are ready for the same.

“Travellers don’t want another app they’ll download once and forget,” Elcock concludes. “They want everything in one place. Simple, instant, reliable. The businesses that embrace intelligent smartbots will own the future of customer engagement.”

rather.chat believes WhatsApp is now the most powerful customer channel in South Africa, with over 90% of consumers using it daily. The company says the businesses that turn WhatsApp into a true service platform, not just a message board, will set a new standard for responsiveness, convenience, and customer loyalty.

The post SA airline industry urged to ‘aim higher’ with AI-powered integrations appeared first on Tech Scene ZA.

Cape Town, South Africa – Cars.co.za’s AI WhatsApp chatbot has achieved a significant increase in dealership leads in just two months, thanks to its latest AI-powered feature developed in partnership with local chatbot specialists, rather.chat.

The new ‘Virtual Car Showroom’ feature, which went live in July 2025, was designed to boost dealership inquiries nationwide and simplify the customer journey for financing, buying, or selling vehicles. Within weeks, WhatsApp purchase inquiries surged by over 1000%: a record-breaking leap that confirms South African consumers want faster, smarter ways to shop for cars.

“The whole process happens in a single WhatsApp conversation,” says Alan Quinn, Executive in Charge of Product and Partnerships at Cars.co.za. “We’re proud to give our users a new interface to browse for their dream car plus provide our dealers with valuable leads to sell cars.”

Dubbed the ‘Virtual Car Showroom’ for a reason, the AI solution delivers personalised vehicle recommendations tailored to each customer based on their previous interactions on Cars.co.za. From make and mileage to colour and model year, the AI-bot analyses key preferences to instantly generate a tailored carousel of up to 10 vehicle options. Once a buyer finds a match, they’re connected directly with the relevant dealership, completing the lead journey in one seamless chat.

Conversions have soared alongside inquiries. More than one in three users who engaged with the carousel went on to submit their details as potential buyers, delivering a 31.3% engagement-to-lead rate for dealerships.

“This is the strongest proof yet that South African consumers want to continue their car purchase journeys inside WhatsApp, rather than return to a website,” says Jonathan Elcock, co-founder and CEO at rather.chat. “This is an exciting opportunity for dealerships, as Cars.co.za continues to strengthen its ability to drive meaningful conversions in an increasingly competitive market. The new WhatsApp tool, available exclusively for dealerships under Cars.co.za, is designed to connect dealerships with these serious buyers while providing data insights, tools, and support that help turn inquiries into real sales.”

The success story offers a blueprint far beyond motoring. Elcock believes sectors like property finance and insurance will be next: “Customers want one thing: fast, personalised service inside the channel they already use every day. Businesses like Cars.co.za that seek to adopt this new way of doing business, today, will lead the market, tomorrow.”

With Cars.co.za setting the benchmark, chat-commerce is now positioned to redefine how South Africans buy, sell, and finance not only cars, but virtually every major purchase decision.

The post From hundreds to thousands of inquiries in two months: how AI on WhatsApp is transforming how South Africans buy cars appeared first on Tech Scene ZA.

A 2024 study, The Role of WhatsApp Business in Increasing Consumer Engagement, has confirmed what many South African executives have suspected: businesses that integrate WhatsApp Business see measurable gains in customer numbers, satisfaction, and loyalty.

The peer-reviewed research found that customers who engaged through WhatsApp Business reported significantly higher satisfaction and loyalty, leading to customer growth and acquisitions in the case studies under assessment. The study concluded that WhatsApp Business is not just a communication tool but a strategic driver of long-term business growth, enabling more personalised, responsive, and effective customer engagement.

“These findings should serve as a wake-up call,” says Jonathan Elcock, Co-founder and CEO of rather.chat. “Our own audits for South African businesses have echoed the findings of this study; but we’re taking it a step further. It’s not just about being on WhatsApp; it’s about being intelligent on WhatsApp. A basic Business profile offers convenience, but an AI-powered smartbot transforms it into a real growth engine. Once automation and intelligence are layered in, we see measurable impact: higher conversion rates, faster response times, and consistently stronger customer satisfaction over time.”

The study supports the Forrester/Gupshup Total Economic Impact report, which recently revealed that WhatsApp campaigns powered by conversational AI can deliver a 270% return on investment over a three-year period.

To help South African businesses close this gap, rather.chat has has launched an end-to-end, AI-powered WhatsApp automation solution designed to remove friction from every stage of the sales funnel and drive measurable uplift. The comprehensive system, made up of five modular automation tools, can be implemented incrementally, allowing businesses to test, learn, and optimize performance while closely tracking uplift, managing costs, and maximizing return on investment. This solution is tailored to the business after engaging with the findings provided by rather.chat’s detailed Omnichannel audit. The audit unpacks an organization’s end-to-end customer journey within the sales funnel, with the aim of exposing any inefficiencies or points of friction that may be contributing to lower customer conversions. 

“We’ve conducted hundreds of omnichannel audits for South African companies and locally owned businesses. Our data and findings consistently indicate that outdated traditional communication platforms or channels, like call-back queues and web contact forms that collect customer data, cause a significant number of drop-offs,” adds Elcock.

“WhatsApp is the most widely used communication platform in South Africa. We cannot ignore this fact – and any company that does will sadly meet an uncomfortable drop in sales against the competitors in their sector who do. Customers want – and expect – to engage with your business on WhatsApp. The only question for business executives is how fast they’ll move to formalise this for their customers.”

From finance to insurance and retail to travel, companies that integrate and use WhatsApp as a strategic sales channel to support their omnichannel strategy will consistently outperform competitors that don’t, quite simply because they are more relevant, more agile, and better equipped to meet customers where they are, rather than expecting customers to come to them.

“The future of customer engagement in South Africa is conversational, and automated: WhatsApp is the tool that sits right at the centre of this evolution,” Elcock concludes.

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