Petloy Grows Sales 55% with Respond.io WhatsApp Automation

Petloy is a Mexican pet supply retailer that sells food, treats and other products for dogs and cats over its website and WhatsApp. The business operates its own warehouses and logistics network, with orders delivered directly to customers from local branches to ensure prompt service.

The problem: Ad-driven WhatsApp orders outgrew the WhatsApp Business App

Petloy relies heavily on click-to-WhatsApp ads on Facebook and Instagram to generate sales. As more and more messages came in, this became increasingly difficult to manage through the WhatsApp Business App. At one point, WhatsApp temporarily blocked a number for 24 hours for suspicious activity because it was receiving so many messages in response to ads. The business gets 80% of its orders from WhatsApp and the rest from its website, so interruptions like this presented a serious risk to sales.

Petloy also struggled to manage recurring processes manually as it grew. Timely reminders when customers are due for a refill of their pet’s food are vital for repeat business, but sending these individually was unsustainable at scale.

And as co-founders Charbel Naime and Abraham Jacobo expanded the business beyond Monterrey with multiple locations in other Mexican cities, they needed a way to separate branch operations, assign conversations to the right team members and monitor performance.

Above all, it strove to keep the same level of service as it grew. Without centralized conversation data and automated customer feedback, it was difficult to understand how sales agents were performing or where the customer experience could be improved.

The respond.io solution: Automate recurring orders while keeping customer service personal

Petloy looked for a customer conversation platform that could handle the surge of WhatsApp messages its ads brought in while expanding automation and integrating with its existing tools. After exploring other WhatsApp API providers including Gupshup, the business chose respond.io for the flexibility it offered. Unlike other providers, respond.io enabled Petloy to integrate its own AI-powered ordering system and Odoo, its ERP platform. It also allowed the business to create separate respond.io Workspaces for each branch to segment operations while giving managers full context and visibility into each branch’s performance.

Respond.io’s flexible integrations connect Petloy’s custom AI Agent with Odoo

Petloy connected WhatsApp API to respond.io to manage high volumes of conversations without the disruption it faced with the WhatsApp Business App. Once the basics were set up, it used respond.io’s APIs, webhooks and Workflows to build a system around its existing processes. Now, when a customer starts a conversation in respond.io, Petloy’s custom AI Agent from its ordering system can access their order history in Odoo, identify previous purchases and use that information to handle the conversation.

The AI Agent confirms delivery details and payment methods, retrieves current product prices and suggests additional products such as treats, wet food or other pet supplies. Once the customer confirms an order, respond.io sends the details directly to Odoo.

Respond.io also gives Petloy control over when automation should end. If the AI Agent cannot confidently handle a request, a Workflow hands the conversation over to a human agent during business hours. The custom system reduces repetitive manual work while keeping human agents available for conversations that require more context.

“We chose respond.io because it gave us the freedom to build the setup we needed, from separate Workspaces for each branch to connecting our own AI Agent and ERP through APIs and webhooks. That has helped us keep the same quality of service as we’ve grown to more than 25,000 customers, and it gives us the foundation to keep scaling.”
Charbel Naime, Co-founder at Petloy

Petloy sees which ads lead to actual sales

Respond.io also enables Petloy to see where sales are actually coming from. It set up respond.io’s Meta Conversions API Workflow so that whenever someone enters WhatsApp through a click-to-chat ad, the Meta ad ID is sent through a webhook to a custom dashboard Petloy built using data from respond.io and Odoo.

The dashboard connects conversations with purchases, allowing Petloy to see which ads led to orders, how much customers spent, which products they purchased and how long they took to convert. The Lifecycle tracking feature on respond.io helps the team connect ad responses to the customer journey. For example, the business discovered that many who purchased through ads were actually returning customers. Seeing an ad from the familiar business reminded them of something they needed for their pet, so they made a purchase on the spot. This knowledge helps Petloy identify which ads are generating actual sales so they can optimize campaigns.

A recognized business number for WhatsApp calls improves delivery success rate

Petloy's delivery team now calls customers through WhatsApp Business Calling API on respond.io, from the same WhatsApp number each branch uses to take orders. Customers see Petloy's business name instead of the “unknown number” delivery calls used to come from, so more customers pick up and more deliveries are successful.

Unlike a third-party courier, which can simply try again the next day, Petloy runs its own deliveries so every failed one costs it time and money. Moving delivery calls to its WhatsApp business number on respond.io means fewer failed deliveries and less time and money lost on them.

Follow-up broadcasts drive reviews and repeat orders

To drive repeat business, Petloy tracks an expected reorder date for each customer based on their previous purchases. Every morning, an employee selects customers expected to reorder that day and sends them a personalized WhatsApp broadcast reminding them that their pet food may be running low.

Before respond.io, these reminders had to be copied, pasted and sent individually. Now the team can reach hundreds of customers at once in just a few clicks, sending around 20,000 broadcast messages per month, including reorder reminders and marketing campaigns.

After purchase, Petloy automatically enrolls customers in its loyalty program, where every peso spent earns points toward future discounts. A Workflow automation sends customers their updated points and available coupons the day after an order is completed along with a link to leave a Google review. Automating this process has helped it collect thousands of five-star reviews.

To get a clearer view of the customer experience and identify where agents are performing well and where processes need improvement, the business also sends customer satisfaction surveys at the end of every conversation.

“Before respond.io, we had so many WhatsApp messages coming in that it was hard to keep everything under control and respond quickly. Since we started using respond.io, everything has changed. Our team can manage conversations much more easily, customers are happier with how quickly we reply, and broadcasts have helped us increase sales significantly. It’s made a huge difference to our business.”
Abraham Jacobo, Co-founder at Petloy

Image of a woman and her dog receiving a bag of dog food. Petloy has branches in multiple cities across Mexico and uses a separate respond.io Workspace for each location. This helps the business manage orders efficiently so customers receive them promptly.

The results: Daily orders more than double as Petloy expands to new cities

Since adopting respond.io, Petloy has increased sales by 55% while continuing to expand its operations into new cities and has more than doubled its daily number of orders.

Automation has played a significant role in absorbing that additional demand. Petloy’s custom AI Agent integrated with respond.io now places 35% of all orders, handling common repeat purchases through WhatsApp and passing more complex conversations to human agents when needed. Respond.io has allowed Petloy to automate processes around those sales, from daily reorder reminders and loyalty updates to surveys and review requests.

Meanwhile, WhatsApp calling helps its logistics team complete deliveries, and its custom dashboard shows which ads actually lead to purchases.

Now Petloy is able to give each of its 25,000 customers the personalized service that drives repeat business while it opens new branches across Mexico.

Want to sell more through WhatsApp ads and automate repeat purchases without losing the personal customer experience? Contact us for a free consultation today.