Image Credits: Jasoren
With increasing attention being given to artificial intelligence, chatbots are becoming a more viable option within enterprise support settings and for retailers and brands who offer digital customer care.
A chatbot by simple language is a conversational agent or digital assistant. However, by definition, Chatbots are innovative computer programs designed to enhance customer service. Chatbots, as supplement to, or substitute to, human interaction via digital conversations can engage with humans via a live chat interface, messaging apps like Facebook messenger and WhatsApp, or voice. Chatbots leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning to deliver accurate answers to customer queries.
The role of a chatbot usually is to interact (by delivering information and answering questions), complete tasks (executing automated back office transactions), and deliver updates, alerts and reminders. From customer service to information sharing to sales, there are unlimited possibilities for incorporating a chatbot into your marketing strategy. With some time investment up front, a chatbot can offer your customers and clients a level of engagement that wouldn’t be possible otherwise. Some potential scenarios for using chatbots include:
• In the retail industry, where a chatbot is used to automatically handle consumer inquiries
• In enterprises and organizations for customer support help-desk and administrative tasks.
• In companies needing 24/7 tech support for users who i.e. forget their passwords, have trouble with their online account training system
• An airline and five star hotel needing support handling travel and hotel bookings inquiries i.e. expenses, arrival and departure time etc
• A local restaurant receiving high volume of a special meal orders and table reservations during peak holidays like Valentine’s day
In each of these scenarios, a Chatbot can be used effectively to ease processes in the background, provide people with straightforward information proactively, quickly, and in high volume.
In a world where mobile phones and digital technology are a must have, it makes more sense for enterprises looking to succeed to exploit the benefits of deploying chatbots. Many enterprises are turning to conversational chatbots to improve productivity within their organizaiton and to strengthen their relationships with their customers and clients both internally and externally.
Here are some reasons why chatbots are important enough for enterprises to get on board with;
1. Chatbots can save you time and money Chatbots as automation tools, can help marketers free up time spent on high impact areas while still delivering quality services. A chatbot is capable of taking on bulk work with no limitation, capture every lead, engage with multiple users simultaneously without getting tired or being biased. These are aspects a human personnel is not capable of hence it’s better to spend human efforts elsewhere like increasing sales conversions rates and negotiating business contracts. 2. Chatbots can be available around the clock With chatbots, enterprises will never have to wait until business hours to get back to a customer or client. Chatbots can be operational and ready to engage with any interested customer 24 hours a day. People expect rapid responses to their inquiry and its unlikely they will wait around till business hours, instead, they will switch to a similar business where they can get rapid responses and their needs can be met promptly. 3. Chatbots can improve customer experience and increase customer satisfaction Chatbots serve to answer common, specific and frequently asked questions in a customer’s journey in a simple, efficient way. They deliver this service with ease and speed, just how the customers want it. Since they record data, trends and metrics of each interaction, chatbots are flexible and can be adjusted and even customized to tailor personalized content to an individual’s specific needs in real-time. Furthermore, enterprises can offer giveaway contests, free trials and exclusive discount codes through a chatbot to encourge engagement, rewards customer loyalty and track ROI. With these perks, customers are likely to leave your chatbot feeling happy and willing to re-engage in the future. 4. Chatbots can process a large volume of requests at once All a company needs in scenarios of receiving large numbers of requests, is a well built chatbot. An enterpise won’t need to increase the team capacity for receiving queries because chatbots are more than capable of handling all questions and engaging with multiple users in a simultaneous manner. 5. Chatbots are platform agnostic One great aspect of chatbots is that they allow for companies to meet their costumers in whichever platform they’re native to. Chatbots can be built in different platforms and can perform equally well across multiple platforms. They are also easy to adapt and integrate to whatever business as they also allow for specific installations. So, should you implement a chatbot in your business? Yes, you should! The possibilities of chatbots are not only great for service, but also for marketing and sales. Whether informational, transactional or advisory in nature, a chatbot can surely benefit your business and provide a better user experience for visitors to your site and social channels. Keep the task package of a chatbot limited to one task and ensure that this task is performed excellently.
At Beem, we have developed a unique chatbot model that combines one or more channels (SMS, WhatsApp & Facebook Messenger) to maximize reach as well as allow for interaction with and without network. This takes your traditional SMS service to a whole new level by adding intelligence and richer content (images, video, web links). Contact us today if you want to take the chatbot leap and do smart business.
