The demand for Chatbots is increasing.
We live in a world where artificial intelligence is taking over. Whether we like it or not, technology means that many human roles can be replaced by things like online chatbots.
Whilst that may seem scary, it doesn’t necessarily mean that humans should be replaced, but the technological advances can certainly make life easier.
Online chatbots are able to automate customer support, whilst still providing a seemingly intimate and personal interaction. Interacting with customers is imperative to success.
Recently, data from Facebook which gives insight into how Chatbots can add value in order to communicate with customers:
- 56% of people would rather instant message than speak to someone
- 53% of people would rather shop with someone they can message
- 2 billion messages are sent between customer and business monthly
What are chatbots?
Oxford Dictionaires defines a chatbot as; “A computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, especially over the Internet.”
It is a virtual assistant that communicates via online conversations and can be integrated into websites, apps and instant messengers.
What are the benefits of Chatbots?
- Chatbots provide assistance and access to information quickly and efficiently, leaving a human to do tasks that it cannot.
- People engage with Chatbots as they are curious as to whether they can assist them as effectively as a human. This keeps people engaged with your website or app.
- They can be entertaining. Chatbots can be built to be witty and have humorous interactions with your clients.
- Your response rate to clients dramatically improves as the bot will automatically and efficiently respond to 100% of messages.
- Repetitive tasks can be handled with a Chatbot. The ‘What time are you open?’ ‘Where are you located?’ ‘How much is postage?’ questions can be handled automatically, reducing employees workload.
There is no doubt that when used properly, Chatbots can be an effective tool to engage with your customers and provide support, freeing up a lot of time for you to handle business elements that bots can’t do!
However, like everything, in order to be effective they have to be used efficiently.
To discuss whether your business could benefit from a bot, contact Digimedia Worx to discuss your digital strategy.
