“If you picture the journey of chatbots from the 1960s to now, you can see that what was once a fantasy of being able to communicate with a nonliving virtual being, is now a part of our everyday lives.” – Rashid Khan (Build Better Chatbots)
What is a Chatbot?
A chatbot is an AI program designed to automatically send and respond to received messages. They can be programmed and trained to send your customers customized messages of your choosing.
There are various mediums to leverage Chatbots, for example, SMS, website chat windows and, social media platforms such as Facebook Messenger and Twitter.
One way to stay ahead of your competitors is to evaluate your processes that require much time/resources and automate them as much as possible.
Chatbots can automate your conversations and add value to your business in the following ways.
Pre-Qualify Business Leads
Website chatbots can send automated messages, such as, “What are you looking for?” or “Let us know if you have any questions”, these kinds of automated messages can help start a conversation, filter customers who are looking to get more information on your business offerings and build a database with qualified leads for your sales team which allows for their time to be put to converting those leads.
Chatbots also learn from conversational interactions with customers, which allows them to send relevant messages regarding your brand and business offerings. It essentially allows you to lead your customers seamlessly through the lower sales funnel.
Efficient Collection of Data and Feedback
You can gather information such as their e-mail address, company name, company size which helps you build your 1st party database automatically. Chatbots can also collect data from users through conversations to fill surveys about customer service, website experience, product, or service needs. This, in turn, allows you to efficiently personalize your marketing tactics to target those customers while also automating repetitive and time-consuming tasks for your customer service/sales team.
Reach and Sell to a Wider Audience Without Hiring a Salesperson
Chatbots can help your business tap into a virtually infinite audience on social media platforms as you can leverage their data on consumer demographics and psychographics.
Using the Messenger Bot, you can create your customizable eCommerce store which is just one more channel to sell. A great example of leveraging bots to drive more sales is Starbucks, the messenger bot is customized to order the coffee as well as give updates about the customer’s order in real-time.
Engage your Audience Virtually
Communicating with a chatbot does not always have to be flat, for example, “What are you looking to buy?”, “Can I help you?”. You can personify your bot by giving it a name and a sense of humor, and well, that’s more than enough not just to start a conversation but also to keep it going. Bots can also help eliminate a need for newsletters, or e-mail updates, it can be customized to send notifications for updates in real-time.
Whole Foods is one such brand that is trying to enhance its user experience by letting users search for recipes and products directly through the Messenger bot. Customers can provide little details such as keywords, type of cuisine, diets, or even emojis, and the bot whips up relevant recipes for them.
In a nutshell, Chatbots can help save so much of those marketing $, time and overall add so much value that there’s no telling how high and far your business can go!
Get in touch with us today to help build a unique chatbot marketing strategy for your business!