Ever since the chatbots have been introduced, there is a lot of buzz that these bots will become the next paradigm shift in marketing brands. Though it’s too early to predict things with only a few brands using it, the developments surrounding these chatbots are surely unleashing a wave of innovation for businesses/brands.
Starting with customer service to the new user experiences, these chatbots are here to stay. Following are 10 reasons why brands and marketers should implement these chatbots:
- Save Resources and Improve customer service: Chatbots can help businesses save time and money. These chatbots can also maintain multiple concurrent conversations – far more than any human, thus standardizing high-quality customer service.
- Facilitate E-commerce: E-commerce seems to be a natural extension of bot-based customer service. In other words, consumers asking questions about products from a bot will be able to complete their transactions quickly and efficiently since the experience will be like talking to someone where they want to guide you.
- Provide better relationship building and more personal engagement: Chatbots conversational element has the potential for relationship-building. They allow the brands to become a best friend. As an example, a text-message-based music retail service ReplyYes’s conversational commerce channel, The Edit, used to send its subscribers personalized text messages each day with a vinyl record album recommendation. If the subscribers want to purchase it, they text back “Yes.” According to a ReplyYes spokesperson, The Edit generated $1 million in sales in its first eight months.
- Bridges the physical and digital worlds and provides enhanced customer experience: During its F8 developer conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg described how chatbots can eliminate endless hassles customers face in calling a brands customer care or in installing new apps. As an example, imagine you are watching a cricket match and want something to munch on, but the lines are long. The other option could be opening your Facebook Messenger, scanning a code that has your seat location in it, ordering a drink billed to your credit card and you’re done.
- Addressing Real time customer needs: Chatbots enable brands to give their consumers what they want, whenever/wherever they want. They give an opportunity for brands to have instant and personalized interactions with customers thus using it for generating awareness, creating interest, enabling purchase, supporting usage and over and above driving engagement and brand advocates.
- Converse openly about sensitive topics: Chat Bots enable brands to interact with the customers who might be reluctant to talk about confidential issues. For example, You follow a beauty/makeup brand on Twitter, but you don’t want to share that you have acne problem but with one-to-one beauty and makeup chatbot, you’ll be comfortable in asking and discussing your beauty regime. It may also give you related videos and tutorials.
- Have conversations on a large scale: Big brands with millions of followers, it becomes pretty difficult to interact with each and every customer but the bots can create personalized experiences with slight variations down to the individual level.
- Integrate utility with the brand experience: Brands can also use @mentions while chatting in a group. Let’s say for example if you are chatting with your friends and you want to know the sports scores, there is no need of closing the chat and opening the app/browser, all you have to do is @score live ’sport’ score and you get the scores. It is just a way of blending utility with branding. This can provide value to group experiences and can work across a lot of brands.
- Improve customer loyalty redemption experience: Bots can help the loyalty members to select personalized redemptions. This will undoubtedly deepen their already devoted connections with the brand.
- Opportunities for System Integration: Bots will offer brands and marketers unparalleled opportunities for services integration and thus enhancing the overall customer experience. For example, Uber appearing embedded inside an airline app so that travelers can request transport to/from the airport. Imagine ordering food directly from a social or a gaming app, you can instantly chat with a bot and order away.
Conclusion:
Starting with customer service, bots may very soon address a wider range of consumer needs in the future by anticipating them through service integration and personalization. Like a movie bot will find movie tickets and also arrange a ride to the theater.
Though, customer service seems to be the critical point for bots to start and with this branch brands can elevate to even higher levels.
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