The Chatty ChatBot For You

When you think of chat bots, you might picture something like Johnny 5 from Short Circuit if you are my age or older but if you are from a younger generation, you might picture something like Jarvis or Ultron from the Marvel movies! The good news is this form of AI (Artificial Intelligence) isn’t here to take over the world! At least we hope not!

We all know that AI is well on it’s way to becoming fully integrated in our daily lives, so why not use them in our business. You might even be asking by this point, what ARE chatbots?

The simple answer is that chatbots are a service designed to simulate conversation with people in order to complete requested tasks or provide entertainment to the user. It can be found in messaging apps, your text messages, or even as a little chatbotty person on the lower right hand of your screen named Jake from State Farm while browsing the web of endless information.

The first form of a chat bot was formed in 1966 and was called Eliza. She was quite believable with her answers to those who used her. When the 90’s rolled out, the dawn of the age of the computers began….as did the first interactive chatbots. In recent years, the modern versions of this AI phenomenon came about when entrepreneurs and corporations decided “Hey we CAN’T do it all!”

Of course you CAN do it all, but then where is the sufficiency in that. It’s hard to grow and run your business when the people at the helm of the ship are scrambling to hoist the sails AND steer the boat during the raging storm!

Next thing you know, you wind up on Gilligan’s Island trying to figure out if Gilligan truly is the smartest one on the island or is he just playing dumb so he can escape without the rest of the crew holding him back. But I digress….

So what do chatbots DO exactly? I think the list is shorter on what they CAN’T do but just for you, I’ll list a few:

*Set Your Medical Appointments

*Call and Get a Ride Home for You

*Answer Questions

*Give Directions

*Give Restaurant Recommendations

*Give Life Advice

Although I don’t really recommend taking life advice from a chat bot since they don’t pay the same bills as you do or deal with the family dog who just can’t seem to make it outside for potty time. I DO recommend trying one for your business needs.

ChatBots have been the business person’s dream. If you think, I really don’t need one, well then think again. Gartner has predicted that by the year 2020, over 85% of customer contacts will be handled without a human. Let’s examine the “What’s” and the “Why’s” the Chatty Chat Bots can work for YOUR business!

AVAILABILITY: ChatBots are at your disposal on your customer’s schedule! This is immensely important when customers want answers, and they want them now. No one wants to sit on hold and listen to smooth jazz for 8 minutes or Clay Aiken belting out, whatever it is that he sings. This is especially important when having customer service issues such as an internet outage
PRODUCTIVITY: Not only are they always available and have access to your database of queries, but they also streamline the process of helping the customer/consumer in what they need. You don’t have to ask a salesperson who may or may not know the answer, but now the bot has answered all of your specific questions and directed you where you need to go.
RESPONSE RATE IMPROVEMENT: Business pages without proper management have about 90% of their messages going unanswered. Chatbots, however, respond immediately and give your business a 100% response rating. When the consumer sees this, they know they have a business they can rely on.
SAVING YOU MONEY: Integrating chatbots to do the everyday tasks can greatly reduce your costs on the amount of staffing required. This savings can be passed to your customer which is a winning situation for all!
ACTING AS A PERSONAL ASSISTANT: When you are running a business, you are generally quite busy. It makes life easier when you can schedule a flight and ask a chatbot to check for upgrades. Imagine how breezy things will be when booking a hotel and having the chat bot take the time to find rooms with swanky feather pillows.

Now you’ve seen just a few of the main benefits, you may be asking which chatbot service is for you because it’s time to make an investment! The list goes on and on but here are a few that are recommended:

*Statsbot (for business stats, measuring KPI’s, metrics measuring),

*Jarvis (for the FB platform, works with personal reminders and scheduling),

*TradeshiftGo (works with all of your traveling and on the go needs),

*Chymebot (works as a customer service agent), and *Botkeeper (manages all of your bookkeeping needs).

So there you have it. It looks like Jarvis started taking over the world after all. We hope you found this blog useful and have a better understanding of Chat Bots as we know them! If you’d like to learn more, feel free to message us or reference the links below for additional learning!