AI Chatbots: How to Improve Customer Experience

 

In this fast-paced world, everyone wants instant answers to their queries. Having to have instant answers is why every business enterprise tries to solve its customers’ problems to maintain the brand reputation without harming customer loyalty.

Source: AI Chatbots: How to Improve Customer Experience

But giving instant replies to the users on a 24/7 basis is not possible at all from the human end. Here is how to improve customer experience with AI Chatbots.

To manage the issue of instant information — the Chatbot was introduced. The whole customer service industry revolutionized with this new addition, and the concept of business tactics has changed drastically. As a result, Chatbots are the new savor of customer care services.

On the other end, many are not in favor of this invention, saying that it is just robotic interaction. They prefer the traditional way of telephonic support as it supports the human touch and better resolves the queries. Contrary to this, the majority is on the side of Chatbots. People are accepting just another invention leading to better solutions to the problems.   

According to Statistics, it has been found that more than 69% of consumers seek instant replies for their issues from the concerned person. Yes, you read it right, and this figure will keep on increasing with time.

Let’s explore the world of chatbots and their applications. This article will cover all the minor and major points related to Chatbots.

What is a Chatbot?

When you get a natural response to your query from the computer programs, then this real type of conversation is said to be because of AI chatbots.

With the help of a chat interface, chatbots get to chat with the users on their queries. The best part of this application is; you can use it with many other applications and establish easy communication without any barrier.

The AI chatbots are developed in a way that they can address the verbal as well as non-verbal queries and interpret the same. Depending on the questions, it delivers relevant information to the users.

Now you might be admiring that these features are also available in the simple chatbot then how the AI version makes a difference. Well, to make you understand this concept, let’s take an example. 

As a user, you are asking about the timings for a restaurant to stay open. To this context, the simple Chatbot will reply that “we are open until 10 pm today.” On the other hand, the AI chatbot will answer more naturally and will reply – “Hello (name), we are open until 10 pm today. It’s a warm day; stay cool and fresh.”

The difference between both of those situations (above) is that the AI Chatbot will maintain a more humanistic approach.

All this is done with the help of NLP, which stands for Natural Language Processing. AI Chatbots support automatic decoding as a human conversation to answer the numerous questions of the customers by understanding the context accurately. In this way, the users feel like they are chatting with an actual human being rather than a machine, which is less interactive and appealing.

Can a Chatbot Replace Customer Support Agents?

It is a topic of huge debate – whether chatbots can take the place of customer support specialists and gives the same experience to users with better efficiency.

These days, chatbots are highly in trend as it saves time and supports 24/7 availability. But you can’t ignore that these are not meant to resolve extraordinary queries and complex issues. These problems divert your chat to specialists.

Despite numerous benefits, you can consider AI chatbots as a perfect replacement for human interactions. Today is the world of real-time interactions, and for that, you need to use bots at one point or the other for a better user experience. 

Yes, bots are a perfect solution to tackle simple and basic issues of the users, and there is full-time availability too. Human agents are best to handle complex conversations of the users, especially when the user is frustrated and doesn’t want to talk or chat to a machine.

With the existence of NPL, chatbots are getting proficient in handling everything with more efficiency. So putting one above the other is not possible as both have their own roles and benefits.

Below — we are discussing the pros of both the mediums, i.e., AI Chatbot (Machine) and Customer Support Agent (Human), to give you an exact idea of both the terms.

Chatbot Technologies in Use:

Before thinking about chatbots and their uses, you need to get aware of the technologies that are being used by the same. It will decide the overall cost and productivity of a chatbot.

There are two basic types of AI Chatbot. The Command based chatbots and AI-based chatbots. 

Command-Based Chatbots

The very first category is the Command based chatbots, which give a reply after matching the context of the query and its answer. This means these types of chatbots are unable to create their own content and depend on the databank of replies.

You cannot expect this chatbot to answer different sets of questions with full accuracy. There are codes supporting these, and you cannot get an answer beyond the level of that. Based on template search or dynamic search, command chatbots understand the user’s data accordingly. 

AI-Based Chatbots

On the other hand, AI-based Chatbots are the latest innovation in chatbots, which makes this type more efficient to answer ambiguous questions. Using the NLP, these chatbots try to get the best reply from scratch. These keep on updating themselves by earning from past experiences.

Overall, there can be recommendations and pros and cons for both types of chatbots. On one end, command-based chatbots support error-free answers within their knowledge base. And, AI-based chatbots are more into giving an answer in a natural language. It’s up to you which type will you prefer the most. 

Benefits of Chatbots:

When it comes to advantages linked to the chatbots, there is a huge list of series. Here we are discussing all the points in detail. 

• Instant Customer Service:

The best and the most nominal pro related to chatbots is their availability. It will give the reply, no matter if it is 2 in the night or 5 in the morning.

The 24/7  response feature attracts many businesses to invest in chatbots. By taking an idea from the historical conversation, chatbots can resolve any query. These are proficient in solving the most basic tasks, like answering basic questions about account balances, giving information about the services, amending an invoice, and more.

You won’t believe it, but in some of the cases, these can judge human emotions like anger, fear, happiness, etc. Another amazing addition is that they can find out if the customer is angry and transfer the interaction to humans.

Waiting for someone to reply to your query is frustrating for many. It adversely affects your brand image too. Using chatbots, you can minimize the waiting time and reply to the customers regarding their doubts on time. 

Another smart move of Chatbot is they can personalize the customer experience in retrospect. By working on the information developed in the conversation of agent and customer, Chatbot personalizes their interactions with customers, leading to effective results. In this way, the mindset of the customer can be judged, and relevant solutions can be driven by focusing on the customer’s interaction with the company at the previous time.

It is quite unbelievable, but Chatbots have the capability to interact with the customers in the same way as an agent does while having a live conversation with them. There are many chatbots that use NLP methods to maintain more fluency in the conversion, just like the human does.

Other than that, chatbots can also integrate with the website of the company as well as with the smartphone application, making it convenient for the customer to connect well with the company’s online resources. This means users can connect with you using their favorite messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and more. 

By getting a timely reply from the respondent makes it easy to get rid of the problem on time. Waiting for hours to get a valid answer can make anyone anxious. Hence the timely response from the AI chatbots can be counted as a great feature to make the overall conversational experience stress-free and more manageable.

It has been found that people like getting solutions from chatbots; at least they get an on-time reply. Furthermore, more and more people show their interest in chatbot resolving their critical issues. 

Without a doubt, chatbots offer you the chance to engage with your customers at multiple levels. For stuff like technical support and sales information, they can be counted as one of the best assets that a company can own. Chatbots are really flexible and are programmed with different types of conversational styles. This helps you maintain better engagement with the customers and give them a definite reason to come back and join you again.

The relationship between AI and the employees goes on and off. But yes, the existence of AI will develop a fear of losing the jobs in the minds of employees as AI has such a great ability to mimic human behavior. This, surprisingly, will encourage your staff members to perform better, which automatically enhances your productivity and leads to more profits. 

• Chatbots Continuously Learn:

One of the amazing pros linked to Chatbots is they automatically enhance its quality with the help of AI. That means with time; Chatbots will give you more optimum answers.

To understand this, let’s take an example. If you are asking the chatbot – how do I get another user?. Then, it will recognize other related queries like – where do I get another user? And more with that. The story does not end here as the Chatbot will also be able to answer questions like “How can I manage different users?”

The Chatbot will answer other complex questions related to the same topic just by upgrading its data. All the information will add to the knowledge bank of a Chatbot.

Issues related to AI Chatbots:

Surprisingly, it is a fact that many people are unable to distinguish between chatbots and humans. It is totally fine to create machines that can act as human beings to communicate effectively, but one needs to know whether he or she is chatting with a human or a chatbot. This leads to ethical aspects like transparency, maintaining privacy, and more. 

One discusses a lot of sensitive information on chats, and if all this data gathered by a chatbot is shared internally, then there is a high risk of mishappenings. A customer has the right to know with whom he or she is chatting as then they will become less open about their personal information. The disclosure of sensitive data can lead to many criminal offenses. 

Have you heard about the talk therapy chatbot, Woebot? If not, then you need to read this. “Woebot” is designed to interact with the users by tracking their moods, videos, and more. On the contrary, users were not at all afraid of being judged by machines on their personal issues.

Rather, people find this feature quite interesting. On the other hand, privacy activists have totally different views regarding Woebot. The major reason behind that is – it takes content from social sites like Facebook, Messenger, and Facebook to learn about a person’s identity in detail.

Another Drawback of Using Chatbots

Well, another drawback of using chatbots is the level of accuracy. It is obvious that a human can give the best answer related to complex queries in the most optimum way by understanding the prospect of the whole conversation. Chatbots are not that accurate (yet) when it comes to dealing with complex issues. This is likely the reason why they shift the whole conversation to a human agent in case of a complex query. 

Furthermore, you can’t deny the fact that there are some bots that are not intelligent enough to carry the interactions responsibly. Along with that, you will find that the use of bots is quite limited in the field of education and medicine due to the concern about the “dehumanization” of interactions.

But still, there are Healthcare Chatbots available that can help you get a lot of information. For instance, people become stressed about their health issues. Hence at that point, they don’t want to chat with a machine that can’t give real sympathy. This is the area where bots can’t beat humans — “emotions.”

What is the Future of AI Chatbots?

Considering the above-discussed issues, still, there can be a lot of scope for AI Chatbots in the future. You can’t ignore the amazing benefits instead. It can be said that Chatbots are at a very early stage, and there is a need for a lot of modification.

There are several companies already using this, and it has become one of the trendiest things. With time, it is believed that a number of upgrades will be seen in Chatbots, too, like any other application.

Essentials to keep in mind while developing a chatbot for your Business.

Obviously, you want to use the feature of chatbots to enhance user experience as well as to build a better communication channel with the consumers. If your bot appears on the website telling about the services and features, then it will give a personalized approach to the visitors. 

The design of the bot also plays an essential role in this context. A well-designed design will fetch more attention from the visitors and probably convert them into your loyal customers. Other than that, you need to pay special attention to the format of the text, quality links, and pictures in the replies of your bot.

Welcome visitors with a greeting and then ask them about their requirements without making many repetitions. Support an NLP approach as this will reduce the ratio of grammatical errors.

Role of Chatbots to meet your Business Needs

Chatbots tend to have a lot of benefits for your business. From enhancing your communication channel to organizational efficiency — you can avail yourself of the multiple pros of having enhanced efficiency and communication on your channel

• Uplifts the operation Scale:

It will be right to say that chatbots eliminate the limitations of a human agent. It is obvious that humans cannot be available 24/7, and elements like mood swings and fatigue are there. Machines are not affected by this kind of stuff. Other than that, overall productivity is also enhanced as an AI chatbot can handle thousands of conversations (revechatdotcom –chatbot-business-benefits) at a time. It is a perfect solution for business enterprises that want to enter this competitive world with a bang.

Undoubtedly, you will receive an abundance of queries from your customers, and to tackle them on time, you need to invest a lot of time. To manage this, you can use chatbots for basic queries. This will also take off the load from the customer support staff. For complex queries, calls can be shifted to human agents.

• Working with identical product Range:

Many a time, a business enterprise indulges in the selling and purchasing of similar kinds of products. Customers face a lot of problems in finding the right one. In this context, a chatbot can be a really good help. It can suggest to buyers the best choice depending on the features and price range. 

• Dealing with Millennials:

Interacting with the Millennials can be a hectic task for customer support agents, too, as they want to inquire and compare different products, depending on their features, price, style, and more. Hence chatbots can deal with all their basic queries with full efficiency.

• Effective communication with Customers:

Staying connected with your customers can actually help you stay in demand among the audience. You will get more business and appreciation from the clients. Using online channels for effective communication is the newest trend, and chatbots will make the whole experience convenient for you.

It is often witnessed that many companies invest in backend support to manage their online interactions, and this needs a great team that will charge a decent amount from your side. By investing in chatbots, you can convert the whole process into an automatic system.

Top 10 Chatbots:

Chatbots are so much in trend that you will get a number of options in the same. Here we are discussing the most efficient one that will definitely enhance your overall productivity.

Snatchbot is a convenient addition to a website dealing in multi-channel messaging. You will get the best security and administrative features with this. Plus, you don’t need to work on codes for collecting payments or sending receipts. This application will give you a hassle-free experience.

Another popular addition in this category is Reply. With this application, you will get a standard integration experience just in one click. To enhance the overall customer experience, Reply support tools and the level of accuracy is also high.

SAP Conversational AI is specially designed for business enterprises to enhance their profits by providing an automatic customer support service. This also supports FAQs integrated with SAP Solutions.

Bold360 offers assistance to multiple types of businesses, especially for the eCommerce websites where a customer needs to ask a lot of questions regarding the product range. In this application, you get the chance to personalize the customer service option. The ultimate aim is to provide top-notch customer service.

Vergic is the one solution for all your customer care support issues. This app features activities like handling data, answering basic queries, transferring complex issues to human agents, and more. In short, providing the top-notch support service is the aim of using the natural language. Moreover, features like management of conversational workflows, highlighting of pages, sentiment analysis add a cherry to the cake.

Manychat offers you the facility to connect with the website through Facebook Messenger, which acts as a  great opportunity for small business ventures, especially those which are new to the market. This helps in generating leads and connectivity with more audiences.

Along with that, it also connects with Shopify, Google Sheets, and more, leading to a better balance between business and communication.

Flow XO offers you easy maintenance of communication with your audience with the help of social media platforms, especially if you are dealing with more than one website. It makes it easy for you to gather more connections without much difficulty.

The option of live chat is also there with this application, along with the convenience of accepting payments, resolving queries, and more.

HubSpot Chatbot Builder supports an estimated 200 integration along with the features like booking meetings, scaling conversations, and more. The best part of this application is that you can customize everything according to your requirements. With this, you can enjoy better lead management by adding all the contact records.

Original Postroducts/chatbot/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Inbenta supports NLP, i.e., Natural Language Processing, to maintain a humanistic approach to the queries of the customers without any kind of error. In case of complex issues, Inbenta automatically transfers your query to the right support agent. 

Another fantastic addition to this category is the Watson Assistant, which lets you build conversational interfaces into any device. Yes, you read it right. In this way, you can develop a direct pathway in finding the solution to an issue. 

FINAL THOUGHTS:

With the enhancement in the use of automation technologies, there can be seen an advancement in every sort of life. From smart cities to smart homes and automated workspaces, you will witness that everybody is going digital.

It won’t be wrong to say that we are going a step closer with every new upgrade in the digital world. As per the views of an industry expert, the features of a chatbot are still in the infancy stage, and there is a lot to work on. It is a fact that the number of business enterprises using chatbot AI will keep on growing with years. 

Due to the existence of multiple benefits, people love it. It has proved its place among customers as well as business enterprises. As the features of chatbots develop, it will come more and more into use.

A chatbot is perfect for handling the basic queries of customers and addressing them on time. It helps you save time as well as money that you can invest somewhere else. If you are still doubtful, then this is the time to give this a try; half of your pressure will be released.

Ravi Sharma, CEO of Webomaze is a highly enthusiastic entrepreneur. His love for making every business reach the greatest heights made him establish his Web Development and Digital Marketing Company. Ravi delivers the best eCommerce development and SEO services. He has got a great grip on the idea of effective eCommerce Strategies, SEO processes, and tactics which are vital for virtual exposure. Ravi Sharma is a fun-loving person and a keen traveler who always hunts to find adventure in new places.