Generally speaking a bot is any software that performs an automated task, however we are interested in the class of bots that live online in chat platforms or on social media called chatbots.
A chatbot is a software system, which can interact or “chat” with a human user in natural language (such as English, or whatever other language the chatbot has been built on). Chatbots can help inform a user or help them with fulfilling a task.
Many companies' chatbots run on messaging apps like Facebook Messenger (since 2016), WeChat (since 2013), WhatsApp, LiveChat, Kik, Slack, Line, Telegram, or simply via SMS. They are used for B2C customer service, sales, and marketing.
In 2016, Facebook Messenger allowed developers to place chatbots on their platform. There were 30,000 bots created for Messenger in the first six months, rising to 100,000 by September 2017.
Since September 2017, this has also been as part of a pilot program on WhatsApp. Airlines KLM and Aeroméxico both announced their participation in the testing; both airlines had previously launched customer services on the Facebook Messenger platform.
The bots usually appear as one of the user's contacts, but can sometimes act as participants in a group chat.
Applications of chatbots in business
1. Accessible anytime
Since chatbots are basically virtual robots they never get tired and continue to obey your command. They will continue to operate every day throughout the year without requiring to take a break. This improves your customer UX and helps you rank highly in your sector.
2. Handling Capacity
Chatbots can simultaneously have conversations with thousands of people. No matter what time of the day it is or how many people are contacting you, every single one of them will be answered immediately.
3. Flexible attribute
Chatbots have the benefit that it can quite easily be used in any industry. Unlike other products where you have to do a lot of development and testing to change platforms, chatbots are relatively easy to switch. One has to just train the bot by giving the right conversation structure and flow to switch its current field or industry.
Humans are bound to change emotions. Chatbots, on the other hand, are bound by some rules and obey them as long as they’re programmed to. They will always treat a customer in the perfect way no matter how rough the person is or how foul language the person uses.
5. Cost Effective
As one chatbot is equal to loads of employees, it can easily communicate with thousands of customers at the same time. We would only need a handful of people to jump into conversations sometimes when necessary. Hence, it would drastically bring down the expenses and bring about a steep rise in revenue and customer satisfaction.
Before you want to accomplish a task, you first must learn how to work on the task and complete it. Only then will they be considered fit for the job. There is a continuous teaching involved in every level of hierarchy the employee will go through. Also, there will be a lot of change in the employees, some stay, some get fired, some more join in etc.
What we want to say is, employees will change; it’s a fact. And this would require you to allow a lot of time of your employees into grooming the new joiners. Chatbots could eliminate that time to almost zero, but provide a very clean and easy to understand conversation flow and structure that needs to be maintained by the chatbot.
7. Work Automation
People tend to be less productive when given a recurring job or work. We humans usually get bored doing the same thing over and over again. Chatbots can now automate tasks which are to be done frequently and at the right time. And now there are already numerous slack bots which automate repetitive tasks. This helps people save time and be more productive.
E-commerce brands like H&M, eBay shopbot, Tommy Hilfiger are now selling many products using chatbots. Amazon is also betting heavily with a far more advanced voice recognition AI called ‘Alexa’ which is gaining popularity nowadays.
9. Personal Assistant
People could use Bots as personal fashion advisor for clothing recommendations, or ask trading tips from a finance bot, suggest places to visit from a travel bot and so forth. This would help the users get a more personal touch from the chatbot. Also, the chatbot will remember all your choices and provide you with relevant choices the next time you visit it.
References :
wikipedia.org
botpress.io
medium.com
marutitech.com
youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/slidenerd
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