Web Chatbots & How to Utilize AI in Your Business: How Artificial Intelligence is Changing the Internet

The explosion of AI assistants and bots has made it more important than ever to adapt to how information is presented and found.

 

What is a chatbot anyway?  

 

A chatbot is a form of automated service designed for clients to interact with on your site. Just as Siri or Alexa respond to your questions in a conversational form, chatbots are robots that engage with an online user who visits a site in the form of a pop-up window or dialogue box.

As these chatbots become more and more popular, businesses everywhere are starting to integrate them with their sites to help with managing customer service, helping navigate the site, and even fulfilling simple transactions right in the chat (talk about changing the game of impulse buying).

 

Why is it worth the investment?

 

  1. They’re basically a customer service desk 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Whether it’s 4 am or 9 pm, you can answer your customer’s questions without interrupting your daily routine. The chatbots use AI and sophisticated natural language processing (NLP) to answer both simple and more intelligent questions to decide whether the client concerns are being adequately answered by the bot or if they need to be referred to a live representative.

 

  1. They keep people on your site longer.

Bad news alert: the average amount of time a user spends on a site is less than 3 minutes before leaving your page. Simple sites with a landing page and “Add to Cart” option have an average bounce rate of 70-90%. In the fast-paced world of the internet, a user that can’t find the information they need quickly will leave and find it somewhere else. Chatbots can fix this by answering questions and helping them find all the information they need; this minimizes the amount of time a visitor spends aimlessly wandering on your site. This quick service will keep them on your site longer and decrease the amount of impatient “bouncers” by providing answers right away. (Source: Neil Patel)

 

  1. They can start the conversation.

Another nice thing about chatbots is that they can start the conversation if you’d like them to. Chatbots can pop up on a user’s screen, informing them of promotions, new updates, or even asking if they need help. This eliminates passive customer interaction and engages users, providing straight to the point answers and active learning for the bot to better assist future site users.

 

  1. They can help with transactions.

Did you know that 74% of North Americans abandon their shopping cart online? Chatbots can help customers complete their purchase on your site if you choose to integrate the API of a payment system (such as PayPal) into your bot. Having a chatbot helps to prevent your guests from second-guessing their purchase and eliminates an equally frustrating checkout process–keeping shoppers from doing the one thing online sellers dread: abandoning the cart. (Source: Shopping cart abandonment)

 

  1. They can collect customer feedback.

Another smart reason to utilize a chatbot on your site? The constant feedback you can collect through site visitor usage. What information is asked for most? Which pages are your clients struggling to find? Is your pricing clear? With this feedback, you can adjust your page accordingly to better the user’s experience in the future.