With industry bigwigs entering the fray, text-based or conversational ai powered chat bots are in steady demand.
Top brands are now leading the march in embracing chat bots or automated messaging apps to engage with their consumers. The uncanny ability of bots to fulfil the requirements of holding a sensible conversation with the user has the markets ringing. Bots have come to stay as many businesses begin to embrace the idea of providing real-time consumer engagement. Moreover, bots live on servers—like web pages—and not on the mobile phone, making it handy to create and update them.
It only remains to be seen how bots change the face of Internet and internet usage.
Hello, I’m your bot!
Regular messenger apps had a palpable level of popularity even in their earliest avatars as chatroom applications. The last year witnessed a flurry of events in this sphere, especially as more people took up to using messaging apps than even social media. This has prompted tectonic shifts in the marketplace. For brands, the upshot of delivering personalized experience using messenger apps was huge. But then, it gave rise to the question: how many more apps can you really use? Enter chat bots. Chat bots help to take care of most of your tasks, including those that you’d otherwise rely on numerous apps to perform.
Imagine sitting in a theatre and ordering refreshments. In most cases, you’d be required to download app supported by the establishment. You’d have to first search for the app, download it or open the mobile site, create an account, choose your items, enter your seat number, enter payment details and check out. Well, honestly, you’ll be missing out on your show if you spend time performing these tasks on your mobile.
Life would be a lot easier if you just had to open your messenger app and inform the establishment’s chat bot to bring you what you’d like to have. Or, if you are seated in a restaurant, seek the bot’s help in exploring the menu and choosing the chef’s special. The scope is unlimited and the proliferation of chat bots in the coming days is inevitable.
Coming of age
With the enhanced potential to have realistic conversations with consumers, marketers enlist bots to help in brand discovery, customer service, and data collection. Also, building bots is a hassle-free affair, and scalable—they can be deployed across several messaging platforms. This is very different from the earlier chat services, which responded to the input of keywords and phrases. Moreover, industry leaders in language technology are utilising their competencies in artificial intelligence, natural language processing and natural language understanding to equip chatbots with multilingual conversational abilities, especially suited for countries as diverse as India.
Bots and their avatars
The number of automated bots doing the rounds on Twitter and, recently, on Facebook is surprising. Most messaging apps have their own functional bots, although they still allow developers a free rein to create their own bots. Some apps have incorporated chat bots with a high degree of personalization.
The jury is out there!
The proliferation of messaging apps and chat bots has opened the market for brands. In the coming days, one is sure to witness a lot of movement in the bot marketplace.
Just as the app marketplace witnessed its meteoric rise after both Apple and Google entered the ring, the bot market is gearing up as both social and telecom biggies show their interest. Moreover, businesses such as restaurants and hotels that have been lukewarm to adopting apps are readily embracing bots.