How can Chatbots improve user experience

The increasing need for flexibility and speed in customer service is driving the triumphant advance of chatbots. But despite increasing awareness of the technology and the use of artificial intelligence to optimize chatbots, virtual interlocutors are often not yet able to convince customers.

This is particularly evident in interactions with chatbots, where many customers often resort to insults out of frustration. This is a clear sign that there is still potential for optimization in order to increase acceptance and make customers happy in the long term. Currently, an average of 49% of shoppers aged 30-44 say they prefer using chatbots. This is quite a big number.

Now that you got a better idea of chatbots in general, let’s learn why should your business invest in a good chatbot.

Why Should Your Business Invest in Chatbots Now?

The importance of virtual assistants such as chatbots is increasing rapidly for companies. By 2024, the global chatbot market is expected to generate $9.4 billion in annual revenue. In concrete terms, companies benefit from the following advantages of using chatbots:

• 24/7 support: A key advantage of chatbots in customer service is their continuous availability. With the help of chatbots, you can automatically answer inquiries around the clock and provide support at any time of the day or night.
• Data Collection: Chatbots help you gather important data about your customers’ preferences, issues, and activities. From this, you can draw essential insights and conclusions to improve customer satisfaction.
• Increased productivity: Chatbots take over repetitive tasks and inquiries and relieve employees of mundane tasks. You save time and effort and increase operational efficiency.

Complex requests lead to frustration

Companies often use chatbots to relieve customer service employees and to answer inquiries quickly and effectively. But even this area of the application still partially reveals a few weaknesses of chatbots. For example, when buyers make unexpected or very generic requests, the technology often reaches its limits and cannot satisfactorily answer the requests. This is also reflected in the results of the survey. More than a quarter of those surveyed stated that the bots did not process their customer inquiries satisfactorily and therefore did not solve problems.

There is also often a lack of the ability to forward customers as directly as possible to a human colleague in the event of problems. Instead, the interaction ends with no result, and the customer has to contact the company again by phone or email. In the case of distressed consumers, in particular, the emotional mood of a program cannot be assessed and responded to appropriately – and this can ultimately lead to insults and even the loss of the customer. Because even a bad experience with a chatbot can have serious consequences. Oftentimes, one negative experience with customer support is enough to persuade prospects to look for another brand for the product or service they want.

Sentiment analysis – AI can assess the mood of customers

When implementing intelligent chatbot systems, companies should pay particular attention to a well-thought-out and comprehensive system implementation. In order to be able to effectively train the artificial intelligence (AI) used, it must be specifically integrated into processes, sufficient training data of high quality must be available, and tasks must be clearly defined.

Personalized communication is becoming increasingly important for customers. Through this, interested parties often feel better understood, and the bond and loyalty can be strengthened. A well-trained AI can be useful here. For example, this offers the possibility of automatically analyzing given answers and thus better understanding the behavior and preferences of customers, saving them and responding to them more specifically in the future.

The assessment of whether the communication should be handed over to a person in certain situations can be supported with the help of sentiment analysis, i.e., an automatic evaluation of text or speech.

For example, involving an employee can have a de-escalating effect on the conversation. However, before handing over the call to a consultant, it is crucial that he or she has all important information from the the interaction with the AI. This way, the customer does not have to repeat himself.

Intelligent bots of the future

The demands on customer support will continue to increase in the future. Due to the desire for constant availability and quick feedback, chatbots will also play an increasingly important role in customer service. However, the results of different surveys also show that there is still a considerable need for improvement when it comes to practical use.

But most of these problems can be easily eliminated: Company-specific integration and the use of artificial intelligence for bot solutions are particularly important in order to fully exploit the potential of digital assistants.

Moreover, in the future, more technically sophisticated solutions, such as speech and pattern recognition, will make dialogues more pleasant and efficient for those interested. Thus, Chatbots become real helpers for customers and service employees (and hopefully no longer the target of insults.)

Chatbot conclusion

Your customers and their satisfaction are important to you, and you want to offer personalized, consistent service? Then chatbots are just right for your company.

A key benefit of chatbots for customers is real-time support. Regardless of whether you support customers in obtaining information, making decisions, solving problems, or other concerns, it is important that, for the first time, customers no longer have to wait when communicating with companies. A study by Userlike confirms that consumers appreciate this advantage: 68% of respondents state that they rate the quick response as the most positive aspect of chatbot communication.

Customer service chatbots represent your brand to the outside world and are often the first point of contact with your company. Thus, chatbots allow you to create a consistent user experience. You determine the appearance, design, and tonality of the chatbot.

So, benefit from automated, 24/7 service, learn more about the needs of your customers and thereby continuously improve your customer satisfaction!

Sources:

https://www.smallbizgenius.net/by-the-numbers/chatbot-statistics/

https://chatfuel.com/blog/future-of-chatbots-based-on-data

https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/consumers-face-challenges-using-chatbots-to-resolve-queries-report-11624287975842.html