Why Businesses Will Consider Chatbots
The compelling case for what chatbots can do for business.
Messaging is ubiquitous. Facing that, it is more than logic that businesses consider possibilities to provide intimate customer relations in a high scaling way. Customer relationships can be described on different levels. While social media posts affect public and social sphere, messages tangent a very intimate field, for instance, texting with friends, sharing pictures in family group chat, and, sooner or later, 1:1 communication with enterprises within same media and stack. That is my prediction for the next couple of years. Moreover, it is not only reserved for large enterprise, but also for small ones, e.g. a simple appointment tool by your hairdresser around the corner or a lunch menu notification by your favorite tavern.
Furthermore, there are some more obvious advantages of chatbots in terms of numbers:
No registration and no additional app download: As a result, two barriers are eliminated. More than 2,000 apps get published every day on Apple App Store and Google Play Store. However, 2 out of 3 smartphone users do not download any app per month.
Humans already use smartphones: More than 2 billion people use smartphone worldwide (2016).
Instant Messaging: Within a couple of years 3.6 billion people will have installed at least one messaging app (about half of humanity).
Chatbots represent a huge opportunity because people don’t have to download a new app to engage, they simply need to send you a message. — Matt Schlicht
Potential
Let us make a curious comparison. Remember the launch of Apple App Store? Unavoidably it is a success story. Back then, in 2008, Apple had sold overall 13 million devices which can be thought of as prospective customers. At the time when Facebook opened their framework for developers, 2016, they had 1 billion monthly active user. In summary, it is all about the market that is huge. Another reason to have faith in chatbots is the simplicity to create them (see previous article “How to create a chatbot without coding a single line”). Not just for beginners but rather coders. You can create chatbots in basically every language - no additionally coding language needed. For that reason, the chatbot ecosystem is growing faster and faster e.g. the amount of chatbot developers grows almost double as fast as app developers did. Rather sooner than later, corporations will be able to create and maintain chatbots with their own IT department.
I love our approach of Botstack Framework (github), which is open source and provides clean templates for coders - give it a shot (short intro here).
It Is All About Expectations
Just in case it sounds easy to introduce chatbots and also that individuals are already waiting for them, you are definitely wrong. We are at the very beginning, similar to the launch of Apple App Store. Since we are far away from maturity phase there is a lot of workload waiting for all stakeholders. In my opinion, one of the biggest challenges for businesses is user expectations. Nowadays, people often start interactions with brands because of complaints or some other kind of dissatisfaction. Keep that in mind while creating concepts with brands and businesses. Chatbots are very useful for recurring processes like providing information. Enterprise has to be crystal clear what users have to expect when starting conversation with a bot. I will show you some — in my opinion — good examples of first mover.
First Mover
I really like the clear announcements. The buttons give me the feeling that it is up to me. It is as simple as that.
One of the most comfortable ways to stick with your favorite team. I love those easy settings. Within 2 words you are ready to go.
It took me just seconds to understand what to do. Left, right or skip. They call it: “Life’s swell” and that’s true.
Conclusion
While the potential is ripe, enterprise and brands should tackle their opportunity. Satisfy your user with clear information and fulfill the expectations you give them. In the near future I will capture another important topic: how businesses have to react within human turnover and freedom of subscriptions. To be first off the mark → follow me :)
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