The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Creating a Bot on Facebook Messenger
This is how you reach 1 billion people.
What is a Facebook Messenger bot? Why are Facebook Messenger bots such a big deal? What can they do? How do you create a Facebook Messenger bot? How do you get people to talk to it? How do you turn it into your number one distribution channel?
These are the questions we’re going to answer for you right now.
Ready? Let’s do this.
What Is A Facebook Messenger Bot?
A Facebook Messenger Bot is an application that can automatically interact with people when they message your Facebook Page. Bots can automatically answer questions, send mass push notifications, sell products, tell stories, and much more.
A bot isn’t only good for customer support, it is also extraordinarily exceptional when it comes to marketing and customer engagement.
Not only will creating a bot let you automatically respond to anyone who messages your page, it will enable you to connect your business to the billion people on Facebook Messenger.
Still confused? Don’t worry. I will explain.
Take a look at this.
You probably already know this, but Facebook Pages have “Message” buttons on the top right. If people click the “Message” button, they can send the business a message the same way they can send their friends messages.
But there’s a BIG problem.
The majority of messages sent to businesses go completely unanswered. Nobody is responding to them.
So, when you message someone on Facebook, you are most likely going to experience something like this:
This is horrible. Businesses get a ridiculous amount of messages sent to them every day, and nobody is responding.
“Matt! There’s got to be a solution to this! What do we do?!”
Yes! Don’t worry, there is definitely a solution, and that solution is a bot.
This is what it looks like when you message Maroon 5 on Facebook after they have installed a bot.
See how much better this is? Now Maroon 5’s bot can get your permission to send you messages in the future, answer questions, and can even help you purchase tickets and merchandise.
Maroon 5’s bot even tells stories.
There are so many things bots can do, and they are incredibly fun and easy to create and grow.
This may sound strange right now, but bots will likely become one of the most powerful distribution channels businesses have on the internet.
How? I will explain.
Why Facebook Messenger Bots Are Such A Massive Opportunity
If I were to tell you that there’s a new social media app that has a billion people using it every month, I would bet you anything that you would start to figure out how to include your business in that network.
Well, guess what? Facebook Messenger has a billion people using it. It is incredibly massive.
To put it in perspective: Facebook Messenger’s audience is equal to Snapchat, Twitter, and Instagram COMBINED.
Think about that for a second.
Think really hard about it, because it is insane and you need to internalize it.
Not only is Facebook Messenger massive, it’s actually growing FASTER than Facebook.
That is crazy!
So, here’s the deal.
Up until now, Facebook Messenger has been used strictly for one-to-one communication. I can message my friends and they can message me.
Now, with bots, you are no longer limited to one-to-one interactions. You can now start to have one-to-many interactions on Facebook Messenger, enabling you to build massive audiences inside the fastest growing mobile app in the world. You can go viral amongst a billion people.
Here’s the bottom line: You are going to have a bot.
No matter what your business is, whether you are a celebrity, a shoe store, a services company, a startup, a dance instructor, a politician, or anything else, you need to have a bot. You will either create your bot today and start building up your audience, or you will create your bot later after everyone else has built up their audience. It is up to you.
But what can these bots do exactly? How are they going to help your business?
I will answer these questions right now.
What Facebook Messenger Bots Can Do
The same way you can create a YouTube channel or a blog about any topic, you can similarly create a bot for any topic.
Here are some examples of what your Facebook Messenger bot could do.
But what do these look like!? How exactly does a bot work?
Don’t worry, I’ve got some screen shots that will help make this easier to understand.
Here are some specific examples of features your bot can have.
1: Send mass push notifications.
Let people follow your bot so that you can send them custom push notifications in the future. Imagine being able to send out a new video, interactive conversation, or product to your entire audience instantly.
2: Create sharable, native content for Facebook Messenger.
Create conversational experiences, called “Convos”, where you can create FAQ’s, tell stories, and more. Convos enable you to create and share content that is native to Facebook Messenger.
3: Let someone request to talk to a real human.
Sometimes people don’t want to just talk to your bot, sometimes people need to talk to a real human.
4: Analytics.
It’s absolutely crucial that you are able to track the performance of your bot.
5: Feature videos, audio, merchandise, or any type of content.
Want to show off your newest videos or your newest t-shirts? You can do it super easily inside of your bot.
6: Train your bot.
You can actually teach your bot to understand specific words and phrases so that it knows how to respond in the future. Every time you train your bot it gets smarter.
So how do you create a bot? It’s super easy.
I will walk you through it right now.
How To Create A Facebook Messenger Bot
Creating a bot for Facebook Messenger is not only easy to do, it’s actually super fun. There are an infinite number of ways to get creative with it.
I’ll walk you through the process of creating your bot, and then I will help you put together a growth strategy so that you can start building up an audience for your bot.
The bot will only take a few minutes to set up, but you will be able to spend endless hours coming up with new and exciting ways to use it.
1: Create an Account on Octane AI
Click here to start. This is free to do and it only takes a few clicks. Octane AI is used by Maroon 5, 50 Cent, Magic Mike Live, Jason Derulo, and many more. Our partners have 200,000,000+ fans.
2: Choose the Facebook Page you want to add your bot to.
Don’t worry, this won’t turn the bot on quite yet.
3: Write out the description of your bot.
This is what people will see before they start using your bot. It is best if the description is short, sweet, and explains the types of content and experiences your bot will provide.
4: Create your bot’s welcome message.
This is the first message people will receive when they begin a conversation with your bot. It is best for the welcome message to greet the person and encourage them to interact with the bot. When people talk to your bot, they automatically begin following it. You will be able to send mass push notifications to your followers with text, photos, videos, links, and conversational stories called “Convos.”
5: Launch your bot.
Now that your bot has been created, it is time to launch it on your Facebook Page. Click the “Launch Bot” button to push your bot live. Now when people message you on Facebook, instead of those messages going into a black hole, your bot will respond to them with helpful information.
6: Explore other features on Octane AI.
There are many features on Octane AI that you can integrate into your bot. Forms, contests, autoreplies, customer service, merchandise, content, and conversational experiences in the form of “Convos” (these are incredibly powerful when growing your bot’s audience). Explore and have fun!
Now that you have a basic bot setup, it’s time to start getting creative with it. I will show you how to get people to talk to your bot.
Ready to learn how? Let’s do it.
How To Grow Your Bot’s Audience on Facebook Messenger
Yes you can make a bot, yes it’s fun, and yes it’s easy, but WHY would you ever want to make a bot if you couldn’t get real value out of it, right?
Right. But how do you get value out of your bot?
I will tell you right now.
Your bot can be incredibly valuable for two very different reasons:
- Your bot can answer frequently asked questions 24/7 any day of the year.
- Your bot can instantly send push notifications with content, products, and information, to a massive audience in real-time.
Imagine that you could regularly send engaging content, as a mobile push notification, to your entire audience in real time…
To achieve #1, just make sure to fill your bot with content that answers every question you can think of related to your business. Use Convos and the Train Bot functionality to do this.
What I really want to talk about right now though, is #2.
I am going to tell you how to get hundreds, thousands, and even millions of followers for your bot on Facebook Messenger.
Ready?
Click here to read “The Complete Guide to Growing Your Audience on Facebook Messenger”
p.s. I am the CEO of Octane AI and I would absolutely love to hear from you. If you ever want to chat, ping me on Twitter, or of course… you can alwaysmessage my bot.
