Interview: Chatbots, A New Opportunity Has Arisen

Georgios Chasiotis hosted me on #SlideTalks, a notable initiative with interviews regarding Digital Marketing trends.

Introduction

For our second #SlideTalk, we have a guest who is a true Chatbots’ master and who can teach us a lot regarding this new trend. His name is Antonis Spyridakis and he is working as a Social Media Executive at Interactive Pro.

He is also a Community manager at Kavala’s (Greece) Startup Weekend. Together, we will try to understand how Chatbots are revolutionizing customer experience and how this new technology could change the way brands communicate with their customers. Thank you in advance for taking the time to read this #SlideTalk.

Q1. Hey Antonis. First of all, we would like to thank you for taking part in our third #SlideTalk. Before we start, tell us a bit about yourself and your professional background.

Hi George! Initially, I would like to thank you for hosting me on #SlideTalk. Well, I am an aspiring Digital Marketer passionate about new technologies (aka Artificial Intelligence & Chatbots), startup ecosystems (currently organized Startup Weekend Kavala & Startup Weekend Heraklion) & entrepreneurship. I am currently working in Prague as a Social Media Executive at Interactive Pro, a British online education platform that delivers outstanding educational outcomes.

Q2. To begin with, what is your definition of a Chatbot?

In my personal opinion, Chatbots are the smart game changers of personalized customer service, they are able to meet the customers where they “live” by providing a personalized chat experience. Chatbots have the ability to interact in real time with customers in Messaging platforms like Messenger, WhatsApp, Twitter, Telegram and Slack. Chatbots can help a business stand out, create new opportunities, to transform repeat customers into influential advocates.

Q3. What steps do you usually follow when designing a Chatbot?

Well, very good question. I have already started designing my own Resume chatbot. I could talk about the steps, I have followed for my Resume bot. First, I found the most important features for the bot. When you start building a chatbot you need to choose the most important features carefully. After, I determined my target audience and the channel. In my case, the target audience is recruiters and potential partners who want to learn more about me and my personal work. I’ll connect this bot to my personal Facebook page. You need to determine the channels and our target audience for a successful bot. The next step I am going to implement for my chatbot is the definition of the personality. Many chatbot experts claim that personality is the new User Experience. After that, I need to find out the platform for building the bot. There are many platforms out there. I suggest Chatfuel where anyone can build a bot without coding within 10 minutes. The last step is testing! Test the chatbot with a bunch of friends or loyal customers. You can optimize some features after testing.

Q4. In your experience, what is the most important feature in a Chatbot?

The most important feature of a chatbot is the personality. As I told before, personality is the new user experience. User experience is a powerful strategy for creating more customers.

Q5. How measurable UX success is when it comes to Chatbots?

We need to measure how usable the bot was for the user, how long takes to users to complete a task like to order food through tour bot. We could measure all of these things through a cool platform called uxpro.be. They claim that they measure UX success by analyzing user performance and satisfaction.

Q6. Could you give us an example of a successful Chatbot that you are aware of; what are its main features?

H&M has launched a functional Chatbot for its customers. This Chatbot has taught to speak in the voice of the H&M customer. I like the fact that the bot makes a good use of images and buttons by making the customer experience better. Customers are able to find each product of H&M, purchase and share the products with their friends.

Q7. More and more advertisers nowadays use Messenger as an ads destination. What’s your opinion on this new trend?

To be honest, I haven’t tried this trend. I have read some case studies. I have heard that you can target customers who have interacted with your page in the past or to target potential customers via Messenger. Actually, I am not a big fan of this tactic.

Q8. How close would you say that Chatbots and AI are?

Actually, they are really close. Artificial Intelligence has the ability to detect content and context, questions of customers and giving back answers through the chatbots. “Intelligent” chatbots are AI-powered.

Q9. How important do you think that personalization is when it comes to Chatbots? What tactics do you usually use regarding this matter?

Nowadays consumers are expecting highly personalized experiences. Personalization when it comes to Chatbots is very important. Imagine a bot that is able to offer the ultimate custom-tailored service or recommendations. Then the customer will spend more. According to Forbes, personalization drives impulse purchases, leads to increased revenue, leads to loyalty as well. Through a Chatbot, we can gather data about our customers. By using these data in an efficient way we can deliver a personalized experience.

Q10. Would you say that automation can harm personalization and how can we balance those two variables?

Definitely. As I said before consumers are expecting highly personalized experiences. In my opinion, automation is a bad “enemy” for personalization. All right, automation saves time and reaches a high volume of customers but there is no human contact. On the other hand, personalization provides customer service, individual attention and increases chances or repeat business. We could combine these characteristics to balance these variables.

Q11. Do you think that in the near future there could be a different use of Chatbots and what would that be?

Chatbots are going to replace customer service departments in the near future. Customers by 2020 will have more conversations with chatbots regarding customer service. In fact, 85% of customer interactions will be managed without a human by 2020 and Chatbots are also expected to be the no.1 consumer applications according to TechEmergence.

Q12. In most cases, would you say that users are aware of talking to a Chatbot and how could developers prevent that from happening?

Yes, that’s true. For instance, when a bot responds fast or repeats the same message, either use a bad syntax. Developers could make it behave like a human with human reactions and human language.

Q13. In your experience, can a not well-designed Chatbot harm a company’s online presence? Could you provide us with some examples?

A poorly designed Chatbot can harm a company’s online presence. Imagine a bot that is not able to answer even the simplest questions or to misunderstand what customers are asking for. If it happens the customers will “run” away. Every Chatbot should offer the best user experience to potential and current customers.

Q14. What would be your advice to a company that plans to design its own Chatbot?

Initially, they should write down and reply some questions. For instance, what are our goals through this bot? (lead traffic to our website? make an efficient customer service? Customer personalization? boost conversion?). They need to conduct a research regarding Messaging platforms. I have noticed that many companies are launching bots in each Messaging platform but without results. We need to detect where our target audience “lives”. They also need to design a personality related to their customers (like H&M’S example). Conversational design is important for creating successful bots.

Q15. Tell us one of your favorite quotes!

I’d like to share with you a quote related to Chatbots.

“Customer service emotion first, information second”. ~Jay Baer