Learn about Social bots
Although its name suggests, a bot is not a robot, but a software which autonomously processes repetitive tasks. For example, web crawlers used by search engine which independently analyze websites, collect data and enable search by keywords. There are also chatbots which can simulate a conversation with a real person via chat interface.
However, now we are going to focus on social bots — algorithms that use artificial intelligence to automate tasks and communicate with people in order to assisting them. They are very sophisticated when it comes to impersonating human interactions.
Even though sound like real persons, they are nothing but accounts that are automated and controlled by code. They pretend to be a regular user with a realistic looking account including name, profile picture, friends, hobbies, posts and so on. How good they can simulate human behavior depends on their intelligence.
Social bots are programmed to independently create posts or tweets and respond to keywords or hashtags. As well, it is possible that the social bot on its own makes friends with other users and follows them.
More intelligent social bot is able to analyze content and communicate like a real person. Thanks to social media we can connect with people anywhere and anytime, but there is not always a human behind each account. Studies estimate that millions of Twitter accounts could be social bots.
Advantages of artificial intelligence and social media bots
Artificial intelligence is already used for automating tasks, analyzing data and improving customer experience and customer service. Business owners and marketers can take advantage of AI using social media bots.
Depending on the platform they are used on, social bots can be programmed to do tasks like answering and sending direct messages, following other users, liking posts and others. Also, they can help build stronger relationships with customers, deliver targeted content and predict user reactions.
Bad side of social media bots
Social bots are found guilty of spreading fake news and hate speech during the controversial political events. They were suspected of manipulating public opinion and discussed as a threat to democracy. As well, the problem is distortion of the social data that is used to make predictions about consumers behavior.
This is significant for companies and brands because it is assumed that social media posts that companies analyze to understand their customers behavior do not come from real users.
Use social media bots for a good reason
It is possible to reach many people in a short time through social media, so why not take advantage of social bots? For example, there are many social bots sharing the current weather, news or different content updates and even warn against earthquakes.
And another example of the positive use of a bot is the Twitter bot which was developed specifically for the EU referendum and the US elections. It had to report the voting results in the real-time by creating and posting graphics.
Use social media bots to boost social media growth
In the field of online marketing, the purpose of social bots is to support marketers to connect with customers successfully. To help you grow your social media page, they can provide real-time customer support and simplifying certain processes.
What can they do more:
· act like customer service agents
· send personalized messages
· answer simple questions
· collect information about customers
· provide real-time reports
Also they can be integrated with email marketing services, deliver personalized content, send traffic to your website and assist in improving conversions.
When something goes wrong using bots
Using social bots is not risk-free. It may happen that social bots can artificially increase the numbers of followers and likes, but it is not helpful as it seems.
If you use them for interaction with users and customers, keep in mind they don’t understand context like humans do.
For example, if they like or retweet posts that do not reflect your brand’s image and so disrupt your credibility and reputation. As well, they might annoy users and waste their time instead of helping them if they are poorly developed.
How to spot a social media bot
Social networks train their algorithms to become better at spotting bot activity but identifying social bots is not easy. Therefore, here are some tips how to spot a social bot.
At first, check the account and see if there are realistic personal information. Then check friends or followers, but those might be also bots so be radical. If you see a lot of similar messages and shared content from the same sources, it is probably a bot. As well, fast responses to various tweets at the same time is suspicious.
Create your own social media bots
You can create basic social bot very easy but you only need programming skills. There are lot of tutorials and even code for free use that could help you. But if you don’t have coding knowledge, don’t worry, buy the ready-made software online.
