How a “Chatbot” will help you win more deals
Bob, your sales prospect, calls and leaves a frantic voicemail: “Hey Nick, I got your quote. I’m about to present this to our CIO for approval but I really need that security data sheet really quick! I hope you can call me back in the next 5 minutes!”
You’re on conference call, and missed Bob’s message.
Now imagine a computer assistant automatically responding and helping out? You’re probably saying “no way, sales is too complex for that”? Think about the following scenario:
What if your personal computer assistant, that’s really a chatbot (a software robot) could produce the following results:
1) The chatbot recognizes the caller ID, cross references your phone’s address book and contact list in Salesforce.com (or any CRM) and pulls the caller’s contact data.
2) The chatbot then searches your emails that you’ve exchanged with Bob, and finds your quote and subsequently discovers that the quote is product XYZ that’s been discussed.
3) The chatbot then searches your corporate website, YouTube, and your intranet (i.e., SharePoint, Box.com, salesforce.com), and finds two security data sheets and one security video that was not previously sent to Bob.
4) The chatbot then texts you via your favorite messaging app (SMS, Slack, Skype, Intellinote): “Hi Nick, Bob just left you a voicemail that he’s looking for more information about XYZ as it pertains to security. Here are two documents and one video I found about security related to XYZ product. Would you like me to send these to him?”
5) Nick texts back to the chatbot, “Send Bob the first document only.”
6) Seconds later, Bob receives an email from you containing the security data sheet you instructed the chatbot to send.
This scenario is becoming reality right now and is something we’ve been beta testing at Illumineto for the last few months.
“Chatbots will fundamentally revolutionize how computing is experienced by everybody.” — Satya Nadella, Microsoft’s CEO, July, 2016
Mr Nadella’s is not overstating, and I can give you a long list of prominent CEOs that are saying the same thing.
Earlier this month I gave a presentation at a technical Meetup about chatbots. If you aren’t familiar with the term, I don’t blame you. Spell checkers aren’t familiar either and MS Word is complaining to me right now that I’ve spelled something wrong ☺. Chatbots are the latest craze in Silicon Valley. They are revolutionizing productivity (in every industry) and we’re excited to be building a chatbot at Illumineto.
Here’s some quick background.
The concept of robots has been around for decades, and when you think of robots, the idea of R2D2 or the Terminator may come to mind. But these are physical robots. Now think of a virtual robot, one that just “chats” with you, or “chatbots” for short. In recent years, we can refer to IBM Watson playing (and winning) on Jeopardy, or Siri, providing you with a current weather forecast.
We are now also seeing businesses start to utilize chatbots, not only for customer service, but also for sales.
Here’s an example from Realtor.com on how information is gathered today. Below is their online form to rent an apartment. If I want an apartment with a pool, a nice water view, and a carport, my form would be complex to fill out, and extremely challenging if I were on a mobile device:
But instead, what if I just typed in a message window:
“I’m looking to rent a 2-bedroom apartment, with a pool and a nice water view. Oh, and I want a carport”?
Using a chatbot, Realtor.com could return the same results as if I filled out the manual form in the above example. This improved user experience will greatly enhance my engagement with Realtor.com, and help me quickly find what I need.
This approach could revolutionize the user’s online experience.
There are three major current events that are converging to make chatbots a revolution in the computing experience for every business, both large and small.
The first is the commoditization of Artificial Intelligence (AI). What? AI, like IBM Watson is for Fortune 1000 companies, right? Not anymore. Consumers and businesses alike can use AI right now — even for free to get started. For instance, you’re a small business restaurant that is extremely busy on weekends with people calling in. You’re so busy that you are losing some customers that are waiting to call in. What if you had a chatbot to answer the line?
“What would you like to order?”
“I’d like a pepperoni pizza”
“Ok, what size would you like?”
{… conversation continues from there …}
The second major event is that EVERYONE is using chat applications now, like Skype, Slack, Google Hangouts, WhatsApp, just to name a few. In fact, studies have shown that people are spending MORE time now in messaging applications than leading social networks!
“People are now spending more time in messaging apps than in social media and that is a huge turning point. Messaging apps are the platforms of the future and bots will be how their users access all sorts of services.” — Peter Rojas, Entrepreneur in Residence at Betaworks
In the past, websites were the first step in getting information to the customer. Shortly after that, custom mobile apps were created to reach an even larger base of users. This led to a tectonic shift; businesses are now interacting with customers and employees not only where they work, but also where they spend their time (in messaging apps). I bet many of you use some type of messaging application and it’s open on your computer right now, right? Your staff, your manager, and even some of your customers can reach you through that app, right? Now imagine that instead of you having to answer each and every comment or question that comes in, your personal chatbot helps you answer those questions (especially when you aren’t at your desk)!
The third major change we’ve been seeing in the last few years is the shift in usage from desktop to mobile device. The fact is, your customers and employees are spending more time on their phones and tablets than on desktops. Let’s specifically focus on your sales team. You most likely want them on the road versus behind a desk.
These three events — (1) artificial intelligence, (2) people using email and messaging apps more than social media, and (3) higher utilization of mobile devices have all converged. People are living on mobile devices and using messaging apps (and email) more and more. If your business isn’t already doing this, your business needs to be interfacing with your customers and employees through these messaging apps.
To most businesses, the idea of leveraging this technology for their own use feels out of reach. IBM is only for the Fortune 1000s, right? In the last year, there’s been an explosion in the commoditization of AI and tools to allow small businesses to achieve this capability. I recently spoke to a company that’s building their own custom chatbot just to reduce their internal IT helpdesk burden.
So what’s Illumineto doing?
Studies have shown that sales reps can spend hours trying to find the right content for their customers, but must search in a wide range of locations. So we built connectors to lots of locations where data is stored — like your email, Dropbox, Google Drive, websites, YouTube, etc., to make it incredibly easy for sales reps to find information from one central location: Illumineto Spark.
And now we’ve extended that capability to support a chat interface, allowing users to stay in their favorite messaging app. For example, a sales rep can be in Slack, Facebook Messenger, or even SMS (text message) our product, and Illumineto will help them instantly find that content, no matter where it exists. As to our original story, we’re experimenting now pre-emptively searching for content based on your emails coming in, your voicemails, etc.
I’ve spent my life in the B2B sales world. I don’t think a chatbot is going to replace a B2B sales professional, but I do think they can be incredible sales admins to automate many of the manual tasks sales reps dislike. So, back to the beginning of this post and how Illumineto can help you — we now allow you to quickly respond to any customer’s inquiry, even while you are out of the office and only have your mobile device with you.
We’re testing this capability with a BETA and it’s exciting to see the potential.
Here’s a short video of the Illumineto Spark chatbot BETA in action.
If you want to learn more, here are a few options:
a) To sign up to test this new capability at Illumineto, please send me an email at support@illumineto.com.
b) We’ve had requests to present about chatbots at conferences and we’d love to share our experiences. Please contact us at marketing@illumineto.com.
c) If you need some technical help in setting up your own chatbot, let us know? We’re having so much fun building our own, we may want to help you too.
What are we missing?
Do you have any other ideas for how a chatbot could be helpful to you as a sales professional (or any profession)? Please let us know in the comments below.
Thanks!
This was written by Founder Nick Caruso of Illumineto; originally posted to LinkedIn on 11/8/16.
