Chatbots — keep them talking or shut them down?
Rapid changes in technology are bringing fundamental changes to the world we live in and Chatbots are a major talking point.
What is a Chatbot?
In my opinion…. a computer program that queries a database to give answers to questions without the need for another human to be present.
Now for The Guardian’s version: “Chat bots are computer programs that mimic conversation with people using artificial intelligence. They can transform the way you interact with the internet from a series of self-initiated tasks to a quasi-conversation.”
What makes a Bot Chat?
It’s all about intent! When we communicate with a Chatbot it uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to understand how the words you have used map to a corresponding intent.
Take a regular customer service query “How to I contact customer services?” — the bot uses AI to understand the queries “intent recognition” and then gives the user a selection of responses based on the users intent pattern.
A response of “Please call 0800 or alternatively email chatbot@services.com” would be expected.
Now what happens if we were to introduce Machine Learning ? This allows users the flexibility to ask queries in different ways but still receive the same responses. Due to a Machine Learning algorithms ability to identify the key wording or conversations structures. A great combination if you ask me!
Where are Chatbots being used today?
Many of you will have already interacted with a Chatbot yet you probably don’t realise it.
A good example I recently came across was Sky. When calling Sky’s customer service you are greeted by a Chatbot who asks you why you are calling and you speak your response.
The Chatbot then recognised my response and passed me onto the team who could answer my question.
Another good example is Amazon’s Alexa that comes with the Amazon Echo. My favourite thing about Alexa — she can order pizza just by asking her!
Sounds great but do you need to be a coding genius to set one up?
In short no — take Microsoft’s Azure Bot Service.
You could have your very own Chatbot up and running in under an hour without even having to use any code.
Check out this great article from James Marshall to get started.
What’s to be gained from using a Chatbot?
Many have already implemented Chatbots from MasterCard to Vodafone. Even Travelex have adopted the Facebook Messenger Bot for support services.
Ibenta commissioned Forrester to conduct an interview of its customer’s using its Inebtabot.
The study showed that a composite organization based on all the customers interviewed would experience benefits of $7.1 million over three years compared to costs of $1.4 million. It calculated a net present value (NPV) of $5.6 million with a ROI of 390 percent. (Remarkable if you ask me!)
Before anyone calls it out…
Yes there have been some notorious chatbot hiccups in the past.
Let’s take three of the best known:
When Redmond's finest engineers released Tay (A Chatbot to resemble a 19 year old teenage girl) on Twitter it was meant to be an experiment to see how the bot could interact with Twitter users.
Within 16 hours of release Twitter users had turned Tay from a Bot tweeting innocent tweets to a racist tweeting, sexually charged themes and politically incorrect phrases.
Ashley Madison was in the headlines yet again after it was discovered that it’s source code actually tricked male members into thinking they were getting messages from real females.
The discovery was it was in fact a series of bots rather than females!
When Eric Brown fed Watson the contents of the site Urban Dictionary he thought it would enable Watson do understand phrases such as “OMG".
It wasn’t long before Watson picked up the profanity and sexual innuendos contained in Urban Dictionary and started giving them back in response to queries! (I blame the AI rather than the Chatbot).
Review with a view
Chatbots aren’t going away any time soon and if anything I agree with Oracle’s recent survey findings that Chatbots can enhance customer service and if anything make sales and marketing more effective.
The key for me is like the success of any new technology — education.
Chatbots have the ability to save companies millions but yet a resistance to change could hamper the success of Chatbot technology.
AI coupled with Machine Learning give a Chatbot the ability to become human like but as you can see from the IBM and Microsoft examples you need to build in safeguards ensure the Chatbot doesn’t get caught off guard.
MyMateTech’s Conclusion
There will always be a resistance to Chatbots as people will feel jobs are at risk, in which they are right to assume.
This confirms we as humans need to up our game when it comes to the skills we possess and train for.
Chatbots are a great way of automating repeatable tasks and remove the need for human interaction when our intent is simplistic. So let’s not shut them down.
For now we will always need human interaction alongside a Chatbot as some queries may be too complex for a Chatbot to answer.
Chatbots are here to stay and as they keep chatting, don’t just dismiss them — work out how they could benefit your business!
