5 Ways Chatbots Can Improve Workflows in the ‘New Normal’

The evolution of consumer behaviors and expectations never stops. As they become more sophisticated, today’s consumers expect a certain level of interactivity with the brands they deal with, whether it’s a compliment, concern, complaint, or question via social media, or the ability to quickly reach out to a member of the customer support team.

This phenomenon is partly responsible for the rise of chatbots. Bots, by definition, carry out repetitive automated tasks, and in this case they can deliver a personalized content experience, answer common customer service FAQs, and streamline product purchases. A look at the numbers indicates the chatbot sector is poised for remarkable growth. One market research companyOpens a new window says the global chatbot Opens a new window market was valued at $1.17 billion in 2018, but that it will skyrocket more than 800% to $10.08 billion in 2026.

Chatbots are particularly valuable under this new paradigm of ultra-high consumer expectations, as they’re a way for organizations to significantly improve the overall customer experience. They offer a number of workflow-related benefits to organizations that deploy them as well, such as:

1. They Increase Conversational Rates

In today’s everything-on-demand landscape, consumers want instant gratification. By using AI technology for conversational marketing, businesses can automate routine processes to engage with and assist customers more effectively, giving them an improved overall experience. When used for customer support, AI chatbotsOpens a new window reduce the amount of time organizations need to invest in what can be a mundane task, while bots equipped with natural language processing capabilities can initiate conversations with customers to assist them.

Industry studies say chatbots can answer roughly 80%Opens a new window of standard questions, and they’re also useful in gathering huge volumes of customer data across various channels and translating it into useful information and business insights that further helps personalize customer experience.

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2. They Eliminate Time-Consuming Search Strings

While chatbots are adept at improving the experience for customers, they can improve the employee experience as well.

Take simple web searches as an example. Performing a search on Google Opens a new window or any other search engine can deliver results that may be irrelevant or otherwise useless to employees. One of the search engines’ most glaring limitations is their dependency on keywords and phrases that attempt to translate thoughts from individual humans into something machines can understand.

Chatbots have the potential to change the way employees across an organization seek information. Instead of listing hundreds of results, specialized chatbots in different domains can do the legwork for employees, thereby eliminating the need to search in the first place.

3. They Help Organizations Gather and Maintain Customer Insights

As chatbots interact with customers to deliver as seamless an experience as possible, the can also gather insights on customers and analyze variables such as purchasing patterns and habits. By monitoring customers’ patterns, businesses can learn more about the products and services individual customers prefer. They can also gain visibility into key areas such as common problems or issues with specific products or services, and then make the appropriate adjustments on the fly.

Chatbots can also store and analyze information on the types of questions they are commonly asked. This makes the chatbot better equipped to answer future questions and upsell additional products while giving decision-makers Opens a new window a better understanding of what their customers need to know to complete a purchase. With this information, organizations are better equipped to market effectively.

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4. They Automatically Push Out Valuable Notifications

AI-powered chatbots can intelligently predict customer behavior, allowing them to push appropriate notifications to the right people at the right time. This sort of timely communication is a powerful marketing tool that helps businesses reach and retain customers.

Generally, there are two types of push notifications that are most common and most effective in engaging with consumers. The first is notifications on product updates. Chatbots Opens a new window can send customers messages about new product features, bug fixes, maintenance updates, or product usage statistics. In addition, businesses can utilize notifications on promotions. Chatbots can push out advertisements, discounts, deals, and sponsored messages to engage customers and get them to take action.

5. They Automate Everyday Workflows

Chatbot automation considerably reduces the time businesses need to invest in repetitive tasks such as pulling leads or parsing and processing data. With chatbots, organizations can streamline a variety of business processes across all of their departments and teams. Instead of employees spending a significant part of their day completing routine yet essential tasks, chatbots can do it automatically and give teams more time to focus on revenue-generating activities, the type of work that is typically more rewarding for employees.

Chatbots give businesses a multitude of possibilities, and the technology will only continue to improve. It’s one example of how AI can give any business the potential to succeed. As always, those who embrace the technology and use it most shrewdly will be the ones that come out ahead.

When it comes to chatbots specifically, they are a proven way to improve the experience for customers, and more businesses are beginning to realize they can help streamline day-to-day workflows.

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