Chatbots have quietly undergone a major transformation. When chatbots became popular in 2016, they were awkward, inefficient, and clumsy. With limited functionality, these chatbots were initially more of a hindrance than a virtual assistant.
But with the development and advancement of artificial intelligence, chatbots have made a strong comeback. Intuitive, seamless, and with a greater capacity to problem solve, AI chatbots are an invaluable addition to any customer-centric business.
Ramping up customer experience is one of the key ways to differentiate yourself from any other business in the market. Improving customer experience has a positive impact on loyalty, retention, sales, and growth.
One area of customer experience (CX) that businesses can focus on is improving self-help troubleshooting, and this is where AI chatbots really shine. Read on to find out more:
With the vast improvements in chatbots, customers are positively responding to the improved customer experience. In fact, 70% of Millennial shoppers find that chatbots can save businesses up to 30% on customer service operation costs.
What is a Chatbot?
Chatbots, for the unfamiliar, are computer programs designed to interact with humans in a conversational way. As such, they’re commonly used for straightforward tasks like making a reservation, searching knowledge bases, connecting users with the best team to speak to about a question, or even taking care of simple customer service tasks completely.
Chatbots can be used for other types of customer interactions too—for example, generating leads, upselling, cart abandonment reminders, administering CSAT surveys, and so on.
With so many use cases, there are numerous ways chatbots can be implemented into your process—but how do they help the customer? This article outlines five important ways chatbots can help you improve customer experiences.
Enhancing Speed and Responsiveness
One of the clearest benefits of using chatbots is that they enhance speed and responsiveness. These are critical metrics that customers consider important when evaluating the customer experience. Listening to endless elevator music while on hold waiting for support is actually one of the quickest ways to frustrate customers.
When customers contact a business with queries or in need of support, they expect to receive it within a reasonable timeframe. This is a critical element of the customer experience, and impacts a consumer’s perception of a business or brand. Being able to self-solve an issue immediately, will always outweigh having to spend an indeterminate amount of time waiting for assistance from a call center, or a response to an email.
53% of customers indicate that speed in customer service and support is critical. Using chatbots brings the efficiency aspect to the customer experience journey, with the ability to service thousands of customers simultaneously. They’re also available at all hours and provide instant responses and solutions.
If an issue progresses past the level of help a chatbot can provide, then queries get passed on to human agents. This can help customer experience teams better allocate human resources and stay abreast of emerging issues, like software bugs.
How to Use AI Chatbots to Boost Customer Experience
While AI chatbots are getting better at responding to questions, guiding users through troubleshooting steps, and assisting with various tasks, CX teams will still need humans. Touched on earlier, but it deserves a stand-alone mention.
Using chatbots to solve basic to intermediate queries allows teams to focus on the more advanced issues that customers face. WIth AI, CX team leads can analyze frequent complaints and queries. If, for example, they notice a high volume of queries regarding the returns or refund process, they can notify the marketing team to put out more information about this in post-purchase emails and social media messages.
Using chatbots streamlines CX processes, allowing businesses to proactively address customer needs.
Providing a Personalized Service
At first glance, speed may seem like the most important feature in customer experience, but consumers aren’t just looking for 24/7 rapid-fire responses. Hubspot confirmed that for 59% of customers, personalization is high up on their list of priorities.
Consumers don’t want to feel like an invisible number; they’re parting with their money and want to be seen as a valued customer. Brands and businesses that can create a personalized customer journey from the onset are able to differentiate themselves from competitors.
When you’re at the initial stages of a business, it may be possible to keep up with your customer base and personalize interactions – startups are no strangers to bootstrapping! Once your business grows, however, maintaining personalization at scale requires help, and AI is a great tool to use. AI chatbots can:
Collect and use customer data to provide personalized customer service and experience
Provide customized product recommendations based on searches and sales patterns
Ask questions of customers to identify new customer data and actions
Going a step further, businesses can initiate personalization from the onset, by connecting chatbots with CRM tools. This will allow you to analyze relevant customer data like purchase history, buying behavior, and details about the customer’s demographics.
Improving Accuracy and Consistency
Okay, touching previously on the importance of speed and personalization, let’s run through the benefits of AI chatbots addressing a number of customer experience expectations. It can be frustrating to receive inconsistent and inaccurate information as a customer, and it can be detrimental to a business.
76% of customers say they’ve received conflicting answers after speaking to multiple agents, and 87% of customers experience frustration at having to repeat themselves numerous times to different agents.
This is yet another area where chatbots can help improve your customer service—since chatbots are automated and draw answers from a specific knowledge base, they can ensure a consistent customer experience across all your channels. In addition, they can reduce errors and inconsistencies in customer interactions.
If you’re using virtual agents alongside human agents, that can also increase consistency. Rather than having human agents searching knowledge bases for solutions or relying on their memory of the policies from the last time they dealt with a specific problem; a chatbot can quickly search the knowledge base for them and bring up the most up-to-date solutions and policies.
Empowering Self-Service
Does self-service really impact customer service? The data says, yes:
– 75% of consumers say that self-service offers a convenient way to find answers to their questions.
– 67% prefer to get help independently (through self-service) rather than speaking with a human agent.
– 77% report they hold brands in higher regard if they offer self-service options.
By enabling customers to access assistance more quickly, self-service options satisfy the growing need for speed, boost customer satisfaction, and can even help drive sales. Chatbots are a key enabler here, providing an intuitive way for customers to navigate self-service solutions.
Whether by directing customers to FAQ resources, answering questions in real-time, or helping with simple transactions, chatbots empower customers to find the information they need without waiting for an agent.
Many companies have successfully implemented chatbots for tasks like completing basic transactions, self-checkout at grocery stores, initiating a return, upgrading a subscription, regaining account access, and more.
In-store scanners, for instance, allow customers to check prices, locate items, and access other essential details. While these interactions may not feel “robotic,” AI and chatbots are driving self-service throughout the customer journey. The more companies enable customers to resolve issues on their own, the more seamless and effective the customer experience becomes.
Offering Scalability and Cost Savings
Finally, implementing AI chatbots is a great way to increase your scalability and cost savings. This is a more abstract, indirect benefit for customer experience, in that:
Businesses can allocate resources to other areas by reducing costs through AI chatbots
Enhancing scalability reduces wait times and improves customer service
At scale, businesses are able to grow, without losing the personal touch
During busy seasons and high volumes of customer complaints and queries (e.g. the holiday shopping season), businesses are able to manage the influx of messages
All of these are solutions that a chatbot can help make possible. These tools help businesses reduce the number of human representatives needed, lower customer service costs, and increase financial capacity in the organizational budget for new tools, improve data analysis or allow for better service overall.
Gearing up for the festive season shopping period is an incredibly busy time for businesses. Beyond managing stock, extended shopping times, and last-mile delivery challenges, there is the added pressure of customer queries, which increase by up to 75%.
Automation and AI chatbots are key to managing the high volume of customer interactions and providing a seamless customer experience, regardless of where they are in the sales funnel. These seasons are a stress-test for chatbots’ ability to enhance both scalability and cost-savings; they can handle multiple conversations simultaneously, and prevent the hiring of additional support staff during these months.
Concluding Thoughts
AI chatbots are revolutionizing customer experience by delivering quick, scalable, and personalized support. They’re essential in today’s CX landscape. Chatbots handle multiple tasks, from simple queries and reservations to more complex actions like lead generation, personalized product recommendation, and self-help services.
Available 24/7, chatbots enhance service speed and responsiveness, allowing customers to resolve issues instantly and freeing human agents for complex cases.
Integrated with CRM systems, chatbots offer personalized support based on user data. They also provide consistency by accessing up-to-date information from knowledge bases, ensuring accurate responses across all channels.
Businesses benefit from cost savings and scalability, making AI chatbots a key investment in modern customer engagement.
The customer of today wants to feel valued and seen. A seamless, personalized CX journey through the sales funnel can be achieved with the help of AI chatbots.
