September 18, 2020 
With the increasing need to pull ahead of your competitors in the online marketing stratosphere also comes the need to build a chatbot.
Chatbots are the future of digital marketing. Although more developments are still being made, the impact they can have and are already having on some businesses cannot be denied.
Whether you desire to be ahead of your rivals or your priorities are different from that, your business still needs to improve.
There is never a limit to how far a business can grow. This is why you see bigwigs in technology like Google, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft, constantly providing new updates.
Your business needs to constantly strive to match the latest technologies in the market constantly, and there is no better contemporary program to improve your business than chatbots.
As they contribute significantly to a business’s growth, the need to build a chatbot for your business becomes greater.
The need becomes urgent when you discover you are being left out in the market, and more and more companies and businesses are already reaping the benefits chatbots provide.
Before examining what we need to build a chatbot, let us first consider why you need to have one for your business.
Read: What are the Benefits of Chatbots to a Business?
Why Does a Business Need To Build a Chatbot
You may have heard about the wonders chatbots can do, but it is still possible you have not yet known the full extent of their capabilities.
Chatbots will transform your business from small scale to large scale, large scale to national, and national to worldwide.
What if a business is already worldwide? Well, so is Facebook, and they have introduced chatbots since 2016. There are now over 300,000 Facebook Messenger bots in existence.
With the way chatbot usage is increasing, most of us would contact a chatbot at least once before. It may be on Facebook Messenger or through conversations with Alexa.
Siri, Google Assistant, and Alexa are all forms of chatbots, so if you have at one time or the other used any of these, you have been in contact with chatbots at least once.
Although these bots are advanced and use artificial intelligence that is rare, they are still chatbots, and you will agree with me they are interesting to use.
Now imagine incorporating that into your business. You would have successfully given your business the upgrade of the century if AI-Powered chatbots like these respond to your users.
Asides how it completely changes your business outlook and makes it more appealing, there are other reasons you need to build a chatbot for your business.
Here are some of the reasons why you need to build a chatbot:
Customer Satisfaction
Customers are happy when their queries are not only solved but are solved speedily.
Since chatbots offer speed, efficiency, intelligence, and availability, customer satisfaction is guaranteed.
Imagine being available 24/7 to receive customer requests! There is no such thing as closing time with chatbots.
When you are always open, you have already halved the possibilities of new and existing customers patronizing other businesses.
Although you may think there is no problem with your customer service, remember the need to improve. You need chatbots to achieve better customer satisfaction.
It is not rocket science to figure out a happy customer will always come back.
Therefore, this is why companies strive to do all that is within their power to ensure customers are always satisfied.
Well, look no further than chatbots as they will do it, and do it with some aplomb.
A Boost And Improved Reputation
How do you feel when you are responded to quickly and getting the right responses to what you want?
Chatbots oil the wheels of progress of any company that uses them.
Chatbots beautify the communication process and eliminate the annoying situations of an online audience waiting for responses.
In their little but impacting way, chatbots help secure and maintain customers with its timely and effective relational intelligence.
Your reputation increases and becomes better when you constantly satisfy customers.
Huge Boost in Sales
All of the above will eventually lead to an increase in sales.
Chatbots can also set reminders for customers who have not confirmed orders, help you send personalized adverts, book appointments, and many more.
These will, in their ways, increase and boost sales.
These are many more are metrics that show how effective chatbots are to you and your business. All you need do is choose the right metric that suits you.
There are indeed more reasons why you need to build a chatbot, but now it is time to move on to what you need to build one.
Type of Chatbots Available and What We Need To Build Them
There are varieties of chatbots available in the market. Chatbots are different; there are some for simple tasks while there are some for simple and complex tasks like Zebrabuzz and the likes.
Although there is still work being done on developing more bots, the ones in existence presently are classified into two or three major types.
Below are the types of chatbots and tips to consider if you need to build a chatbot.
Scripted or Rule-Based Chatbots
They are also referred to as decision-tree chatbots. From the name, you can almost figure out what they are about.
They have been programmed to follow a pre-defined set of rules, so it is no surprise they are the lot’s un-chattiest.
Chatbots that give you multiple-choice options when you are talking to them are mostly rule-based.
There is no room for customers to ask different or personal questions from those programmed into the bot.
Intellectually Independent Chatbots
This is usually the second and final type of chatbot by most people. However, there are upgrades to chatbots that are just intellectually independent.
Intellectually independent chatbots are an advanced form of decision-tree. They are advanced in that although they are also programmed like any bot is, the can adapt.
These chatbots know how to respond by learning from the keyword inputs of your users and customers. This is done through the use of machine learning.
That is to say that your chatbot begins to learn from users’ keywords by itself and, over time, adapt to them and begin to know how to respond to questions that are similar but structured differently.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) Powered Chatbots
They are also intellectually independent but more advanced. They can simulate conversations like humans. Remember Siri? Alexa? Yes, these are AI-powered.
While the previous two chatbots adhere to set rules and programs, AI-Powered chatbots more or less make their own rules.
AI-Powered chatbots know how to respond because they have Natural Language Processing (NLP), Machine Learning (ML), and Semantic Comprehension.
What You Need to Build A Chatbot
Ask yourself these questions first:
- What type of chatbot do I need?
- What functions should it perform? Should it simulate conversations/engage customers, or execute commands?
- What would be its tone and personality?
To build a chatbot has become relatively easy. Building a chatbot on Facebook Messenger, for example, is straightforward.
However, those kinds of chatbots are simple, almost too simple, and will encounter problems once client queries become complex.
While you can create one for yourself in 10 to 15 minutes, you can also trust chatbot builders to do the job for you.
With various types of chatbots available for any budget, you have all you need to build a chatbot under one tap.
