You’ve heard all about why customers love chatbots. Their speed and consistency of response, the fact that chatbots never sleep, and their ability to look up information quickly all make them a great experience. But you might not know how chatbots benefit eCommerce businesses. As much as customers love chatbots, eCommerce businesses love them too. You can use chatbots to cut costs, figure out where to upsell, and much more. Today we’ll take a look at how.
1. Chatbots help with branding
Yes! They absolutely do. And that’s why brands must avoid creating an annoying chatbot. Nobody wants the term ‘frustration’ associated with their brand. Think about the personality of a chatbot, which is an extension of a brand and creates the customer’s first impression of the company. Personality is defined by the chatbot’s avatar, the way it greets customers, and what kinds of questions it asks and answers. Having the chatbot answer simple questions is a crowd-pleaser – 74% of users prefer chatbots while looking for answers to simple questions.
2. Chatbots let customer support focus their energy on more challenging questions
When brands automate the answers to simple questions through chatbots, they free up more time for customer support agents. The agents can use this time to study and become more skilled for difficult to answer questions. And they can also put more effort into quality responses to tough problems that customers bring to them. 64% of customer support agents who use AI chatbots can spend most of their time solving complex cases.
3. Chatbots help eCommerce businesses analyze customer data
Businesses can set up analytics for their chatbots to see how well they do with customers. You can check chatbot ratings for discussions, see if they generate sales, and learn how customers engage. This information can improve the chatbot’s interaction and help brands make better choices about what to sell to the customers during the conversation. You can also use chatbots to track customer purchasing patterns and customer information. 57% of executives said that chatbots bring significant ROI with minimal effort.
4. Chatbots improve customer acquisition and retention
Companies can use the instant response-ability of chatbots to help customers who are ready to buy right now. Rather than having the customer wait to have simple questions answered about a purchase, the chatbot can answer the questions and then guide the customer by placing their order. 54% of executives expect to use chatbots to help customers make their purchases.
5. Chatbots have a wide range of uses
Some great uses for chatbots include customer service, where the chatbot answers simple support questions, and marketing, which provides information about products and services you provide. Other uses include sales, IT service, and even internal use for activities like onboarding new employees.
6. Chatbots increase the speed for support resolution
Because chatbots never sleep and provide consistent answers, their results can be outstanding when answering simple support questions. They are so effective at helping customers with basic support issues that 90% of businesses report considerable improvements in the speed of complaint resolution.
These are some of the many reasons businesses love chatbots. But chatbots also provide value to your customers. 69% of consumers prefer to use chatbots because they deliver quick answers to simple questions.
7. Chatbots never sleep (well, unless you turn them off)
Just like businesses, customers love chatbots because they provide round-the-clock help. According to thechatbot.net, 64% of customers say 24-hour service is the best feature of chatbots. Instead of having a canned response on their site that says ‘come back at 8 a.m EST,’ brands can let their chatbot handle customer questions, then fall back to a support email if the chatbot cannot answer the question. If using the chatbot during business hours, an excellent service to offer is the option to be handed off to a human agent.
8. Chatbots can be personalized
If customers log in to your site, or the chatbot can see who the customer is, you can create a chatbot that can suggest information tailored to the customer. Even just saying the customer’s name can make an impact. Or maybe the chatbot can see that the customer purchased Product A. Then it can offer to help with common problems customers have with that product or provide complementary services that go with Product A. According to HubSpot, 40% of buyers don’t care if they are served by a bot or a human agent as long as they get the support they need.
9. Chatbots can improve your omnichannel experience
When businesses include chatbots in an omnichannel experience, they can increase customer satisfaction. Rather than waiting on hold for a human agent, customers can start working to resolve their problem with the chatbot. If the chatbot can’t fix it, the customer can be transferred to a human agent, along with all the information needed to handle the issue. You’ll be surprised to learn that 65% of customers feel comfortable handling a problem without a human agent. They just want their questions answered as quickly as possible.
10. Chatbots provide consistent answers
While not done on purpose – when customer service representatives are new, they’re more likely to make a mistake or not know the answer to a question. A chatbot will answer the same question the same way every time because that’s what it’s programmed to do. This relief can help during the onboarding and training of new agents. Customers, just like e-commerce businesses, appreciate consistency.
11. Chatbots respond instantly
Customers love quick responses. One minor downside to a human-only service is that sometimes support agents will be busy. Chatbots are always ready to answer a customer. Response speed is critical to a company’s image and brand – 82% of customers feel this way.
12. Chatbots provide more seamless transactions when looking up data
Setting up chatbots with access to certain records can offer customers a more seamless experience. The chatbot can quickly pull up the necessary information instead of the customer waiting while someone looks something up.
13. Chatbots are great for younger generations
Millennials and younger generations prefer to handle support issues by themselves. So chatbots are a great way to appeal to this customer base. Forbes says 60% of millennials have used chatbots, with 70% saying they had a positive experience.
Regarding the last point, when it comes to engaging Millennial and Gen-Z customers, chatbots have a strong appeal. They are great for brands who want to target a younger customer base because:
14. Millennials prefer text-based communication
Over and over, we see that Millennials would rather text or send a quick message than call. One report found that 88% of Millennials would rather text than call. This makes chatbots perfect for this generation. Instead of engaging with a phone call, they can type to a chatbot to solve their problems.
15. Millennials like solving customer support problems on their own
Yes, that is correct! Unlike previous generations who don’t want to read the documentation, they just want a person to explain things; Millennials would prefer to find answers themselves. SEND IN THE CHATBOTS! Because chatbots aren’t actual humans, millennials include them as part of self-service support. Millennials are all for it if a chatbot can guide them to the correct document to help them or directly answer their question. 69% of Millennials say they feel good about themselves if they can resolve a problem without talking to customer service.
16. Millennials view a brand more favorably if they respond to social media comments
If you don’t provide good customer service, Millennials will complain loudly on social media. However, if you respond to Millennials on social media, 74% say their perception of a brand improves. It can be hard to keep up if you have many social media channels, but not if you send in the chatbots! Chatbots can provide immediate responses on social media and alert humans to comments that need attention. Users might not even realize they’re conversing with a chatbot at first!
As you can see, nearly everyone loves chatbots. And for good reason! They make the customer experience more frictionless and enjoyable. They also lighten the load for support agents and allow those agents to focus on the more complex support cases.
If you want to give a chatbot a try, Mitto is here to help. We’ll walk you through every step it takes to create the perfect chatbot for your organization. To begin reaping the benefits of chatbots today, shoot us a text at (424) 653-3380, and we’ll get you started!
