In the digital age, consumers want to connect with a company as soon as they come across their website. 44% of B2B consumers say the main reason they abandon websites is because there’s no contact info immediately visible. What better way to connect than with a chatbot?
22% (11 out of 50) of the fastest-growing B2B companies have a live chat widget on their website.
What is a chatbot?
A chatbot is exactly what you imagine; AI created and tied into your website to facilitate conversations with visitors.
Whether you use it as a help feature, for sales leads, or for FAQs, a chatbot can add immeasurable value to your website.
How is it used?
The majority of chatbots are used for customer service, lead generation, and information facilitation.
Using a bot for CS and information can be as simple as answering your FAQs and connecting a user to a representative to assist with more difficult questions. In a survey, the biggest benefits of using a chatbot included:
- 64% – the top benefit is the ability to get 24-hour service
- 55% – getting instant responses to inquiries
- 55% – getting answers to simple questions
If you choose to use a chatbot for sales, the bot can help you gather customer information and connect them immediately to a representative that can facilitate the process. It helps the customer reach your business more quickly and increases your conversion rate.
Why would it be useful to my company?
Since chatbots are often used as customer service tools, they can assist in answering questions and providing solutions to a customer’s problem. This is especially useful after hours, to provide 24-hour support. If a client has a problem, they can get an answer right when they need it. They can also be configured to respond in any language. Both of these features make having a chatbot valuable to businesses with international clients.
Since chatbots are built to answer a high volume of questions in a short amount of time, it will even help increase your customer service efficiency and customer satisfaction.
They are also a great way to engage website visitors and grab their attention before they leave, encouraging them to move through your sales funnel.
How are we using it?
We use HubSpot as our CRM, which offers a chatbot feature we integrated with our website. We have ours focused on a sales-based approach, providing an instant connection to visitors where questions can be answered by a team member within minutes.
The most important thing about chatbots to remember is they are there to help, not impede. You want to make sure it is easy to click out of the chat if users don’t want to use it, doesn’t appear too frequently, and is easy to access if they change their mind.
Ours is set to pop up only on certain pages after a certain amount of time spent on the site, but is easily accessible by a small chat icon in the bottom right corner of the page.
Here is how our chatbot appears:
Want to learn more about chatbots and how we use them? Contact us to find out.
