If you're here, it means you've succumbed to the lure of conversational marketing.
Good for you!
There is hardly a more natural way to provide a personalized online experience 24/7.
But before you get down to creating your first bot, let us share a checklist that everyone should follow when creating a chatbot.
1. Who is it for? (Identify your audience)
Naturally, you first need to know your audience.
This will help you set the overall tone and structure of the conversation you want to deploy and connect more effectively with your audience.
Focus on a specific demographic and consider some or all of the following factors:
Age
Geographic location
Nationality
Gender
Income level
Education level
Marital status
Occupation, etc.
After that, don't forget to also create a psychographic profile of your target audience. Take into account aspects such as:
Personality
Attitude
Interests/Hobbies
Values
Lifestyle
Identifying the target audience of the chatbot will help you in further steps of the creation process, such as defining the language patterns and personality of the bot.
2. Why? (Set a clear goal)
The second item on our checklist is not revolutionary. However, it is a step that will save you a lot of time in the long run. Before you start dragging, dropping, and connecting, define the purpose of the conversation.
What do you want to accomplish?
What problem are you trying to solve?
While there are endless conversational chatbots you can create, they usually fall into one of the two models below:
👩🏫 Informational bot: designed to give your audience a more convenient way to get information.
👨🏻🔧 Utility bot: designed to perform an action or solve a problem, such as completing a registration or filing a complaint.
So, do you want people to register for an event, apply for a job, sign up for a service, learn more about you, or fill out a survey?
Your goal will fundamentally affect the flow of the conversation and the design of the chatbot. If you don't clarify your intentions early on, you could get tangled in a web of constant fixes and replacements 😱.
3. Make a list of the information you want to collect
If one of your goals is to collect information, make a list of the data you need to achieve your goal.
This could be:
factual information (name, age, address, email, job title, company...)
descriptive information in the form of answers to more complex questions (multiple choice or open-ended).
4. Creating the bot's persona and personality
It may not seem like it at first glance, but creating a chatbot persona is the most important step in creating a believable conversational experience.
Why?
While you should never hide the fact that your customers/users are talking to a bot, creating a persona with human characteristics will help you convey a pleasant interactive experience with a personal touch.
So, before you start creating your own chatbot, give it some of these elements:
name
age
shape (human, animal, fantasy creature, superhero, car... )
nationality
hometown
hobbies
main characteristics (good and bad)
maybe pluses to spice things up?
It may seem silly, but this simple exercise will help you choose language and phrases that seem more personal and, ultimately, more fun. Now is the time to unleash your creativity.
Who would your target audience like to talk to?
5. Introduce Yourself
So. You've got your audience, your target, a list of data you need to extract, and a chatbot persona... then let's communicate!
Chat marketing is about presenting information as part of a smooth conversation. Consequently, you can't just pop out of nowhere, requiring people to share their personal information.
Imagine going to a sports equipment store. Now imagine someone asking to see your ID before saying hello or inviting you in. Rude and unacceptable, wouldn't you say? Basically, don't do or ask anything that you wouldn't do or ask when talking to a customer face-to-face.
Start the conversation with a greeting👋 and a brief introduction! This is also a great opportunity to ask the person's name!
6. State your purpose
Explain to your visitors what they can and cannot do. For example, they can ask you for product information but can't make a complaint, they can make a reservation but not order food, or just take a fun quiz, etc.
In other words, make sure customer expectations match the capabilities of your bot.
7. Keep your messages short.
Have you ever gotten one of those rambling, dissertation-like messages from one of your friends on messenger 📝🙄? Have you ever wanted to read it?
How do you create a chatbot that converts? Don't make that mistake again. Make your informational embeds short and sweet. If you have something to say, break it up into 2-3 short messages.
8. Don't just roll into a monologue.
If people wanted to read long snippets of information, they would read your blog or product descriptions.
They turn to your bot because they want the information to be quick and clear. So when you break up information into multiple posts, don't send more than three in a row!
Avoid monologue at all costs!
There are always ways to make the bot more talkative.
9. Use GIFs, Emoji and videos 🤩
Engage and reward customers with GIFs, Emoji and/or videos.
Once upon a time, GIFs and emoji were not part of the spoken business vocabulary, but things have changed. Significantly!
GIFs and Emojis serve as convenient substitutes for facial expressions and hand gestures. Subtle use of these graphic elements will make communication more natural and also more engaging when it comes to online chatting.
Video, on the other hand, is a great way to share a lot of information without overwhelming your customers with essay-worthy messages.
10. Ask direct questions
Always ask direct questions that have only one possible answer (especially if you use a text box).
You may think, "Everybody knows that!"
However, you'd be surprised how easy it is to go astray when creating a chatbot. For example, trying to be extremely polite can get you into a little trouble:
Bot: Could you type in your e-mail?
User: Yes, of course! | Of course... It's ..... | No, I don't mind...| user@gmail.com
As you can see, a simple question can lead to a lot of confusion because only one of these options will be recognized as the correct answer.
So make sure your questions require a clear answer.
Bot: What is your email?
OR
Bot: Please write your email address below👇.
11. Hide the text box when possible
In some cases (such as when asking for opinions), it is important to let people type their responses freely.
But in most cases this can be avoided by introducing interactive choices. This way, the information you collect can remain simple and structured.
In addition, using the interactive option to keep the conversation flowing is faster and more convenient (especially when communicating from a cell phone).
12. Allow people to be human (allow fields to change)
It's perfectly natural for people to make typos. So give them the opportunity to check and correct the information they send.
It's a small extra step that can more than pay off.
13. Use basic features
PuzzleBot is packed with incredible features designed to make your life easier. This applies to any decent chatbot builder on the market.
So, simply put, use them!
For example, if you want potential customers to call you, don't just use PuzzleBot to give them your phone number. They would find that number on their own if that was their intention.
Don't get us wrong, there's nothing wrong with your goal of connecting customers with customer service managers. But do it wisely!
A simple example: you can use a conversational bot as a "filter" to narrow down the customer's questions. Once you figure out what the customer wants, you can send that information to a spreadsheet, calendar, or any other web application to set up an appointment, arrange a phone call, or follow up with the lead via email.
The possibilities are endless!
14. Test
Before launching, don't forget to add the secret ingredient of all worthy "How to Build a Chat Bot" tutorials: test your chat!
Are you using spelling correctly?
Does the flow feel natural?
Are there no dead ends?
Do you feel like the written text is overwhelming at some point?
15. Observe and analyze
Congratulations! 🎉
Your bot is alive and working!
But the work doesn't stop there. PuzzleBot offers great analytics that allow you to see how many people are interacting with your conversational chatbot, and allows you to trace the customer journey.
You can see which conversation options are going best, which ones are being ignored and causing problems.
To create a conversational chatbot, you need to analyze the data and improve the bot as you go along.
Final words...
Developing chatbots is no longer about wading through the swamps of artificial intelligence and untangling the dysfunctional tangle of natural language processing and machine learning.
The magic of simple user experience is attainable. People like you can create conversational interfaces in minutes!
