How chatbots can accelerate trust

Chatbots have become the most common interaction between humans and AI. With the ability to manage everything from internal workflows and document searches to pre-sales conversations and customer service issues, AI-powered chatbots are very attractive assets to modern business leaders. In fact, nearly two-thirds of B2B companies currently use one on their website with the global chatbot market growing to $10B+ in 2026.

Customizing your bot

From speaking personally with hundreds of companies in the market for chatbots, the potential for scope creep is staggering. Companies start out thinking they “just want a bot on their website” but they are quickly faced with a myriad of extensions to the core bot functionality. These include live chat handoff, workflow integration, database connectivity as well as which applications the bot will need to integrate with.

When to build, and when to buy

As the technology becomes more ubiquitous, the decision to build versus buy becomes front and center for established organizations and startups alike. Build is appealing when startups are tight with cash or when larger enterprises have standardized on one particular stack (ex. Microsoft framework). However, most organizations have a patchwork of different applications they use in which case the integrations and workflows become a deciding factor. If there is some proprietary IP tied up in your bot deployment, by all means build it. But for most companies partnering with a vendor is the right path. 

Implementation becomes key in the success of enterprise adoption. Specifically, organizations need to decide which areas are being prioritized up front vs which areas of expansion will come down the road. While companies of all sizes have been raving about the benefits of chatbots in recent years, customer sentiment has led to mixed results with conflicting stats on how much people prefer talking with bots or talking with humans. When implemented correctly, chatbots have the power to transform business operations, but the majority of customers still trust a human over a machine.

This doesn’t have to be the case. Instead of implementing chatbots for new technology’s sake, early-stage startups, small businesses and large enterprises can use AI-powered chatbots to foster trust with their customers by learning from daily interactions and becoming more “human” while still delivering the immediate responses they want.

Chatbots power human-like interactions

People want to have conversations with people, even when they’re actually communicating with a machine. Chatbots allow you to design responses that sound human, and they make it possible to engage in meaningful conversations with every person who visits your website. The more human a chatbot sounds, the more likely a customer will be satisfied with their experience.

Chatbots with a personality are much more engaging than those without one. By no surprise, the AI required for chatbots is focused on natural language processing. In the past, chatbots have struggled with various dialects, slang and jargon. With AI-powered chatbots, however, learning the subtle nuances of language has become simpler than ever. Your chatbot can learn language complexities such as irony, humor and even double entendres through natural language processing—essentially giving it a customized “personality” of its own.

Being able to imitate human interactions while still delivering quick, relevant responses will establish a sense of trust between your business, your chatbot and customers visiting your site.

Chatbots drive personalized conversations

Businesses have realized how important personalization is for end users. Despite this, only 15% of CMOs believe they’re on the right track with personalization. While customer personas have helped identify potential customer profiles in the past, AI-powered chatbots can now create even more personalized experiences for each individual visiting a website. Personalization is a difficult trend to follow without the help of large teams of researchers and marketers. Chatbots, however, continually learn through interactions, and they can keep up with the trends.

While chatbots aren’t a perfect science yet, automation allows them to make less mistakes than some of their human counterparts. Some mistakes humans make when interacting with a customer—lack of knowledge, off-topic questions, impersonal interactions—exist within chatbots, as well. The difference, however, is chatbots can be created, trained and implemented in a far shorter time than it takes to hire and train a new employee. With personalization, AI-powered chatbots will be more dependable and consistent in their actions while still providing a pleasant, personable experience for customers. Also, a chatbot won’t forget to send an email or make other common human errors.

Personalized conversations prove your business is dedicated to building a relationship. When trust is established, customers will have a far better time working with your chatbot and business as a whole.

Chatbots fuel always-on customer support

When it comes to customer service, the beauty of chatbots is they allow for 24/7 support. Customers, at any time of the day or night, weekend or holiday, can receive personalized responses to guide their process and provide necessary information without any human intervention. This is not even a new breakthrough—4 years ago, IBM found that up to 80% of routine customer service questions can be answered by a chatbot. With new AI developments, this number will continue to rise. This matches our own data from Capacity where we’ve seen an average bot answer rate of 90.4% in the first half of 2021.

Chatbots can also work in any way a customer desires. Their versatility helps customers interact with your business through their preferred method. Contacting support is stressful for customers, so catering to your customers’ needs will ease tensions and build trust throughout the process. If a chatbot doesn’t know an answer, the question can be escalated to the appropriate internal team member via a ticket or live chat, and the answer gets added to the knowledge base. Since always-on customer service is here to stay, investing in a chatbot now will save you resources in the future.

Today, chatbots do so much more than just chat. They guide deep conversations, kick off complex workflows, take actions on behalf of your team and escalate requests accordingly. Not to mention, chatbots are incredibly simple to implement, meaning the ability to foster that trust with their customers isn’t a heavy lift for businesses.

With AI-powered chatbots, the communication is always personalized and contextualized. Chatbots are here to stay—and they’re evolving. In 2021, the organizations investing in chatbots will build solid customer relations because of the clear, 24/7 communication chatbots provide. Giving your customers a stable, always-on resource will benefit your business and build their trust in you.