A Helpful Bot is a Brand Concierge

Since Facebook announced its Messenger Platform in April, bots seem to have been designated the current “it” technology. Far from a fad, bots have been around for years in different forms — and offer tons of potential for brands and businesses to engage with customers in new ways. But bots are not the end-all of digital experiences — and certainly no replacement for apps or the web. Think of a bot as a virtual concierge, a friendly assistant that can answer your questions and help you get to where you want to go based on the experience you’re looking for.

But before we get too deep, let me explain what I mean by a bot.

Defining bots and how they fit into the world

We like Wikipedia’s definition of “chatbot” as a starting point. Wikipedia defines “chatbot” as “a type of conversational agent, a computer program designed to simulate an intelligent conversation with one or more human users via auditory or textual methods.”

Like the web and mobile apps, bots are just another piece of software — comprised of code and logic. What makes them different from other digital mediums is that bots live within other platforms, including messaging services ranging from Facebook Messenger to Slack. There are plenty of other types of bots and conversational interfaces. You’ve got assistants like Siri and Google Now that live on iOS and Android devices at the operating system level. There are hardware solutions like Amazon Echo (aka Alexa), Google Home, and, even Siri on Apple TV. Bots can also live on websites and even within other mobile apps.

But what has our industry abuzz right now is the opportunity presented by Facebook Messenger and other consumer and enterprise messaging platforms. It’s now easier than ever to have a presence where millions of users are already spending time. (Though as we cover in our new ebook, Good Bot, Bad Bot, it’s almost too easy. There’s plenty you should know before you get started on building your own bot). And it’s here where brands and business have the chance to offer a unique kind of experience to customers — with helpful bots that serve as virtual concierges.

A helpful bot connects people to other mediums

Building a helpful bot for consumer messaging platforms works best when it’s a complementary piece of a digital strategy that includes other channels. These digital denizens can get input and direct users to these other mediums, like apps and the web. As bots and the platforms they’re built on get smarter over time, they can learn about users — and get them to the desired action or result a lot faster. Some examples:

• The NBA’s Facebook Messenger bot, released just before the recent NBA finals between the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers, sent fans videos of top plays during the series. You could search for videos by typing in names of the players. Then, the bot offers a link that takes you to a separate screen to watch videos of those players.

• Weather.com’s Kik bot sends a daily forecast every morning at 7 a.m., and shows current conditions in your area and the opportunity to change your settings — along with links to get more detailed forecasts and information through Weather.com’s website or app.

• H&M’s bot on Kik is interactive, giving you choices and, ostensibly, keeping track of your choices to get to know your personal style. From a brand relationship standpoint, H&M could take its bot — which currently serves as “instant outfit inspiration” — much farther. For example, the ability to save and favorite outfits could help H&M create bot-driven personalized app- or web-based boutiques for users — a great way to increase brand loyalty.

• Media bots like CNN’s and the Wall Street Journal’s Messenger bots push news headlines you can scan — along with links to get the full story on the websites.

Whatever their specialty, consumer bots work together with apps, websites, and the other vehicles brands use to engage with customers at various touch points.

Helpful bots at work

Another place a truly helpful bot adds value and creates efficiency is in the workplace. On group messaging platforms like Slack or Hipchat, enterprise chatbots can easily answer quick questions and send people to the right resource — so employees don’t have to spend time digging or searching for information that could be stored in any number of possible locations. For example:

• A sales rep asks the sales bot to provide the company’s latest forecast data, and it returns a link to the report on the company intranet or a business intelligence dashboard.

• An office worker books a meeting and conference room by pinging a scheduling bot from within a workgroup team’s messaging chatroom.

• A product development team member asks a project bot to give her an update on the status of the latest project ticket.

At ArcTouch, we built a helpful bot for Flowdock, our own group messaging platform, that links to a web app where we track our inventory of mobile devices used for testing. The solution replaced a paper-based system, and now employees can ping the bot to check out and return devices, as well as find out who has what device at any given time. This is just one example of the type of enterprise mobility solutions we help companies with.

A helpful bot offers advice

The reason a hotel concierge comes in so handy is she can answer virtually any question about your hotel stay and the local area. You might want a recommendation for French cuisine, and you also want to know the price range, perhaps, or proximity to the hotel or local landmark. Or a French restaurant that has a kids’ menu.

With a few questions, the concierge can offer advice on the perfect restaurant based on the input you provide. But she doesn’t drive you to the restaurant, take your order, cook the meal, or even serve it. A well-designed bot can spend a bit of time in conversation with you to learn exactly what you want or need — then send you off to get it directly from the source.

The beauty of concierges is that they don’t just provide one kind of information so hotel guests can tick off a single experience during their stay. The same can — and should — be true of bots, which should ultimately be a smart, easy, fun way for your audience to connect with your brand in ways you may not even have imagined yet. Most importantly, they are always helpful. Just like a good concierge.