Chatbots are very popular now, especially in instant messengers and social networks - read, for example, how to create a bot for VKontakte. With the help of bots, they order food, buy tickets, choose clothes and do much, much more. You can create your own chatbot even without being a programmer: there are dozens of platforms and tools that automate the process (there are links to them at the end of the collection).
However, one of the key factors in the success (or failure) of your product is UX, which means you need to think about a quality user experience. We offer you a selection of tips to follow when designing bots, both personal and corporate.
Basics
Choose a specialization
No need to try to please everyone and collect many different functions, nothing good will come of it. Determine specific functionality, topics and audience - concentrate on them.
Create a personality
Avatar, vocabulary, a set of emoticons, the tone of communication, and in general any components of the interface of your bot, focus on the audience and the task that you have chosen. At the same time, the user must know that he is communicating with the robot - do not try to deceive and pass off the bot as a person. But for comfortable interaction, the bot must still imitate some human qualities.
Write a list of required features
What information is most likely to be needed by anyone who is going to use your bot? What are the main actions the bot will perform? To display help, it is recommended to use traditional commands for the platform - for example, /help in Telegram.
Keep it safe
Your bot must be protected from potential attacks, especially if it is already integrated with CRM, internal servers or other important systems.
Think over the logic of communication
Create a script tree
You need to take into account all possible options for developing a dialogue with the user: from the most unsuccessful to the successful ones. An example can be found on the Chatbots Magazine website.
Tell me where to start
Chatbots are not yet intuitive for many. The bot should send the first message without additional requests, immediately after opening the dialog box. It should have: a brief introduction and a specific call to action so that questions like “how does it work? what's to be done?".
Avoid dead ends
Specify the interaction as much as possible: the conversation should be consistent, messages from the chatbot should be concise. It is not necessary to put the user in situations in which he can "get lost": for example, even a simple question that can have two answers - "yes" or "no" is better to be presented in the form of buttons.
Add Buttons
Making a click is faster and more convenient than typing, especially on the run. In addition, the button will tell the user what kind of requests can be sent to the bot.
Use images
Now you can add an image on all platforms, including SMS. The picture draws attention to the message and in conjunction with the signature is more effective than just text. But don't overuse it.
Make error messages useful
After the phrase that something didn’t work out for the bot, add some kind of offer to the user, at least “return to the main menu”. Do not leave dead ends, as discussed above.
Specify a communication channel with a real person
There will always be requests that the bot cannot handle, so you need to make sure that at least some of them (which you define yourself) are addressed to a person. In addition, the user should have a command at hand that expresses the intention “I don’t want to communicate with the bot anymore, let me contact the person.” But think things through carefully 🙂
Watch the wording
Clarity is more important than elegance
Try to use clear and familiar words.
Clarify with questions, not statements
"Book a ticket for this Monday?" - better than "The ticket will be booked for this Monday". Because interrogative sentences sound softer, and affirmative sentences, as it were, shift all responsibility to the user. If, in the situation above, the person actually wanted to book a ticket for next Monday, and not this one, the clarification message in the form of a statement will sound in the subconscious mind as “Ha ha, I was wrong.”
Make questions unambiguous
Questions from the bot should not cause discrepancies and confuse. You should immediately give a response template: “Which airport do you usually fly from? For example: "from Sheremetyevo".
Be honest
Do not try to create a false impression of an omnipotent tool - the user must understand what your bot can do and what limitations it has.
In fact, there is nothing complicated here. The main thing is to think over the actions (commands) for the bot.
For mine, I made a small menu of 3 points - where you can pick up a useful gift, get access to my free course on affiliate programs and contact me in a personal.
This menu looks like this:
I created the bot itself through the Manybot platform. You can do this for free, but in the dialogue with your bot, users will see a link to the developer.
What features does the bot have?
1) Create custom commands and responses to them.
2) Creating a menu from commands. This is convenient, because users do not need to enter commands, but can use a ready-made menu for navigation.
3) The ability to send messages to subscribers (including delayed ones), view the number of subscribers in the bot.
4) Several interface languages, including Russian.
5) You can set up auto-posting to the bot from an rss blog or website, as well as from a YouTube channel, VK, Twitter.
How to create your own Telegram bot?
I recorded a step-by-step video tutorial - an example of creating a simple bot with a menu:
You can see my bot in action here. In a dialogue with him, click "Start" (Start), he will prompt you for further actions.
So, to start creating your Telegram bot, go to the site manybot.io, there click on the "Create bot" button. You will be redirected to the original instructions.
You need to go to Manybot in Telegram and click "Start" in the chat with the bot to get further instructions.
You will see a description of the bot's capabilities in English, and you will also be prompted to select a language.
After choosing the Russian language, you can start creating a bot, all instructions will be given in the dialogue (chat).
First of all, enter the /addbot command or simply click on it in the message received from the bot.
The next step is to type the /newbot command in the dialogue with BotFather and follow further prompts. Namely:
1) In English, we are offered to indicate the name (name) of our future bot. I named it ViktoriaHelps and sent this name in the BotFather dialog.
3) After that, I received a message with congratulations that my bot was created, a link to it in Telegram, as well as a token that I need to copy.
In response, I receive a message that I need to add a description (welcome message) for my bot. The user will see this description in the chat with the bot when they switch to it.
After sending Manybot a description, I see a message that my bot was successfully created. To make it appear in contacts on the left, follow the link to it and click "Start" in the chat.
By the way, the description of the bot can be edited at any time. This is done through the /setdescription command in a dialogue with Manybot.
Setting up commands and menus in the bot
In response, we receive a message with a description of our bot (what we indicated in the previous step). Your bot subscribers will also see it.
The message below will display a menu to manage your bot (only you, as the owner of the bot, can see it). If this message does not appear, you can call it yourself by entering the /help command in the chat or by selecting the "Help" section in the bot's menu.
This message displays the commands you can use to control the bot. For example, to send a new message to subscribers, use the /newpost command. Just click on it, or send it to the bot dialog and follow the further prompts. It's the same with other teams.
For example, let's create some of our commands in the bot and then embed them in the menu so that new subscribers can interact with your bot.
To do this, in the menu under the message input field, click on the item "Custom commands".
Select "Create Team".
Specify the name of our team - it must be in Latin and without spaces. The name can contain numbers and underscores (to separate words). Before the command, use the slash (slash) /.
Enter the command in the message field and press Enter.
The next step is to set the bot's response to the command. That is, the subscriber enters a command into the chat and receives a prepared response to it. That's how it works.
We get a message that the team was successfully created, we see it in the bot menu below. We create other commands in the same way. In particular, a command, upon clicking on which the user will receive a message with a link to download the gift.
By the way, when creating a team, we can add a question - a regular, detailed one, with multiple answers. Follow the bot's prompts to add a question.
If you want to edit or delete a command, click on it in the menu.
A new menu will open from which you can select the desired action.
For example, we select editing. Here the actions will be as follows:
1) First we need to delete the previous response to the command and confirm the action.
2) Then click "Add messages to team".
3) Enter a new answer, send to the bot, save.
4) We get a message that the command has been successfully edited.
To return to the previous menu, press "Back".
How to add a command to the bot menu?
Now I'll show you how to add a command to the menu. This menu is made for the convenience of the user in the dialogue with the bot, so that he does not have to enter commands manually.
Click on the "Customize Main Menu" button.
As well as a button to return to the previous menu.
How to remove a command from the menu?
If you want to delete a menu item or change its name, just click on it.
You will see another menu with available actions. There are many settings here, in particular, you can change the location of items, create multi-level menus. But that's not about it now...
Again, scrolling down the menu, you will see the buttons "Rename" and "Remove item from the menu". Choose the desired action and follow the prompts of the bot.
For example, I'll just remove the Go to Blog item from the menu.
Chatbots shorten the customer's path to purchase, increase consumer loyalty, and allow you to spend less time consulting potential buyers. And according to Gartner forecasts, by 2020, up to 85% of business communications with customers will be bots.
Chatbot builders allow you to develop and customize your own bot without going into the technical part. With their help, you can quickly make a bot in WhatsApp, VKontakte and other social networks and instant messengers. We offer our range of services detailed description and cost.
10 best designers for developing a chatbot in messengers and social networks
Reply.ai
Initially, he worked only with some companies - they were chosen separately. Now the service is available to everyone - just register to get started. To create your own bot, you do not need to delve into the code - just write down the options for answers or messages. You can create a bot once and further update, refine, improve it, as well as integrate it with payment services, various CMS and CRM.
The service interface is difficult for those who do not understand English - its creators have not yet bothered to translate into Russian. Besides, in personal account there are many tabs. But this is offset by wide functionality and the ability to link with other services.
Platforms: SMS, Telegram, Kik, Facebook, Line.
Price: is free.
Converse.ai
The constructor is distinguished by its construction with a graphical display - you can build the work of a chat bot in the form of a branched algorithm, in which there will be a different answer for each user action option. The chatbot can be connected to several platforms at once, in addition, it can be integrated with third-party systems. The service supports the payment processing function - business customers can pay without leaving the messenger using a chat bot.
The interface of the constructor is also quite complex, but provides good functionality.
Platforms: Twitter, Slack, Layer, SMS, Intercom, Facebook, Smooch.
Price: is free.
Chatfuel
This is one of the most popular and simple constructors, with the help of which thousands of solutions have already been created. An interesting fact is that Yandex once invested in this service, and today chatbots for Adidas, HTC and Just Eat were created using the constructor.
The service offers several chatbot templates for different niches - for example, for shops, publishers or real estate agents. Each of them can be customized to suit your individual needs. Ready-made chatbot can be integrated with third party services, and it takes only 7 minutes to create the product itself - the creators of the constructor say this.
Platforms: Telegram and FB.
Price A: from $15 per month.
flow
The constructor specializes in developing bots for sale. Its chatbots can send push notifications to users and collect customer information. You can save the received data in more than 100 services.
The service offers a convenient creation of a chat bot: the algorithm is built by simply dragging windows, and at the beginning of the journey, the user is offered pre-built universal templates. A ready-made bot can be integrated with many third-party business services and "embedded" into one of the four available platforms.
Platforms: Slack, Facebook, Telegram, Twilio SMS
Price: $19 per month, free features included
Korea
This constructor specializes in retail and banking. It is positioned as a service for developing complex chat bots. The logic of creating a bot is simple, accessible to most users who are familiar with the PC.
You can start creating a chat bot by building a unique algorithm. The finished product is available for integration with content management systems and other services. You can connect analytics and evaluate the behavior of users who have entered into a dialogue with the bot without leaving the service.
Platforms: Kore Messaging, Websites, Slack, SMS, Email, FB.
Price: free, but you need to pay extra for analytics and other features
Imperson
This constructor is one of the most versatile. It offers users the visual construction of a bot, integration with third-party products, and hosting a chatbot on multiple sites. There is a unique offer - a training course for the development of the first bot.
Chatbots themselves are flexible. You can create a bot that will perceive pictures, videos, voice messages and even other modalities of conversation - for example, AR and VR content. According to the creators of the constructor, 87% of all users who communicated with chatbots by voice were satisfied with the conversations.
Platforms: Kik, Slack, Skype, Amazon Echo, Twitter, SMS, Facebook.
Price: is free.
Massively
This designer has an unusual and bright interface. It was created for a different range of tasks and helps to develop complex chatbots in the form of graphical algorithms, as well as enter special commands. This constructor was used to create bots for Pictures, Google, Playtex, HarperCollins.
The finished bot will be available on 9 platforms. The designer is one of the few that offers such a wide selection.
Platforms: Facebook, Kik, Skype, Slack, Amazon Echo, Line, Twitter, SMS, WeChat.
Price: is free.
Sequel
This constructor is aimed at bots in the gaming and entertainment field. For example, it provides a GameBot template - based on it, you can build an interactive quiz. In addition, the designer offers many other ready-made templates.
This service was one of the first to introduce bot training - you can create a chat bot once, and then it will be trained. And integration with third-party services and multiple platforms helps to minimize development costs.
Platforms: Kik, Telegram, Facebook, Viber.
Price: free, but you have to pay for some "chips".
motion AI
This constructor offers the creation of chat bots based on the construction of regular diagrams. It also integrates with several platforms, provides the ability to integrate a ready-made bot with other services.
A unique feature of the constructor is ready-made service responses to various commands and reusable modules.
Platforms: websites, SMS, email, Slack, Facebook.
Price: is free.
Botmother
This is a constructor designed for creating cross-platform chat bots for business. According to the developers, the creation and configuration of the bot takes no more than 1 day.
A ready-made bot can be integrated with various external services - for example, content management systems in a company. A good plus for those who "can't" in English is the interface in Russian. And it is also one of the few designers adapted for the Russian-speaking segment and several platforms in it at once.
Platforms: Vkontakte, Viber, Odnoklassniki, Facebook, Twitter.
Price: free for 1 bot, minimum tariff - 799 ₽ per month.
Today, artificial intelligence has found application in many sectors, and it works wonders. Development software to automate various business processes is becoming the hottest trend. From artificial robots to modern Node Bots, artificial intelligence is the future of technology. Chatbots are also one such innovation based on artificial intelligence.
The popularity of messaging apps is skyrocketing and business owners can benefit greatly from this trend. Just like social networks, messaging apps provide many advanced marketing and user engagement options. Business owners can sell their products as well as offer services to users through popular apps like Slack, Facebook Messenger, Hipchat, MSN and many more. Chatbots are basically AI-based applications that can be integrated into messaging platforms, and can also be programmed to perform a range of dialogs and self-promotion tasks. In addition, you can customize them to function in a certain way based on the responses received and save information.
Today, chatbots are used in various fields such as customer service, e-commerce, and marketing. They can be programmed to think and act like a human and are capable of performing various tasks on their own. They can be useful in notifying online users of new offerings, providing information about products and services, collecting information and feedback from customers, as well as to monitor consumer preferences. Therefore, if you are a business owner or a developer who is interested in building bots, then we offer 9 popular platforms to create your own chatbots.
The Facebook Messenger Platform is a major player in the bot development world. It offers tools for building chatbots and live messaging. This platform is characterized by the presence of the Wit.ai tool, which allows you to integrate a conversational interface and bots into applications. It also offers built-in templates and plugins that let you integrate personalized text messages, photos, calls to action, and more. In addition, the Facebook Messenger Platform allows you to benefit from an ecosystem of diverse development tools and resources.
Chatfuel is one of the most popular chatbot tools for Facebook Messenger. The tool has a powerful artificial intelligence potential that allows you to create chatbots without any programming knowledge. Chatfuel is used by over 7 million users worldwide. Chatfuel is used by well-known companies such as Uber, National Geographic and Tech Crunch. Over 230,000 chatbots have been created with Chatfuel for various industries - sports, hospitality, publishing and e-commerce.
Another useful tool to create and integrate chatbots into messaging applications. It supports multiple platforms such as Android and iOS, and integrates with Stripe, which allows you to actively engage customers online, providing an improved online shopping experience, payment acceptance, and easy order fulfillment. The platform allows for a wide range of other messaging platforms such as Twilio, WeChat, Shopify, and Telegram. Smooch integrates with Facebook Messenger using most of its features - images, pictures, emoji and buttons. It also syncs with other business tools - Front, Slack, Hipchat and Zendesk.
Botsify is another bot building tool focused on Facebook Messenger. Botsify offers an easy to use interface that allows business owners to create bots without having to write any code. The platform provides the Facebook Messenger API, enabling developers to set up personalized responses, schedule messages, integrate with WordPress and Medium, and extract data from analytics tools. Botsify supports multimedia content, including videos, images, and audio files.
A modern platform for creating and hosting bot projects for Messenger Facebook and Slack. Source projects is hosted on GitHub and after running the bots as Docker containers, they can be written in any programming language - Ruby, Python, Go, and JavaScript. Beep Boop offers some great features like notification creation, hosting public bots and auto-grading support, as well as continuous integration via GitHub.
Pandorabots is a set of web-based tools and services that allow developers to create and host chatbots. There is also a tool called AIaaS (artificial intelligence as a service), which is a complete API for accessing the bot hosting platform and integrating the chatbot into the web and mobile applications. Pandorabots allows you to build artificial intelligence based chatbots for customer service, IoT interfaces, advertising, games, and more. The Pandorabots community has approximately 225,000 developers, and to date, more than 285,000 chatbots have been created using the tool.
Microsoft offers its own platform for developing bots that provide advanced conversation creation. The Microsoft Bot Framework allows you to create bots for Skype, Facebook Messenger, Slack, Office 365, Email, and more. The tool offers a bot builder with SDKs for Node.js and .Net. Developers can also visit the bot directory, which has an impressive collection of ready-made chatbots.
It is a great bot building platform for several popular messaging platforms at once, providing an open API for Viber, Telegram, Slack, Facebook Messenger, Kik, Slack and Telegram. Dexter offers over 250 integrations for analysis, hosting, and other enterprise solutions. It also provides good documentation and technical assistance for installing the SDK, building custom bots, mailing services, and more.
What are chatbots? Why are they such a great opportunity? How do they work? How are they created? How can you meet people interested in chatbots?
We will answer these questions in this post. Ready? Forward!
“~90% of the time we spend on mobile devices, goes to email and messaging in messengers. It makes sense to send product development teams to where customers hang out!” - Nico Bonastos, CEO of General Catalyst.
What is a chatbot?
A chatbot is a rule-driven service and sometimes artificial intelligence The one you are interacting with through the chat interface. The service can include different features, from functional to entertaining, and it can itself be included in the package of any chat product (Facebook Messenger, Slack, Telegram, Text Messages, etc.).
“Many businesses already have phone trees, and they work, although most users use them with dissatisfaction. A text response tree is much simpler and faster than a voice one, which was the purpose of the first bots, sometimes with the ability to chat with a live person.” -
If you haven't figured it out yet, don't worry.. Here is an example to help you visualize the chatbot.
Example:
If you wanted to buy shoes online from Nordstrom, you would go to their website, sort through the range until you found the right model, and then buy it.
If a bot appears in Nordstrom, which I have no doubt, you could just contact Nordstrom on Facebook. The bot would ask what you're looking for and you'd just...say it.
Instead of searching the site, you would just need to chat with the store bot, imitating a conversation with a consultant in an ordinary shoe store.
Examples of Chatbots on Facebook
Watch this video from the recent F8 conference(where Facebook announces its latest innovations). At 7:30 a.m., David Marcus, VP of Facebook's Messaging Products Division, explains what shopping for shoes with a Facebook Messenger bot looks like.
Chatbot Examples
Buying shoes is not the only possible purpose for chatbots. Here are a few other examples:
See? With bots, the possibilities are endless. You can realize anything that is born in your imagination, and I will help with this.
But why create a bot? Sure, it looks cool, uses some super advanced technology, but why would anyone waste their time and effort on it?
This is a huge opportunity. HUGE. I will explain this further.
Why are chatbots so promising?
You are probably wondering: “Why is anyone even interested in chatbots? They look like simple text services… what’s the secret?”
Great question. I'll tell you why people are interested in them.
Because for the first time people use messengers more than social networks.
Let this hang there for a second.
People use messenger apps more actively than social networks.
“Now people are spending more time on instant messengers than on social networks, and this is a very important turning point. Messengers are the platforms of the future, and with the help of bots, their users will be able to access different types of services.” - Peter Rojas, Entrepreneur at Residence on Betaworks
So, logically, if you want to build a business online, you want to build it where people are. Now it's a place inside messaging apps.
This is why there is so much buzz around chatbots. This is potentially a very big business opportunity for anyone who wants to quickly grow their business and create something that people want.
But how do these bots work? How do they know how to talk to people and answer questions? This is some kind of artificial intelligence, isn't it hellishly hard to implement?
Yes, you are right, it is artificial intelligence, and you can do something similar yourself.
I'll explain.
How chatbots work
There are two types of chatbots - one is rule based and the other more advanced type uses machine learning.
What does it mean?
Rule-Based Chatbots:
- They are very limited, only able to respond to certain commands. If you say something wrong, he won't understand what you mean.
- The bot is as smart as its programmed capabilities allow.
Chatbots powered by machine learning:
- They have an artificial brain (artificial intelligence). You don't have to be ridiculously precise when talking to a bot like that. He understands the language, not just commands.
- This bot is constantly getting smarter as it learns from talking to people.
“You need to remember that bots have the illusion of simplicity on the front end, but behind this simplicity there are many technical complexities that need to be overcome in order to create a convenient, full-fledged functioning. A huge amount of work needs to be done. Analytics, scenario optimization, taking into account all updates and platform changes in the absence of a single format. For deeper interactions and real commercial value, like in Assist, you will need an error analyzer, API integrations, routing and escalation to live human understanding, NLP, no back and home buttons, etc. We need to forget everything we have learned in the last 20 years to create amazing user experience in this new direction.” - Shane Mac, CEO Assist
Bots are created for a specific purpose. The store will need to create a bot to assist in making purchases, and a service like Comcast will likely create a bot that can answer tech support questions.
“Messaging is something we spend a lot of time on and rely on communication. It's really funny that we still have to contact most companies by phone.” - Josh Elman, Partner at Greylock
You start interacting with the bot by sending it a message. Click here to send a message to CNN's Facebook chatbot.
If these bots use artificial intelligence to work well...is it that hard to implement? Do I have to be an AI expert to create something that uses it?
Answer briefly? No, you don't need to be an AI expert to build an advanced AI chatbot. Just do not make unrealistic promises to future users, describing the capabilities of your future application. If at the moment you cannot make a good product based on artificial intelligence, it is better not to develop it yet.
“Everyone who tries to use artificial intelligence at this level seems to be slightly ahead of the times. Talking to a computer that just doesn't understand a lot of what you say can be very annoying. Be careful when making promises and give users a safety net against disappointment” - Josh Elman, Partner at Greylock
Although over the past ten years there has been some progress in the field of artificial intelligence, and so significant that everyone who knows how to code can introduce a certain amount of artificial intelligence into their product.
How do you embed artificial intelligence into your bot? Don't worry, I'll cover everything in the next part of this post.
How to create chatbots
Developing a chatbot may seem incomprehensible, but in reality everything is quite feasible. You will be building an AI-driven chatbot (or, of course, you can always develop a chatbot with basic functionality, without a sophisticated AI brain that follows strict rules).
“The difficulty in developing chatbots is not so much technical as it is UX. The most successful bots will be the ones that users want to return to regularly and provide them with ongoing value.” -
