How to Use Chatbots to Improve Customer Acquisition

Any brand worth its name needs to draw in new customers. Acquisitions are vital to growing your company and establishing yourself in the marketplace.

Traditionally, that meant lots of cold calling. But the advent of technology is making the ever-dialing sales person more and more obsolete.

Chatbot technology is emerging as the next big thing that will revolutionize the sales force. Between ease of use, unrivaled support, and on-demand access, the bots make for some stiff competition.

Let’s take a closer look at how chatbots are changing the way businesses attract new customers.

Simplifying the User Experience

Endearing customers to your product partially revolves around removing barriers to entry. Simply put, people are likely to take the path of least resistance.

Chatbots offer easy access to both information about, and the ability to purchase products and services. Here’s an example for clarity.

Two people are talking about their new favorite makeup over Facebook messenger. One friend recommends your brand to the other, and she’s interested.

With a chatbot, that person can message your bot, get information, and order the makeup - all without leaving the Facebook Messenger app.

What you’ve done is skip the entire sales funnel. Consumers can jump from awareness to action with only a few messages to your chatbot.

Unrivaled Product Support

Social media changed the face of customer support forever. Companies embraced Twitter with open arms and started building online relationships with their consumers.

Chatbots are the natural extension of these connections. While social media support gives customers an on-demand pipeline to customer service, bots take it a step further.

AI is advanced enough that chatbot services largely mimic human interaction. At 10 pm your customer service reps are home for the night, but a chatbot isn’t.

And even if your chatbot can’t answer a customer inquiry, it can provide a human rep with valuable insight into the problem.

Chatbots can send data back to your customer support team, reducing the amount of time it takes to solve problems.

Less time spent gathering basic consumer information means more money saved.

On-Page Chatbots

While many chatbots live in messaging applications, some businesses implement bots into their landing pages.

Chatbots that live on websites function similarly to their messaging-based counterparts. However, the on-page bot offers a unique take on customer acquisition.

Instead of drawing people in with content or offers, landing page chatbots look to offer convenience and direct sales.

Customers visiting your website can gather product information and make purchases within seconds of your page loading.

This is especially important, as 55 percent of people spend 15 seconds or less on your website.

Offering engaging, informative product information through your chatbot will keep people on your landing page longer. Quick and easy landing pages will only increase your conversion rates.

Implementing Your Own Chatbot

All the knowledge in the world is useless without implementation. Let’s explore how your business can start capitalizing chatbots.

Creating your own chatbot means mimicking companies who’ve created a successful bot. Kayak’s chatbot is an excellent example for attracting customers through a simplified user experience.

The bot lives in Facebook messenger and provides users with a “travel agent.” Users can ask questions ranging from “where should I go on vacation for under $1000” to “I need a hotel in Atlanta.”

Kayak’s bot will answer any question with a travel recommendation and links to book hotels, flights, etc. Customers move from the acquisition to decision phase of the sales funnel in just sentences.

Consider building your own Facebook messenger bot that fits with your business voice and tone. Messenger comes integrated into Facebook, allowing you to drive potential customers from your Facebook page to your chatbot.

Customer support chatbots are better suited to living on-page. It’s usually easiest to choose an outside solution to help implement these bots on your website.

Though just like with Facebook Messenger bots, these on-page customer support bots need to fit your company’s voice and tone. Make sure your on-page bot sticks with your brand image.

Chatbots allow you to engage customers with your brand through ease of use, unrivaled support, and on-demand access to information.

Creating an easy path down the sales funnel ensures that implementing a chatbot will only improve your customer acquisition process.

Note: The opinions expressed in this article are the views of the author, and not necessarily the views of Caphyon, its staff, or its partners.