Imagine someone builds a physical store.

It’s beautiful, inside and out. Everything is ready to serve incoming customers while making the owner(s) money. The problem?

They don’t staff the store and there is no one there to answer customer questions.

Your site (likely) allows visitors onto the site 24 hours a day. Yet you and your reps aren’t ready for live interaction the entire time (at least not likely). It may be an exaggeration to compare a brick and mortar store with zero coverage to a website.

But it’s really not that far off. People want instant gratification when they’re on your site, no matter the time or day.

And the short answer to the problem — Chatbots.

Chatbots are Tireless and Loyal Reps

You’ve put just as much work into your site. Build the site, host it and keep it up-to-date with your products/services. Landing pages and good copywriting go a long way toward moving prospects down funnel.

That said, some people want to ask questions.

Believe it or not, chatbots can:

• Answer the most common questions
• Explain key pain points your ideal customers have as well as details about your offers
• Even book appointments for you to take when you’re ready

Now, let’s cover exactly how to figure out what your bot would say.

Figuring Out Your Bot Type

I have to be general here, because there are a number of quality bot-building tools on the market. Typically, all of them are drag and drop for you to feel the flow and see how your visitors/customers interact with the bot.

First things first, you have to figure out the end goal of your bot. And here are a few options to activate creative thinking.

• FAQ bot: If Pareto’s Principle is in effect at your business, 80% of your support burden comes from the same 20% of issues/questions. Create a chatbot that answers the most frequently-asked-questions and direct customers/users to the right resources to “self-solve” issues.
• Feature bot: Your products and services may have individual pages to explain how it works. A bot that pops up and explains those features is incredibly effective at moving visitors toward conversion.
• Content bot: If you’re an affiliate site or rely heavily on content marketing, bots help direct traffic to the right piece(s) of content. Think of it as a pleasant, interactive “you may also like” section.
• Lead-Qualification bot: Consultants, software products (who do demos) and other businesses rely on appointments for discovery and sales calls. You can actually filter incoming leads by things like company size, current solutions and budget. Then, have the bot set up the meeting on your calendar.

Create the Right Flow and Ask the Right Questions

Questions your bot asks and the answers/choices you give users depends. Depends on things like the type of bot, your business and your brand voice. After you determine these things, you’ll want to visually map out how many layers and questions you’ll ask (see image above).

If you’re creating a content bot, your questions (followed by proposed choices) may be:

• Question One: What are you looking to learn as a [insert ideal persona]?
  • [Content Category 1]
  • [Category 2]
  • [Category 3]
• Question Two: Do you find yourself struggling with any of these?
  • [Pain point 1]
  • [Pain point 2]
  • All of the above
• End result: Well, I can absolutely recommend a few resources to help!
  • [Blog post]
  • [Lead magnet]
  • [Facebook community link]

Choosing the Right Chatbot Tool

This is completely subjective and I have no specific recommendations. I’ve built bots with linear-style builders and complex marketing with drag-and-drop style builders. There are tools that only offer chatbots, others that offer live chat with bots and some that offer an entire marketing automation suite — including bots.

What I can do is leave you with a few tips when vetting a bot solution.

1. If you’re building, focus more on intuitive design, good support (from the company) and plenty of instructions.
2. Hire someone to build your bot and you’ll want to focus on features and using a decent-sized company (more freelancers/services to choose from).
3. Take full advantage of trial periods. Sign up when you have time to test it, build a bot and throw it on a test page of your site. Then make your decision after testing a few options.

And if you have any questions, feel free to reach out!

About the Author

All Pro Content helps B2B companies build a consistent, lasting content asset (aka, your blog). Feel free to connect with the owner, Josh Slone, via LinkedIn.