You’ve heard the hype. Facebook messenger bots cutting costs and increasing revenue. They do this all on autopilot, while you sleep. How? Well Chatbots replace human customer care agents, as they artificially intelligent and can get back to customers instantly 24/7. Chatbots replacing email marketing, as their open rates are 9X higher than emails. Chatbots replace mobile apps, because who turns on notifications for their apps anymore?
There’s a lot of hype floating around chatbots in general. Facebook Messenger bots particularly.
Hence it should come at no shock that 80% of businesses want a chatbot for their business by 2020, according to a survey by Oracle.
So is the hype all real and can bots really do everything they promise?
Well we’re going to look into the real world application of these bots and see how some of the biggest companies in the world are utilizing them to see success.
What are Facebook Messenger bots (a.k.a Facebook chatbots)?
A chatbot is simply an automated set of messages that uses AI to create conversations with people.
Chatbots have been around for a while now, they can be put anywhere, webpages, in mobile apps, and social media.
Bots are programmed to understand questions, deliver answers, collect relevant customer information like customer details they can organize business leads in CRM’s and promote a business in ways email marketing would.
From a customer perspective, chatbots are user-friendly and deliver an engaging conversational experience. For businesses chatbots are a 24/7 digital assistant which helps automate and organize tasks in the business. Not to mention they help drive businesses sales because of their reach & engagement.
Gone are the days where customers need to download a separate app for every business, in order to be able to communicate with them and receive special features business make accessible on their “mobile app” now those same features can be programmed into the businesses chatbot.
This means businesses are able to do things like create a digital loyalty program or get people to order straight though their businesses personalized chatbot.
These are only some of the features that businesses can start automating & adding to their chatbots.
A Facebook messenger bot is a chatbot that is programmed in a businesses Facebook messenger. And is able to create engaging conversational experiences with the 1.3 billion people who use Facebook messenger every month.
Facebook messenger bots are only growing year on year. As of 2018, Facebook has 300,000 active messenger bots. That’s three times more than the year prior.
As more and more businesses see the power in Facebook messenger bots, the more that will jump on board and start taking advantage of the leverage Facebook messenger bots give their business.
Why use Facebook Messenger bots for your business?
There are several advantages to utilizing Facebook messenger bots inside of your business, two of the major advantages are:
Chatbots on Facebook have a low barrier to entry
First major advantage is that there is a low barrier to entry. Not only for your business to reach your customers, but for your customers to be able to reach your business.
Facebook is the second most downloaded app in the world and is used by 71% of users who have downloaded the app. And as we mentioned earlier there are 1.3 billion active monthly users.
These aren’t just people messaging their friends and family. People exchange over 1 billion messages with businesses every month on messenger. According to a recent Nielsen survey, people think messaging is the second best way to talk to a business.
Compared to the rest of the mobile app market, where within the first 90 days 71% of users delete an app.
If you want to communicate with your customers building a Facebook messenger bot is far more cheaper than building a mobile app. All the same advantages with having a custom-built app can be integrated with your businesses Facebook messenger bot.
Facebook Messenger bots are still an open field
The second major advantage is that Facebook messenger bots are still wide open for businesses to take advantage of them. While Facebook has 300,000 active messenger chatbots there are over 6 million advertisers on the same messenger platform. That so much less competitive.
Facebook messenger chatbots help your business bypass email inboxes, Facebook messages have a much higher open rate compared to emails. 89% compared to 20%.
This makes Facebook messenger chatbots far more superior in both reaching your target audience in in creating a ongoing conversational experience.
So with that perspective lets break down exactly what chatbots on Facebook can help your business do:
Save money and time for customer care staff
Customers expect 24/7 availability, with a Facebook messenger bot in place you’re able to answer those customer questions at 3am in the morning, customers can ask the same questions and get their answers instantly.
If your business is already spending a lot of time, replying to customer questions, neutering & qualify leads, booking appointments, helping people check your website, or track deliveries, then a little automation will go a long way and will allow your business to deploy the your customer care staff to take care of more serious tasks.
Directly reach your audience
Facebook charges you less money on advertising when you’re redirecting them to the Facebook messenger app. As the user is not leaving the Facebook platform. It is also very seamless to take your customers through a funnel in Facebook messenger.
Facebook messenger sponsored ads allow your business to re-target users who have already messaged and interacted with your page. You will have the ability to build a subscriber base on your Facebook messenger page which you’re able to reach out instantly, to promote your business.
Keep in mind people are 3.5 times more likely to open a Facebook message than a marketing email.
Be able to take e-commerce transactions
Program your chatbots with the right script and it can do the selling for your business.
A huge bonus that comes with this strategy is that the customer never has to leave Facebook messenger, everything is done in a familiar trusted app, instead of taking that customer to a traditional webpage pipeline.
Not to mention the conversation experience your businesses chatbot has with the customer allows the chatbot to seamlessly up-sell the customer by making suggestions like “would you like fries with that cheeseburger?”
Be able to identify leads
As your bot greets customers it can identify their needs and ask the necessary questions like “what’s your budget?” and it’ll automatically be able to notify your businesses sales team and let them know that they have a high quality lead.
You have the ability to program your chatbot to collect all relevant information that’s required for your business to qualify leads, this means getting information such as name, email, phone number, budget, what the customer is looking for and much more.
This can all be done on autopilot. And integrated with your businesses CRM allowing your sales team to get back to that lead in an organized fashion.
Re-engage with customers
Facebook messenger chatbots are capable of collecting and retaining customer information. And that can go a long way for your businesses. And if utilized correctly this gives your businesses chatbot unlimited potential.
You’ll be able to reach out personally to users who have a certain interest and offer them relevant content at the right time. This could mean reminding them that this time last year they sent out flowers to their partner. There is no limitations to these features. And it can be applied to whatever your business does.
Other applications to this feature could include, creating a digital loyalty program which rewards customers with points who share your business with friends and for every time they visit or buy something from your business.
This can be handled completely inside of Facebook messenger. This is only one of many applications built by bot builders.
How businesses are using Facebook Messenger bots
Each chatbot is unique to the business. Chatbots can help automate regular customer service queries, like appointment bookings and tracking customer deliveries. Chatbots are also drive sales, by suggesting the perfect t-shirt, ordering lunch or booking a direct flight to California. Facebook Bots can even send you jokes every now and then from the business. These are some of the features businesses use Facebook messenger bots.
Here’s how a few worldwide businesses are utilizing chatbots on Facebook messenger.
Lego
Lego has utilized a Facebook messenger bot to aid customers with gift ideas and engage with fans.
Lego’s chatbot “Ralph The Giftbot” has been developed to give customers a guide to all the many Lego products, making gift ideas easier for customers and giving customers a seamless e-commerce experience.
Senior manager and head of digital customer engagement at Lego, James Poulter said: “We are continuously searching for new and fun ways to engage with our consumers and shoppers. Chat bots are increasingly being used by brands to engage in the digital space, and in turn to drive sales. The Lego Group is one of the first in the toy industry to embrace this concept.”
The Facebook messenger bot has been developed to give customers a streamlined experience in which the user answers questions like their age, budget, and the type of sets they’re interested in.
Instantly “Ralph The Giftbot” showcases the best options for the user allowing them to seamlessly buy straight through Facebook messenger.
This gave Lego a 3.4X increased return on their Facebook ad spend compared to sending traffic directly to their website.
Lego were able to get up to 80% open rates on all broadcasts they sent out through their Facebook messenger bot.
Lego’s UK digital marketing manager Genelle Holton stated: “The Messenger Platform enables businesses to build experiences that facilitate connection with customers, create meaningful interactions and ultimately drive results.”
HelloFresh
HelloFresh delivers fresh ingredients to your door, including step-by-step instructions on how to transform your fresh ingredients into delicious meals. HelloFresh’s subscription-box service helps people enjoy healthy home cooked meals without the hassle of grocery shopping and meal planning.
HelloFresh were facing two main problems:
Lots of incoming messages, where they needed to have 1 customer care agent around the clock monitoring and responding to all incoming Facebook messages.
Slow response times. The support team would normally take between 6-12 hours to get through all the necessary steps to resolve a customer issue.
The customer support team was always overworked and were never able to get ahead of all the incoming messages. And the customers were frustrated with the long response times.
HelloFresh built a Facebook messenger bot which will be able to engage with customers instantly. This would ease the strain on the customer care team and would allow them to only focus on the issues they were required for.
The Facebook messenger bot will also initiate conversations with customers instantly. Getting rid of all the long response times.
Instantly FAQ’s were automated on Facebook messenger and HelloFresh saw a 47% increase in total conversations and a 76% reduction in customer wait time. This helped HelloFresh increase customer satisfaction all while reducing support costs.
While the Facebook messenger chatbot was initially only designed to assist the customer care team with the high volume incoming messages. It’s become so much more now.
HelloFresh have used their Facebook messenger bot to increase conversions, and improve engagement as the chatbot has been apart of many kinds of marketing campaigns HelloFresh have launched. For example:
For Black Friday 2017 and 2018, HelloFresh created a Facebook post which contained a question or a riddle.
When a user commented the correct answer Their Facebook Messenger Chatbot would instantly message the user via the Facebook messenger app, giving that user the promo code.
In 2018 this marketing campaign vetted by the messenger chatbot had a 64% conversion rate.
Meaning that well over half the users who received the promo code in their Facebook messenger inbox, actually used the promo code to place an order.
How can I build a Facebook Messenger bot?
There are a handful of platforms which allow you to be able to build a Facebook messenger bot for your business.
Some of the major ones are Manychat, Chatfuel and MobileMokey. These platforms can be quiet difficult to learn and use if you’ve never used them before.
They aren’t necessarily hard to learn.
But if you’re trying to build an intricate Facebook messenger bot, then it’s recommended that you get a professional bot builder to build your business a bot which meets your needs, without you having to figure out how to develop the chatbot.
Facebook messenger bots are developed to solve problems for your business.
Whether it be if you wanted to qualify your leads before you jump on a call with them or you want customers to have a seamless booking experience.
Facebook messenger bots are designed to help your business solve all of these problems. But they can be utilized for so much more than that.
The possibilities are endless, and as the world continues to move into the digital era, Facebook messenger bots will only grow and be able to take care of more intricate tasks for your business.
