In today’s context, interacting with robots is commonplace. The majority of us communicate with chatbots and digital assistants via websites and our smartphones. An SMS chatbot is simply a type of bot that automates communications with two-way conversations. Chatbots can exist in all sorts of places, from your website to WhatsApp or even inside your CRM such as a chatbot for Salesforce. So, how can you determine whether your business might profit from an SMS chatbot?
In this article, our experts offer some tips on using SMS bots effectively.
What are SMS bots?
Let’s address a few fundamentals first. A chatbot is a conversational computer program purpose-built to simulate a human. Chatbot development can be simple or complex, but their common goal is to automate communication.
SMS chatbots converse with users through text messaging. While it may seem apparent, it’s crucial to remember that SMS chatbots have certain restrictions. Bots designed for popular messaging apps like WhatsApp can provide more interactive, dynamic experiences with audio, video, and graphics. On the other hand, SMS bots can only send SMS texts, each of which can only contain a maximum of 160 characters.
Is using an SMS chatbot the best option?
If you’re just getting started with chatbots, short text messages can be just what your business needs. The widespread use and ubiquity of SMS among consumers of information is a huge benefit.
SMS is the most popular mobile message method when hearing from brands, surpassing email in most scenarios. After all, almost every contact you need to connect with uses text messaging.
Your chatbot should be where your customers are. Most customers prefer text messaging. It is only logical for your chatbot to be present on this channel. Chatbots enable you to scale communications when you have a large number of customers that use SMS as their primary method of communication, and you need to interact with them. The chatbot experience should be consistent across the customer journey regardless of the channel they interact on. An enterprise messaging platform like GirikSMS App by Girikon can help you connect all your engagement channels seamlessly.
Common SMS chatbot use cases
Most chatbots are designed with a specific purpose and communication type in mind.
Transactional/operational: SMS bots can offer automatic responses and information regarding orders, delivery, appointments, accounts, and a host of other topics.
Customer support: These chatbots reply to FAQs, delivering real-time support and assistance. Even troubleshooting could be facilitated by more sophisticated bots.
Marketing: These chatbots can converse with customers to spread the word about their products. This might be anything from a discussion about how to get an exclusive deal to utilizing an SMS keyword to enter a contest.
What role does AI play in SMS chatbots?
AI chatbots, often referred to as smart chatbots, are used to enhance automated conversations. Rule-based or pattern-matching chatbots are the most basic kind; they provide answers in response to identifiable keywords or targeted questions. More sophisticated bots leverage natural language processing (NLP) capability to comprehend customer inquiries more deeply.
Generally speaking, 3 types of AI are employed in chatbot development:
Conversational AI: These chatbots are designed to do more than just provide pre-written, triggered responses, in contrast to rule-based chatbots. It replicates the flow of a conversation and emulates real-world human interactions.
Predictive AI: To give users a better-tailored experience, predictive chatbots combine natural language processing (NLP) with data and analytics.
Generative AI: ChatGPT is credited for popularizing the term “generative AI.” It generates content based on its training data.
If your company is just beginning to use chatbots, a rule-based solution might be more suitable and provide you with greater control over the communication flow.
Knowing the risks of generative AI
Although there is immense potential, using generative AI in customer communication necessitates caution.
Most individuals who have experimented with general AI have observed how programs such as ChatGPT and Gemini can yield false or misleading results. Sometimes the usage of large language models (LLMs) produces nonsensical outputs, which are often referred to as AI hallucinations.
Train your SMS chatbot
Chatbot developers put in place safeguards to keep their chatbots in check to prevent this kind of undesirable AI behavior. Safeguards make it easier to ensure they abide by legal requirements and ethical standards.
By using a particular set of data to train the chatbot according to its predetermined use case, you can also control the user experience. For example, a chatbot designed for customer support may be trained using all of your product manuals and support documentation. Additionally, chatbots can be trained to only respond to questions based on the content found in blog posts published by your business. It can also examine historical customer service exchanges to learn more about how to communicate with people.
Know your limits
The message length of an SMS chatbot is one of its most obvious restrictions. You can create a bot that responds in a way that complies with the 160-character limit on a single text message. This could entail creating guidelines for a bot that comes up with responses on its own or ensuring that the expressions you create for the bot don’t exceed 160 characters.
SMS character restrictions can be useful in some ways. Text messaging should be brief and direct, yet it should also be friendly and conversational.
Selecting the questions your chatbot should NOT respond to is another crucial step. Sometimes it might be more helpful for a bot to lead a customer toward the resources they need to get the answers. For instance, you might want visitors to go to a specific page on your website if they want pricing information.
The benefits of teaching a chatbot to solve complex problems follow the law of diminishing returns. It is generally more difficult to automate conversations around rare situations or problems. Putting time and money into automated discussions that are difficult to resolve and infrequent might not be something you want to do.
7 Benefits of Using an SMS Bot
Here are the top seven benefits of SMS bots for both your customers and your business.
1. Everyone uses SMS
Well almost everyone. Ninety percent of users text daily, and the majority check their messages ten times or more during the day, according to research.
The most common type of communication is SMS, which works on all phones. All of this implies that a large audience is accessible by an SMS bot.
2. SMS is highly scalable
SMS messaging is a very effective way to expand your user base, boost sales, and cultivate new customers because of its ubiquitous reach. In most markets, SMS is one of the most economical and efficient marketing channels. What’s more? You can quickly begin interacting with a worldwide audience by integrating an SMS API with your current tech stack quickly and easily.
3. People read their SMS messages
Text messaging has outstanding engagement rates. We are talking about click-through rates of 36% and open rates of 98%.
4. SMS chatbots enhance efficiency
You can save time, effort, and human resources by using an SMS chatbot to automate text-based interactions in response to frequently asked customer questions. Support personnel can now focus on providing greater value and assistance in the resolution of more urgent and complex issues. And chatbots never sleep. An SMS bot can be used for support and is always there to help.
5. SMS chatbots improve customer satisfaction
Integrating an SMS bot into your customer messaging can lead to higher customer satisfaction. When their concerns are resolved more quickly, what more could they ask for?
90% of the organizations surveyed by MIT research reported measurable improvements in the speed at which complaints were resolved following the implementation of chatbots. Additionally, a measurable improvement in customer satisfaction was witnessed by 80% of respondents.
6. SMS bots can be multilingual
SMS chatbots can be easily adapted to multiple languages and countries, making them ideal for expanding into new markets or meeting the needs of a worldwide organization.
7. SMS messages can be easily personalized
Texting is a highly personal and private way to communicate with someone. Thus, it stands to reason that conversational AI would be ideal. An SMS chatbot that addresses contacts by first name establishes a more intimate relationship between your brand and its customers. Personalization isn’t limited to names, of course. When you integrate your CRM with your SMS bot such as a Salesforce chatbot, you can take personalization to a whole new level.
Conclusion
Imagine being able to engage with customers across all channels of communication. What if those communications flowed naturally and consistently over voice, text, and mobile messaging as well as email and SMS?
All this is possible with GirikSMS, a 100% native Salesforce messaging app. Get in touch with us today to learn more about GirikSMS’s conversational messaging platform.
