Upscale All Your Efforts With Chatbot For Marketing

I often wonder what exactly is Marketing? What am I doing as a marketer? To dig deeper, I started recreating a small mom and pop shop’s scenario. He has a small hoarding that tells me what products he is selling, and then when I visit his store, all he does is talk to me about the products he has. Isn’t that everything we do as marketers? Pick a channel and talk to the customer about your product.

With the advent of the digital medium, we now have websites that “to an extent” are the mom and pop shop’s online version. But haven’t you heard people talking, “I need to talk to the salesman before I buy the product.”

Quoting Paulo Coehlo, “The most important thing in all human relationships is a conversation.” Think about it; you are more likely to shop at a store (especially a hairdresser) where the owner talks to you in a polite, gentle manner, though he might be selling the goods at higher costs. Thus, conversations are critical to good selling and good marketing. You have built a website; you are one step there, but it is necessary to talk if you wish to replicate an appropriate offline experience, and that’s where chatbots pitch in.

Chatbots can assist with any communication channel. This article mainly helps you figure out how to use chatbots across your marketing channels and activities.

Email Marketing 

Do you, too, at times wonder – Wasn’t email supposed to die this year? And last year? And the year before that? As much as marketing gurus claim the final nail of email’s coffin is forthcoming, the data tells us it’s not even close. 

In the U.S., email usage has grown every single year since 2013, and 91% of American internet users use email. Most of the millennial generation prefer communication from brands via email.

As of now, subscribing to your favorite online publications through email is the best way to keep up with their latest stories and news. And since it takes an average of six to eight touchpoints to generate a qualified sales lead, persuading people to subscribe to your emails and, in turn, continually consuming your content will generate more leads and revenue for your business.

Growing an engaged, loyal subscriber base also speaks volumes about your content’s quality and emotional resonance. Even though hoards of content saturate the internet and most people’s inboxes today, people are still actively engaging with your content, which is a clear sign that they actually value it. 

How can chatbot give your email marketing a boost?

You can use chatbots to provide real-time and personalized support to people who visit your website from an email. For e.g., if a customer landed on a specific product page from an email, the bot will now talk about why buying that product would be beneficial to the customer.

If your goal is to provide multi-channel customer support to your customers, you can also promote your chatbot within the email and the bot will make sure to answer all the queries that your customers might have.

If the person has subscribed to your newsletter and is visiting your website but not reading it, you can use the chatbot to remind them to read it. It will give the viewer a more powerful reason as to why they should read your email. This strategy will enhance your email open rate and CTR.

If you run an e-commerce website, and your customer came to your website from a transactional email asking the status of their order, a chatbot could solve these basic queries with ease.

Thus, the email could be your first and primary communication, but your chatbot will make sure your customers are engaging in a personalized fashion.

Social Media Marketing 

Most people surf social media to escape everyday life, entertain themselves and connect with others. Sometimes, though, brands forget why people use social media in the first place, blindly pushing their content to as many people as possible.

With over 3.6 billion social media users worldwide today, millions of brands promote their content via these platforms. This has flooded each forum with heaps of articles, photos, and videos, skyrocketing the supply of content while the demand for it has plateaued.

So how can brands cut through the noise? One strategy is to publish engaging videos, interact with fans as much as possible, and post content that doesn’t direct users to another website, like insightful status updates instead of links.

How can chatbot give your social media marketing a boost?

Bots for Social Media are definitely the most used bots in the space of chatbots. With the width of Social Media, chatbots can have many different applications. It takes a lot of effort for brands to get the audience to start interacting with them. Hence making sure that whenever the conversation begins, is the necessity where chatbots fit perfectly.

Chatbots are used extensively to greet customers as soon as they land on a brand page. It serves two purposes, starts a conversation with a prospect, and also tells the brand what are customers expecting when they visit your page.

But one of the most important applications of a chatbot is while you run ads. If you are running message ads, and you are starting a conversation with your audience, most of them might come back with counter questions, here a chatbot can be of tremendous help. It will answer the questions on its own. It will also do lead prospecting and qualification for you! If you are running any other form of advertisement, even then chatbot can identify the audience who is visiting your page after having seen the ad and can implement its query solving and lead qualification sequence.

Now Let’s think of stories or webinars which have become a norm on social media. Chatbots can engage and get your prospects to book tickets, or visit your website, or more. Chatbots can also answer FAQs intelligently.

Example of a brand using a chatbot to take orders

Here’s a quick wrap about everything that is happening in the above-shown example: 

• An individual has placed an order via Dominos online platform

• They are looking to check their order details without getting in touch with the humanized customer support, at their fingertips

• They have a preference in customizing the topping and they request about the same via chat 

• The chatbot service team gives them a confirmation that their order has been customized

Website

Search engines are arguably the best marketing channel for acquiring attention – most people discover new brands and publications through Google. In fact, according to one of the studies by Google, 89% of B2B buyers and 81% of online shoppers use search engines to research new products and services. Now, all we know is a search engine that leads us to a list of websites. Let’s evaluate our interaction with websites on a usual day.

Craving for a cheesecake? You surf on Google, land on a listicle. Looking to invest in a SIP? You run a search to understand the one that offers the best returns. Planning a trip? You check the distance and best mode of transport via Google Voice. Essentially, all of this lands you in a world of websites. So how can you, as a marketer, use chatbots on websites to improve the metrics?

How can chatbot give your website marketing efforts a boost?

Improved Engagement – People have visited your store, now they want to talk to you, chatbots are your way of being available 24/7 to everyone who wants to talk to you.

Improved SEO – Think about it, the conversation improves the time spent by your prospect on the website, create multiple events, telling the search engine that engagement happened.

Improved Product Discovery – Websites especially eCommerce websites are used to find products, the sooner a customer can reach the product, the easier it is to convince them to buy it. A chatbot can expedite.

Improved Lead generation and qualification – On the website, the bot can ask for information from your prospect by which your sales team can qualify him/her as well as contact information by which they can contact him/her. 

Quicker query solving – A bot can easily solve all simple queries and can also take a hit at the more complex ones. An eCommerce customer asking the status of his/her product solved easily. 

Example of a brand using a chatbot to delight a user and keep them hooked

Here’s a quick wrap about everything that is happening in the above-shown example: 

• An individual, out of curiosity and fun starts a conversation with a Disney chatbot. The chatbot talks in a very fun manner and keeps the person hooked while asking questions, generating a story. Overall, delighting the customer towards the end with a mind to get back to them again! 

Bots with phones and other products

With the growing IoT sector, more and more devices are getting connected to one another, and a bot serves as a master of your entire IoT platform. You can use Bots to connect with your customers on other platforms too such as WhatsApp or text messaging.

In fact, these on the go channels are currently the most preferred communication channels and drive higher ROI. 

Example of a brand using a chatbot to take personalized orders 

Here’s a quick wrap about everything that is happening in the above-shown example:

• An individual is looking to send roses to a friend to celebrate a particular occasion

• They find a website that serves the purpose and places an order with basic details like name, message, and address in a span of minutes!  

How can chatbot give your SMS marketing a boost?

The strategy of customer acquisition via SMS is simple. You enable an SMS bot on your phone number. Then, a potential client clicks on an ad (more about those later), or texts you from a button on your website, social media, business card, billboard, etc, and they’re placed into a conversation with your bot. By the end of that conversation, your bot should collect the information you need to turn this lead into a client.

With almost every business going online, it’s getting almost impossible to set up a customer support team in place. In these instances, a chatbot service comes as a savior. Assist your customers throughout the way through pre-trained bots and use a chatbot for marketing to make the best of all your efforts. 

Nissan using QR based chatbot to market their offerings

Here’s a quick wrap about everything that is happening in the QR code bot:

• A QR code is shared by a bot on your screen or you spot it in an automobile shop

• A custom QR code linking to marketing collateral is created using a QR code generator

• A QR code is shared by a bot on your screen or you spot it in an automobile shop

• You use a scanner to unveil what it holds

• Once you scan it, you land up to a page that has a master image and then gives you option to explore other options

• You select the option that matches your interest and you find all the information you are looking for!

Use Cases Of Chatbot For Marketing 

The above-mentioned section is an explicit read for anyone who is looking at understanding how chatbot for marketing can add 100x value and change the way things take place today. A quick overview of all of this can bring in is as follows:

Lead generation: In most instances, a chatbot for marketing is a platform to not leave any visitor unattended. This, clearly can enhance the lead generation process for businesses across the industry. Training a bot to get basic details like email can go a long way. Pass these details onto your sales team and let the funnel begin.

Improved conversion: As a customer, if all your questions are answered with ease and addressed well, there are higher chances that you will move to step 02. Chatbot for marketing can help you bring more power to all your efforts by enhancing the conversion rate to a massive level.

Real-time support: As mentioned above, chatbots are available 24*7. This means, there’s no rest for chatbots. And that is something that differentiates chatbots from live chat. With a powerful chatbot in place, never miss a chance to turn a prospect visitor. In fact, assure them that your services are 24*7, truly.

Enhanced navigation: A business website has a number of properties – industry-specific landing pages, blogs, knowledge centre, pricing, and so on. And a visitor has hundreds of questions. There’s a possibility that these visitors find themselves lost. Chatbots can help them navigate better by directing them to the right piece of information. 

Key Takeaways

• Almost all forms of marketing efforts can be accelerated by integrating a chatbot

• Some of the biggest benefits a chatbot can bring in to a marketing team in any organization are lead generation, effective conversion, and an enhanced experience

• Some of the biggest brands in the industries like Nike and Spotify are setting an example to smoothen the marketing efforts and creating an impact

• Chatbot for marketing is becoming essential for every marketing team that wants to sustain, scale, and grow

Conclusion

There’s no end to talking about what all these chatbots can do. For brands and consumers alike, we have a chance to redeem communication and commerce. Research would be convenient, purchases streamlined, and service personalized.

Don’t miss the opportunity here. By nature of what bots are, they offer a radical new reality. Bots are built to be helpful. They require a person to opt-in. And for the first time, they encourage scalable, one-on-one conversations between brands and consumers.

It’s the makings of a marketer’s dream: a world where brands can build authentic relationships with their buyers, and buyers can learn to trust brands again.

Do you plan to explore and experiment with a chatbot for marketing next? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section and we shall have your back, always!