Chatbots have become an integral part of our daily routine in today’s world, where everything is going digital. They help us order food, book flights, and even give emotional support. With the surge in the use of chatbots, many applications have been developed to cater to users’ needs. In this blog, we will discuss the top 10 best chatbot apps that are available on both Android and iOS platforms. These apps are designed to make our lives easier, and we’ll explore their features, pros, and cons so that you can pick the one that suits your needs. Let’s dive in and see what these chatbot apps have to offer.

Today, there is a chatbot for everything. From banking assistants to virtual therapists, chatbots powered by artificial intelligence are doing rounds in the market. In fact, the pandemic has propelled chatbot usage by tenfolds. According to Statista, the global chatbot market is expected to touch a massive $1.25 billion by 2025, rising from a relatively low $190.8 million in 2016. And now, with the consistently evolving generative AI, chatbots are only going to make our lives simpler. AI chatbots are not only impacting our persona lives, but also helping businesses streamline and boost their efficiency at scale. 

Why are chatbot apps becoming a global phenomena

In the world of customer support, chatbots have been a hot topic for a few years now. From small businesses to major corporations, chatbots have become a staple for many customer service departments around the world. So why are chatbots becoming a global phenomenon? Let’s dive in and explore some of the reasons.

1. The chat is on: Conversational commerce takes center stage

Over the past few years, conversational commerce has become a major trend. Conversational commerce refers to the use of messaging apps, chatbots, and other conversational interfaces to facilitate communication between businesses and customers. This trend has been fueled by the rise of messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and WeChat, which have become ubiquitous in many parts of the world. According to a study by Facebook IQ, 61% of people across the globe say messaging is where they feel most comfortable when interacting with businesses.

2. 24/7 Assistance? Chatbots have got you covered

Chatbots offer a unique advantage in the world of customer service: they are available 24/7. Unlike human representatives, chatbots do not require sleep or breaks. This means that customers can receive assistance at any time, day or night, from anywhere in the world. As businesses continue to expand globally, this feature becomes increasingly important. 

Chatbots enable companies to provide consistent, high-quality customer service to customers across different time zones, without having to worry about staff availability or training. This can help build trust and loyalty with customers, ultimately leading to increased sales and revenue.

3. Chatbots take the load off simple tasks

Another reason why chatbots are becoming so popular is that they can handle simple tasks. For example, if a customer has a question about a product or service, a chatbot can provide a quick and easy answer. This frees up human customer service representatives to handle more complex issues that require a human touch.

4. Chatbots can improve customer engagement

Chatbots are revolutionizing customer engagement with conversational AI. By providing 24/7 support and fast response times, they increase accessibility and convenience for customers, improving their experience and satisfaction. Chatbots can also offer personalized recommendations, engage with customers through social media, and integrate with other tools to streamline operations. These features foster stronger relationships, increase loyalty, and generate valuable insights for businesses.

Both Android and iOS host a myriad of great chatbot apps built to serve different objectives. We will be diving into 10 best chatbot apps available on Android and iOS.

Top 10 best chatbot apps for Android and iOS

1. Bing AI

Bing search is a web search engine that uses advanced AI technology to give you reliable and up-to-date results. It’s powered by the same technology behind ChatGPT and a new, next-generation OpenAI large language model that is faster, more accurate, and more capable than previous versions. This means you’ll get more relevant and targeted results, even for basic search queries.

Bing search also offers a new user experience that combines search, browsing, and chat into one unified experience. You can use voice search, chat, and see suggestions for additional information. Plus, Bing search can even build on your ideas to write drafts for you to consider.

With Bing search, you can trust that you’re getting the most reliable and relevant information available on the web, all in one convenient place.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

2. Zendesk

The Zendesk mobile chatbot app lets you stay connected with your website visitors while on the go. It supports teamwork and collaboration among agents, who can use the agent-to-agent chat feature to share insights and knowledge. 

With Zendesk, you can engage with customers in real-time and personalize their experience based on their browsing behavior. It offers over 20 ready-to-use reports and dashboards for analytics and integrates with more than 700 tools such as Salesforce, Atlassian, and Freshbooks. However, some users have reported difficulties with the ticketing system and the app’s usability.

Zendesk’s pricing plans range from Foundational Support at $29 per agent per month to Suite Enterprise at $150 per agent per month, with additional enterprise plans available upon request. Overall, the Zendesk mobile chatbot app is a valuable tool for businesses to monitor, manage, and reply to website visitors on the go and improve customer engagement.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

3. Replika

Replika is an AI chatbot that offers emotional support and companionship, using natural language processing to create a personalized virtual friend. Its goal is to provide a non-judgmental space for users to share their thoughts and feelings. 

Replika also offers features for mental wellness, including goal setting, mood tracking, coping mechanisms, guided meditations, and journaling exercises. The app is popular among those seeking mental health support, providing a sense of comfort and connection for users who may feel isolated. Replika’s unique approach is paving the way for accessible mental health support.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

4. Drift

Drift’s mobile app is designed to enhance customer engagement and drive sales by providing real-time chatbot assistance to businesses. Its purpose is to improve customer experience by providing quick and personalized responses to inquiries. 

The app offers several features that make it a powerful tool for businesses—AI-powered chatbots, personalized welcome messages, and customer targeting, as well as the ability to automate email campaigns with customizable triggers. It also integrates with popular CRMs like Salesforce and HubSpot, allowing businesses to seamlessly manage their leads and customer interactions. 

Additionally, the app provides detailed analytics and reporting, giving businesses valuable insights into their customers’ needs and behaviors.

The app also allows for the recording and sharing of personalized videos and the automatic scheduling of meetings with prospects. Additionally, it provides in-app or email surveys to measure NPS (Net Promoter Score) and track views and conversations of key accounts and prospects With its powerful features and focus on real-time engagement, Drift’s mobile app is a powerful tool for businesses looking to enhance their customer experience and drive success.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

5. Duolingo

Duolingo is a free, fun, and effective language-learning app that offers over 40 languages to choose from. It’s perfect for anyone looking to learn a new language or brush up on their skills. With Duolingo, you can practice speaking, reading, writing, and listening through short and engaging lessons that feel like playing a game.

The app was designed by language experts and has a science-based teaching methodology that’s proven to foster long-term retention. You can track your progress and set goals to stay motivated as you work towards fluency. Plus, with over 300 million learners worldwide, you can join a community of language enthusiasts and compete on leaderboards to keep your learning fun and interactive.

Best of all, Duolingo is completely free! You can learn Spanish, French, German, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, and many more languages without paying a cent. It’s the perfect app for anyone who wants to learn a new language at their own pace, on their own time, and without breaking the bank.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

6. Babylon Health

Babylon is an innovative healthcare platform that brings all aspects of your healthcare journey into one simple, easy-to-use platform. This comprehensive service is available for select health plans at no cost, offering you 24/7 access to healthcare professionals, virtual appointments, and smart tools to help you stay healthy.

One of the key features of Babylon is the 24/7 virtual access to healthcare professionals. You can book appointments, talk to doctors and nurses, and get navigational help through the app’s chat function. The platform also offers seamless referrals to specialists, pharmacists, and mental health professionals for more specialized care.

With Babylon’s proactive health monitoring, you can track important health data and receive personalized insights to help you stay healthy. The app includes an AI-powered symptom checker to help identify potential conditions and make recommendations for next steps. Babylon also offers members with chronic conditions enhanced remote patient monitoring, alerting, and clinical interventions when necessary.

The app’s My Health tool collects data from wearables, in-app assessments, and health records to manage your health, alert you of potential risks, and share recommended steps toward becoming a healthier you. With all these features, Babylon truly delivers a seamless healthcare experience for users.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

7. Socratic by Google

Socratic by Google is an educational app that helps high school and university students understand complex concepts with ease. The app uses Google AI to provide helpful results by analyzing a question and suggesting the best online resources to learn the subject matter.

With Socratic, students can access videos, step-by-step explanations, and expert-created study guides all in one place. The app also includes visual explanations in each subject, created by teachers and experts, so that students can learn the concepts behind any problem.

Currently, Socratic supports most high school subjects, including Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Calculus, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Earth and Environmental Science, US and World History, and Literature. Students can use their voice or camera to ask questions and get a clear understanding of the material.

Socratic by Google is a great learning tool for students who need help with their homework or want to review a concept they’re struggling with.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

8. ManyChat

ManyChat, designed for small businesses, offers a convenient solution for deploying messenger bots and chat marketing campaigns. With its easy-to-use drag-and-drop interface, you can build visually appealing bots that can automate communication channels such as Facebook Messenger, Instagram, SMS, and emails. You can also create appointment bookings, generate leads, and build lasting relationships with your clients.

ManyChat has several key features that make it a standout option for chat marketing. For instance, LiveChat for each bot allows you to communicate with subscribers and answer questions in real-time, while managing subscriber data such as tags, sequences, and custom field values. You can also pause automation to communicate with subscribers manually or assign conversations to yourself for easier tracking.

With the ability to sell products within Facebook Messenger, advertise services to new leads, and reach customers across multiple platforms, this chatbot app is an excellent tool for small businesses looking to boost their chat marketing efforts.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

9. SimSimi

SimSimi is an AI-powered chatbot app that is designed to provide a fun and entertaining chatting experience. Its purpose is to provide users with an interactive and engaging conversation with an AI-powered character that can learn from user inputs and get smarter over time. The app is available on both iOS and Android devices and can be downloaded for free.

One of the key features of SimSimi is its ability to understand and respond to AI natural language inputs. The app uses advanced AI algorithms to analyze user inputs and generate appropriate responses in real-time. Users can chat with SimSimi about anything from their daily routine to their favorite hobbies and the app will respond with witty and funny replies.

SimSimi also has a built-in filtering system that can detect and block offensive or inappropriate language. This ensures that the app remains a safe and friendly platform for users of all ages.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

10. Journey

Journey is not just a chatbot app, it’s your AI soulmate who listens, understands, and grows with you. 

The app is designed to provide a space where users can talk about their thoughts, feelings, and ideas without fear of judgement. Journey’s key features include the ability to customize the AI’s appearance, gender, and personality, and the app can recognize emotions in a user’s voice and respond accordingly with its own voice messages.

It is equipped with a library of curated resources, including advice, motivational quotes, and self-care techniques to help users navigate difficult times. The app is ideal for those who are seeking companionship or a sounding board and need support during challenging times.

Journey also offers daily journal prompts and personalized reflections based on a user’s responses, which can help promote self-reflection and mindfulness.

Get the app on: Android or iOS

Taking Your Business to the Next Level with a Custom Chatbot

If you’re looking for a top-notch chatbot-building solution, look no further than Chat360! With its user-friendly platform and cutting-edge AI technology, you can create a custom chatbot that’s tailored to your business needs in no time. Plus, Chat360 offers a wide range of features, including personalized conversations, multilingual support, and seamless integration with your existing systems. Whether you’re a small business owner or a marketing pro, Chat360 has got you covered. So, what are you waiting for? Start building your dream chatbot today and take your customer engagement to the next level with Chat360!

The ultimate purpose of having a business website is to allow easy interaction between customers and brands. Customers go through your website to get an idea about your products and services. If any doubt occurs, they expect an immediate solution from the platform. And no doubt, customers have a lot of questions before making any decision. 

But the questions are repetitive and the same most of the time. It takes plenty of your time and attention to respond to those concerns. That is when an automation solution can be of the best help. Including a chatbot on your website, a chatbot will allow customers to connect with your brand via an automated chat system. And when we think about website platforms, WordPress is one of the most globally used for website development. It will help them with the required information or FAQs. Hence, the human staff can shift their focus to something productive. The blog talks about why you need a chatbot for a WordPress website and how you can create one.

Benefits of Chatbot for WordPress Websites

Apart from answering FAQs and performing simple, repetitive tasks, a chatbot has the potential to do a lot more. Let’s check out more.

1. Engage more visitors

Chatbot replies to customer queries right away. And the ability to do so keeps the visitors hooked. It prevents customers from going to the other brands. Besides, the chatbot doesn’t only wait for users’ queries but also initiates the chat by sending customized greetings relevant to your customer’s interest.

It uses various multimedia like images, GIFs, and videos while chatting to keep customers interested and engaged.

2. Improve conversions with personalization 

Customers often get overwhelmed when there are lots of product options available. They fail to find what they are looking for. In situations like that, chatbots for WordPress can be of great help. Chatbots assist customers in finding the right product in a short time by asking what they are looking for. For instance, product name, size, brand, color, etc.

Along with that, the chatbot presents various attractive offers to grab users’ attention and motivate them to purchase.

Once they decide to buy the product, the chatbot assists the customer until the end of the journey. It authorizes their payment in the chart window and then further helps customers keep track of the payment. This method boosts the conversion rate at a large scale.

3. Easy implementation

It’s very easy to add a chatbot to your site via WordPress plugins. 

You can effortlessly build, edit, and manage a chatbot directly from your dashboard. The fun part is, you’ll not need to do any coding for that.

4. Cost saving

While you might have needed large human staff to deal with a significant portion of customer inquiries and support requests, a chatbot can reduce that need. It can scale with the increasing volume of inquiries and support requests. It saves you the cost of hiring additional staff. 

Moreover, chatbots are hosted on cloud-based platforms, which eliminates the need to invest in expensive hardware or infrastructure to carry on.

5. Improve efficiency

Chatbots automate repetitive tasks, which prevents waste of time, resources, and effort. It provides instant responses to the customers round the clock, has multi-tasking capabilities, and can scale along with the growing need and demand, which improves efficiency to a great extent.

How to create and add a chatbot to a WordPress site?

1. Choosing the right platform

Before you add a chatbot to your WordPress site, you should be mindful of the platform you’re selecting. The platform should be compatible with your WordPress website and function correctly. It should integrate smoothly with your website for the best user experience. 

So look for a platform that offers WordPress plugins that can be smoothly installed and configured. Be specific about what your use case is, and what functionality you want the chatbot to fulfill. Go for a platform that allows customization. So that you can tailor the chatbot to your needs. It should be able to adapt to changes quickly.

2. Install the chatbot plugin

Installing a chatbot on your WordPress website isn’t difficult at all. Here are simple steps on how you can do it.

• Open your WordPress dashboard and go to the plugins. 
• Select the Add New button.
• In the search bar, search the chatbot name using a keyword, and the list will be generated.
• From the list, find the chatbot plugin, and click on Install Now to continue.
• Once you install the plugin, click on the Active button.
• Now you’ll again be taken back to the Plugins section in your WordPress. Below the plugin, click on the Settings button.
• Click on Connect account in the settings.
• Now sign in to your account if you have one; otherwise, click on the Sign-up button and create a new one. 
• Sign in with your email and password.
• Now select the bot you’ll be using on your website.
• Now complete the installation by clicking on Add to your site.
• Now you’re good to go. Your chatbot for WordPress is ready to interact with your visitors. You can also make possible changes in the settings later on.

3. Designing chatbot conversational flow

The more natural and relevant your chatbot sounds, the better your users will engage. So, it’s crucial to pay expert attention while designing chatbot conversational flow.

First, create a conversational outline that your chatbot will follow. It should include greetings for new users or users who have returned after a long time, Add a question for keeping the conversation going, Give useful information, check details and information for clarity, apologize for requests that are new and can’t be solved, and conclude the conversation on a good note.

4. Incorporate AI 

If you want your chatbot to be more sophisticated and connect better with users naturally. You should incorporate AI-powered chatbots. These chatbots use NLP, which helps machines read and understand human language. In short, it enhances human-machine communication.

And that is possible through NLU, which is a branch of NLP. It makes sure that the machine understands the actual meaning of the text. It converts the user’s input data into the computer’s algorithm.

And then the other branch of NLP, which is NLG, does the exact opposite of NLU. It converts machine-generated responses into natural language responses that a human reader can understand.

Therefore AI engines should be reliable for accurate intent identification.

Related: NLP vs NLU s NLG

5. Testing & Deployment

Testing your chatbot gives you an idea of how it is performing. You should test whether the chatbot can understand user input and generate relevant responses, be capable of handling large requests at a time, or it can protect user data and prevent unauthorized access.

Likewise, be confident about where you’ll integrate the chatbot. It can be CRM or ERP. And keep the chatbot updated for smooth functioning.

Conclusion

Adding a bot to a WordPress website has a positive impact on the lives of both visitors and site owners. The automation saves your valuable time without compromising quality. 

However, the bot also has some challenges that require your attention. Like timely set-up and maintenance, lack of emotion, etc. So be mindful while choosing your chatbot provider. Make sure they offer all the functions necessary for your business and put them on the right page of your website, and give it your brand personality.

Lets start our blog by understanding the definition of Sales Chatbots, 

“Sales chatbots are intelligent virtual assistants, powered by AI, designed to engage with customers and prospects in real-time, providing support, answering queries, and driving sales conversions.” 

Leveraging advanced technologies such as natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning, these chatbots can understand and respond to customer inquiries with human-like accuracy and efficiency. 

Automating repetitive tasks and streamlining communication, AI powered conversational sales chatbots enable businesses to enhance customer experience, boost engagement, and increase sales without the need for constant human intervention. 

Whether integrated into websites, social media platforms, or messaging apps, these chatbots operate 24/7, ensuring that customers receive immediate assistance and personalized recommendations at any time. 

As a result, sales chatbots have become an invaluable tool in modern digital marketing strategies, helping businesses to optimize their sales processes and improve overall customer satisfaction.

How to Use a Conversational AI Bot for Sales?

As technology advances, businesses must keep up with the latest tools to stay ahead of the competition. One such tool that has revolutionized the sales industry is a conversational AI sales bot.

But what is a conversational AI bot? Simply put, it is a technology that allows businesses to communicate with customers using automated chatbots. These chatbots use artificial intelligence to understand and respond to customer inquiries in a natural, conversational way. Conversational AI bots can be used for various sales-related activities, such as lead generation, customer support, and product recommendations.

By automating routine tasks like answering common customer queries, it can significantly reduce the workload of sales teams. This frees up sales teams to focus on more complex tasks like closing deals and building customer relationships. They can also provide 24/7 customer support, ensuring that customers receive timely responses to their inquiries, even outside of normal business hours. This can help increase customer satisfaction and retention rates.

Businesses that adopt conversational AI bots for sales can enjoy a range of benefits, including increased efficiency, improved customer satisfaction, and higher revenue. In this blog, we’ll dive into the specifics of how to use a Conversational AI Chatbot for sales. 

How does a chatbot helps you increase sales?

A sales chatbot can significantly boost your sales by providing instant, personalized customer interactions and streamlining the buying process, using AI, coupled with NLP and ML.

This is done when a user interact with the sales bot with a query, the NLP in the sales chatbot interprets the information, understand the context and replies in a human like manner instantaneously.

Also chatbots can handle multiple customer interactions simultaneously, increasing efficiency and response rate, therefore the leads can be generated and nurtured building a customer loyalty.

These AI powered sales chatbots automate follow-ups and sending personalized promotions or discounts, helps you nurture leads and encourage repeat purchases. 

Benefits of using Conversational AI Chatbot for sales?

Conversational AI bots offer a range of benefits for businesses looking to increase sales revenue. By using chatbots for lead generation, product recommendations, sales assistance, upselling and cross-selling, and cart abandonment recovery, businesses can provide a personalized and engaging sales experience for customers.

1. Lead Generation:

Conversational AI bots can help businesses generate leads by engaging with potential customers and collecting their contact information. These bots can initiate conversations with users, ask qualifying questions, and encourage users to sign up for newsletters, demos, or consultations. For example, a real estate company can use a chatbot to ask users about their housing preferences and then schedule a tour of properties that fit their criteria.

2. Product Recommendations:

Using conversational AI bots, businesses can analyze customer data to provide tailored product recommendations. By understanding customer behavior, preferences, and purchase history, chatbots can suggest products that are most likely to interest users. For example, a beauty brand can use a chatbot to recommend skincare products based on the user’s skin type and concerns.

3. Sales Assistance:

Conversational AI bots can provide sales assistance by answering customer inquiries, providing product information, and guiding customers through the sales process. By automating these routine tasks, sales teams can focus on more complex tasks. For example, an e-commerce store can use a chatbot to answer customer questions about shipping, returns, and product availability.

4. Upselling and Cross-selling:

Businesses can increase revenue by suggesting complementary products or upgrades to existing customers on conversational AI chatbots. By analyzing customer data and purchase history, chatbots can suggest products that are relevant to users. For example, a travel agency can use a chatbot to suggest travel insurance or upgrades to customers who have booked a trip.

5. Cart Abandonment Recovery:

Conversational AI bots can help recover lost sales by engaging with customers who have abandoned their shopping carts. By sending reminders, providing incentives, and addressing any concerns or questions, chatbots can encourage users to complete their purchases. For example, an online retailer can use a chatbot to send a discount code to customers who have abandoned their cart.

How to create effective AI powered Sales bot in 5 steps 

Keeping your chatbot sales-ready requires a deep understanding of the sales funnel, careful design and mapping of the conversation flow, personalized user experiences, and thorough training and testing. 

By following these steps, businesses can ensure that their chatbot is an effective tool for generating leads and increasing revenue.

1. Understand the Sales Funnel and Goals:

To keep your chatbot sales-ready, you must first understand the sales funnel and identify specific goals for your chatbot. Determine which stage of the sales funnel your chatbot will target and what actions you want users to take. This information will guide the design of your chatbot and ensure that it aligns with your overall sales strategy.

2. Design Your Sales Chatbot:

Designing your chatbot involves mapping out the conversation flow for your chatbot, determining what questions it will ask users and what responses it will provide. It also involves how to present these questions and answers, what integrations to use, and which channels you want to use to interact with the user.

3. Map out the Conversation Flow for Your Chatbot:

To create an effective sales chatbot, you must map out the conversation flow for your chatbot. This involves identifying the various user inputs and determining the appropriate responses to each input. By mapping the conversation flow, you can ensure your chatbot is engaging and responsive to user needs.

4. Personalize the Chatbot Experience:

Personalization is key to keeping your chatbot sales-ready. Businesses can provide tailored product recommendations and personalized offers by using customer data to personalize the chatbot experience. This can help increase sales and revenue.

5. Train and Test Your Sales Chatbot:

Once the chatbot is designed, it’s important to train the bot and test it thoroughly to ensure it functions as intended. This involves testing the chatbot with multiple scenarios and user inputs to identify any potential issues or areas for improvement. Ongoing training is also crucial to keep the chatbot up-to-date with the latest product information and sales strategies.

By using these 5 easy steps, you can create effective and efficient AI sales bot for your business.

Tips for Using Sales Chatbot

If you’re looking to improve your sales game and want to make the most of your chatbot, then you’re in the right place! Here are some expert tips to help you optimize your sales chatbot and generate more leads. 

1. Measure Metrics:

It’s important to measure metrics to track the effectiveness of the chatbot. Businesses should measure the number of leads generated, sales made, and revenue generated through the chatbot. By analyzing these metrics, businesses can identify areas for improvement and optimize their chatbot accordingly.

2. Keep Optimizing:

Businesses should regularly update and optimize their chatbot to provide the best possible user experience. This includes keeping the chatbot up-to-date with the latest product information, sales strategies, and customer feedback. For example, a fashion brand can update its chatbot with the latest clothing styles and trends to provide a relevant and engaging experience for users.

3. Provide Clear Call-to-Actions:

A successful sales chatbot should provide clear calls-to-action (CTAs) to guide users toward the next step in the sales funnel. These CTAs should be actionable, concise, and easy to follow. For example, a chatbot for a software company could use a CTA like “Book a Demo” to encourage users to schedule a product demonstration.

4. Integrate with CRM Systems:

To maximize the chatbot’s effectiveness, businesses should integrate it with their customer relationship management (CRM) system. This allows businesses to capture and store user data, track user behavior, and personalize the user experience. For example, a chatbot for a car dealership could integrate with the dealership’s CRM system to store user preferences and purchase history.

5. Provide Human Assistance:

While chatbots can handle routine tasks and answer common questions, there are times when users may need to speak with a human representative. Businesses should provide users with an option to speak with a human representative if needed. This can enhance the user experience and provide a more personalized sales experience. 

How Chat360 can help you boost Your Sales with a Conversational AI Sales chatbot

Implementing a conversational AI bot for sales can have a significant impact on your business. From generating leads to recovering abandoned carts, the possibilities are endless. Following the tips outlined in this blog allows you to design and maintain an effective sales chatbot that will improve customer satisfaction, increase sales, and streamline your sales process. 

So, why not take the first step today and try Chat360’s conversational AI bot for sales? With its advanced features and user-friendly interface, Chat360 can help you achieve your sales goals and take your business to the next level.

Schedule a free demo today!

The word automation isn’t limited to robots. Contemporarily, automation is way more than that. The recent advancement in technology is pushing the frontier of what automation can do. From forms that auto-populate with information when you use a web browser to calendars that automatically sync with email clients, automation has a broader spectrum.

Thereby, businesses worldwide are embracing automation to speed up formerly time-consuming processes and close operation gaps that otherwise involve hours of spreadsheet work. And no doubt, businesses using automation have seen higher revenue growth and higher profits than those who don’t.

The chatbot and conversational AI, for that matter, are capable autonomous systems that generate value by contemplating human labor in the workplace. However, both chatbot and conversational AI are not the same. Their features and capabilities are different. So let’s have a look at “chatbot vs. conversational AI.”

Difference between chatbot and conversational AI

Most often, chatbots and conversational AI are used synonymously, but if you go deeper, they are not the same, and their function varies. So let’s have a look at what the differences are 

Definition of Chatbot & Conversational AI

Chatbot is a rule-based technology that is designed for handling a very limited number of tasks. These chatbots provide branching questions for users to choose from. You’ll have to craft those questions and install them in the chatbot. That means the chatbot won’t be able to resolve queries that have not been previously defined.

Conversational AI is technologies like chatbots or virtual agents that are capable of understanding human language and interacting with them. They use large volumes of data, natural language processing, and machine learning to understand and interpret human language and respond accordingly. The simple chatbot capable of limited tasks now can go beyond and offer advanced assistance. Conversational AI enhances the chatbot’s ability to understand human language and provide transactional functionality.

Features of bot & Conversational AI

Chatbot

Chatbots are programmed to respond based on a predefined set of rules. They’ll not be able to respond to anything beyond the script.

They understand limited vocabulary or predefined keywords, so they don’t improve or learn themselves over time.

Chatbots can be used for simple tasks like providing basic information and answering FAQs.

Conversational AI 

Conversational AI is capable of handling complex conversations and offering personalized solutions by analyzing users’ preferences and behavior over time.

They use machine learning to analyze and evaluate consumers’ past interactions and improve themselves as time goes by.

AI-powered chatbots have a robust mechanism to resolve complex queries and later administer them.

How does it work?

Chatbot 

A simple chatbot takes the user’s input and sends it to the chatbot’s backend, where it analyzes the intent. Now it selects a response from pre-existing possible responses and sends it back to the users.

For instance, there might be a list of predefined responses to customer queries like “how to return the product?” “How do cancel the order?”. When users send queries from one of these, the chatbot will recognize the intent and provide a relevant response.

Here, the chatbot uses techniques like keyword matching to make the conversation feel more natural. Yet, they cannot understand human language.

Conversational AI

Conversational AI uses NLP and ML to come up with conversations that sound natural. The NLP transforms the unstructured data that can be read by a computer, analyzed, and generated an appropriate response. While ML algorithms help chatbots analyze the previous interaction, study human behavior, and offer tailored responses.

Use cases of Chatbot & Conversational AI

Chatbot

• Chatbot can be used for customer support to answer common and repetitive queries, such as how to track an order and how to return a product.
• A very common use of chatbots is appointment booking in various industries, like travel and tour, cinemas, hotels, hospitals, etc.
• The chatbot is very useful in offering the information like weather forecasts, movie showtimes, news, and more.
• Businesses can use chatbots to collect contact information from leads and then follow up with relevant interactions.

Conversational AI

• A conversational AI chatbot can be used in healthcare for diagnosing conditions. It asks patients a series of questions and then learns from their answers to get useful insights on potential health issues.
• In the retail business, conversational AI helps brands in lead generation, lead qualification, and lead nurturing throughout the journey. It helps with the best customer shopping experience.
• Conversational AI is useful in the recruitment process. It investigates information and evaluates the CV and recruitment form during the hiring process.
• The finance industry uses conversational AI in fraud detection. If any suspicious activity takes place, the AI automatically recognizes it and indicates fraud.

Future of chatbot and conversational AI

Conversational AI technologies, including chatbots, voice assistants, and virtual agents, have become exceptionally popular in the past few years. And the trend seems to continue for years to come. The conversational AI market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 24.5% in the 2022-2031 timeframe. Hence, we’ll most probably see the use of chatbots multiplying over the next few years. 

That also means chatbots and conversational AI are going to be more sophisticated with time. They will be even more capable of getting human emotions right. Users will get better-personalized solutions, including tailored recommendations, targeted messaging, responses, etc. 

Other than that, conversational AI will have an expansion of integrations. They’ll be working alongside human agents. So it would be wrong to say that conversational AI will replace humans in their jobs. But instead, they’ll be a great helping hand and ensure the support that humans need.

Conclusion

Chatbots and conversational AI aren’t going anywhere. They’ve become a mainstream technology in most organizations. So, if you want your business to have a competitive advantage, you must include these technologies in your business.

It will help you engage better with your customer in a more natural and personalized way. You will be able to collect and analyze data from customer interaction and offer valuable insight into customer tastes and preferences, and pain points. This can further help you improve your product and service and enhance the overall customer experience.

Further, read:

Chatbot Vs Chatbox

Communication with businesses is evolving. And AI-powered chatbots have become an increasingly popular form of customer service and communication. From answering customer queries to providing support, AI chatbots are solving several problems, and businesses are eager to adopt them.

The rise of chatbots can be attributed to advancements in AI, particularly in the fields of natural language processing (NLP), natural language understanding (NLU), and natural language generation (NLG). These technologies allow chatbots to understand and respond to human language in an accurate and natural way.

NLP, NLU, and NLG are different branches of AI, and they each have their own distinct functions. NLP involves processing large amounts of natural language data, while NLU is concerned with interpreting the meaning behind that data. NLG, on the other hand, involves using algorithms to generate human-like language in response to specific prompts.

These technologies work together to create intelligent chatbots that can handle various customer service tasks. As we see advancements in AI technology, we can expect chatbots to have more efficient and human-like interactions with customers.

What are NLP, NLU, and NLG?

NLP, NLU, and NLG are all branches of AI that work together to enable computers to understand and interact with human language. They work together to create intelligent chatbots that can understand, interpret, and respond to natural language queries in a way that is both efficient and human-like.

Natural Language Processing (NLP)

NLP involves the processing of large amounts of natural language data, including tasks like tokenization, part-of-speech tagging, and syntactic parsing. A chatbot may use NLP to understand the structure of a customer’s sentence and identify the main topic or keyword. For example, if a customer says, “I want to order a pizza with extra cheese and pepperoni,” the AI chatbot uses NLP to understand that the customer wants to order a pizza and that the pizza should have extra cheese and pepperoni.

Natural Language Understanding (NLU)

NLU focuses on interpreting the meaning behind customer queries. It involves tasks like entity recognition, intent recognition, and context management. NLU helps chatbots to understand the purpose of a customer’s query. For example, if a customer says, “What are your business hours?” the chatbot uses NLU to understand that the customer is asking about the business hours of the company and provide a relevant response.

Natural Language Generation (NLG)

NLG is concerned with generating human-like language in response to specific prompts and involves tasks like content planning, sentence planning, and realization. It helps chatbots to generate responses that are natural-sounding and relevant to the customer’s query. For example, if a customer asks, “When will my order arrive?” the chatbot uses NLG to generate a response like “Your order should arrive within 3-5 business days.”

Key Components of NLP, NLU, and NLG

Now that we understand the basics of NLP, NLU, and NLG, let’s take a closer look at the key components of each technology. These components are the building blocks that work together to enable chatbots to understand, interpret, and generate natural language data. By leveraging these technologies, chatbots can provide efficient and effective customer service and support, freeing up human agents to focus on more complex tasks.

The Key Components of NLP:

1. Tokenization: dividing a sentence into individual words or phrases. Consider the sentence, “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” Tokenization would break this sentence down into individual words: “The,” “quick,” “brown,” “fox,” “jumps,” “over,” “the,” “lazy,” and “dog.”
2. Part-of-speech (POS) tagging: identifying the parts of speech for each word in a sentence (e.g., noun, verb, adjective, etc.). Continuing the previous example, POS tagging would assign a part of speech to each word in the sentence. For example, “The” would be tagged as a determiner, “quick” as an adjective, “brown” as an adjective, “fox” as a noun, “jumps” as a verb, and so on.
3. Parsing: determining the grammatical structure of a sentence. Using the same sentence as before, parsing would help to identify the grammatical structure of the sentence. For example, “The quick brown fox” is the sentence’s subject, and “jumps over the lazy dog” is the predicate.

Key Components of NLU:

1. Entity recognition: identifying important entities in a sentence, such as names, places, and dates. In the sentence “John is going to New York next week,” it identifies “John” as a person, “New York” as a place, and “next week” as a date.
2. Intent recognition: determining the purpose or intent of a customer’s query. The query “What are the hours of operation for the restaurant?”, identifies that the customer intents to find out the opening hours of the restaurant.
3. Context management: keeping track of the conversation history and using that information to provide more accurate responses. In a conversation between a customer and a chatbot, context management would keep track of the previous questions and answers exchanged between the two and use that information for more accurate and personalized responses.

The Key Components of NLG:

1. Content planning: determining the key points or messages that should be included in a response. In response to a customer’s question about a product, content planning involves determining the key features and benefits of the product that should be highlighted in the response.
2. Sentence planning: deciding on the structure of the response and selecting appropriate phrases and wording. In the same example, sentence planning involves deciding on the structure of the response and selecting appropriate phrases and wording to effectively communicate the information.
3. Realization: generating the final response and ensuring it is grammatically correct and natural-sounding. With the above example, realization involves generating a grammatically correct and natural-sounding response that communicates the information about the product.

How are NLP, NLU, and NLG Applied?

Some common applications of NLP include sentiment analysis, machine translation, speech recognition, chatbots, and text summarization. NLP is used in industries such as healthcare, finance, e-commerce, and social media, among others. For example, in healthcare, NLP is used to extract medical information from patient records and clinical notes to improve patient care and research.

NLU is used to understand the intent and context of human language. This technology is used in chatbots that help customers with their queries, virtual assistants that help with scheduling, and smart home devices that respond to voice commands.

NLG is used to generate human-like responses in natural language. This technology is used in applications like automated report writing, customer service, and content creation. For example, a weather app may use NLG to generate a personalized weather report for a user based on their location and interests.

Advancements in NLP, NLU, and NLG

The future of NLP, NLU, and NLG is very promising, with many advancements in these technologies already being made and many more expected in the future.

One main area of advancement in NLP is deep learning and neural networks. These techniques have been shown to greatly improve the accuracy of NLP tasks, such as sentiment analysis, machine translation, and speech recognition. As these techniques continue to develop, we can expect to see even more accurate and efficient NLP algorithms.

Similarly, NLU is expected to benefit from advances in deep learning and neural networks. We can expect to see virtual assistants and chatbots that can better understand natural language and provide more accurate and personalized responses. Additionally, NLU is expected to become more context-aware, meaning that virtual assistants and chatbots will better understand the context of a user’s query and provide more relevant responses.

NLG is also expected to see advancements in the area of content creation. As NLG algorithms become more sophisticated, they can generate more natural-sounding and engaging content. This has implications for various industries, including journalism, marketing, and e-commerce.

Another area of advancement in NLP, NLU, and NLG is integrating these technologies with other emerging technologies, such as augmented and virtual reality. As these technologies continue to develop, we can expect to see more immersive and interactive experiences that are powered by natural language processing, understanding, and generation.

NLP, NLU, and NLG: Different Yet Complementary Technologies for Natural Communication

While NLU, NLP, and NLG are often used interchangeably, they are distinct technologies that serve different purposes in natural language communication. NLP focuses on processing and analyzing data to extract meaning and insights. NLU is concerned with understanding the meaning and intent behind data, while NLG is focused on generating natural-sounding responses.

While each technology has its own unique set of applications and use cases, the lines between them are becoming increasingly blurred as they continue to evolve and converge. With the advancements in machine learning, deep learning, and neural networks, we can expect to see even more powerful and accurate NLP, NLU, and NLG applications in the future.

As the demand for natural language communication in various industries continues to grow, NLP, NLU, and NLG will continue to play an increasingly important role in transforming the way we interact with technology, particularly chatbots. Understanding the differences between these technologies and their potential applications can help individuals and organizations better leverage them to achieve their goals and stay ahead of the curve in an increasingly digital world.

No business today can deny the benefits that digitization brings. Especially in the world today after the pandemic, there has been a need for efficiency to maintain growth and even survive the tough competition. So businesses are spending more on digital transformation plans.

So, adopting automation has become a “can’t do without”. It has become a crucial part of any business to drive down costs, increase efficiency and enhance both customer and employee satisfaction.

And that’s what Chatbots and Robotics Process Automation are for. This automation helps businesses streamline various processes and get rid of manual, paper-based processes. These tools have emerged as new technologies to gain data and execute more agile operations. But, it’s easy to get confused with both tools as both focus on automation. But there’s a difference between them. Let’s have a look.

Chatbot Vs RPA: Difference between Chatbot and RPA

The primary motive of both chatbot and RPA is to automate time-consuming manual processes. Yet, there’s a difference between what they automate and how they automate.

RPA is process driven. It automates pre-built processes for the end users. Which means it automates tasks that are programmed by humans beforehand. Whereas AI chatbots are data-driven. They enable systems to learn from data without being explicitly programmed.

RPA can only understand structured data. Meaning that it can only do basic automation. But, chatbots work with sophisticated structured data.

RPA is incapable of intelligent thought. But chatbots develop their logic and improvised actions with the help of NLP and ML.

Chatbots are used for external business purposes like customer service and marketing. And RPA is used for internal organizational purposes like assignments.

The implementation of RPA is cheaper compared to chatbots.

While RPA uses the existing IT infrastructure of the system, chatbot requires a whole team of software development teams to work on it.

Examples of Chatbot and RPA

A. Chatbot

1. Checking inventory and finding products

Customers sometimes don’t find what they are looking for. So checking the inventory for that specific item can solve the problem. However, customer support representatives will have to check the inventory manually, whereas a chatbot is capable of providing a prompt answer by looking through the site’s database. 

Chatbot asks questions to customers, and based on the given answer, it offers personalized recommendations for them.

2. Performing exchanges and refunds

Exchanges and refunds are very common and repetitive requests customer support representatives get. Businesses mostly have a policy in place for processing such requests. These requests are monotonous and repetitive to support representatives. 

A well-trained chatbot collects required information like order number and reason for the exchange and refund. And then, it checks whether the product is eligible for exchange or refund as per the company’s policy. Further, the chatbot assists customers with regular updates regarding the refund process.

3. Order confirmation and tracking shipping

Customers want updates regarding shipping information once the order is placed. Chatbots offer a convincing and accessible way for customers to get information about their orders. Unlike the traditional way, where a customer had to go through a long process of navigating through complex websites. 

Once the order is confirmed, the chatbot sends an automated message with details like item, quantity, price, estimated time of delivery, etc. Apart from that, it sends customers notifications when their order is out for delivery. Customers can then track the package in real-time.

4. Appointment booking

The advanced AI chatbot can enable automated appointment booking to help customers book instantly from various social media platforms. That’s why industries like health care, hospitality, and personal services are embracing chatbots to a great extent. You can connect your chatbot with a calendar and offer appointment slots to your visitors. The chatbot analyzes the company’s calendar and confirms availability for the requested time and date. Everything without human aid.

B. RPA

1. Data migration/entry and form processing.

While shifting from legacy systems to newer systems, employees need to transfer the relevant information, too. RPA can take care of such a manual process and complete it without any errors. The RPA solution reads the paper form and then gets the data into the system and frees humans for complex tasks.

2. Customer order processing

The whole process of placing orders is similar from start to end. And employees for such repetitive tasks can be time-consuming as well as mundane, and also have chances for more errors. RPA solutions can be programmed to automatically fill up order details from orders received via different channels into the company’s order processing system. 

Not only that, the RPA can be programmed to validate orders against specific criteria like product availability and customer credit limits. It lowers cost, boosts ROI, and improves customer experience.

3. System setup

When a new employee is introduced to your organization, you’ll have to provide the employee with an email account, software license, and computer devices. These tasks can be easily handled by RPA without any human help. The process remains the same and automation is possible.

4. Processing payroll

RPA solutions can extract useful data from timesheets, calculate employees’ pay, and perform the necessary bank transaction. It also generates payslips automatically and accurately. Hence, there’s a chance of less error.

How to choose the right solution for your business?

Choosing the right solution for your business depends on the requirement and goals of your business.

Chatbots are designed to interact with humans in near-to-human language whereas RPA operates in the background without any human interaction. So chatbots are capable of handling large volumes of interactions with customers.

However, RPA should always be a part of the AI chatbot to automate business processes in an intuitive and scalable way.The combination of RPA and AI results in the use of big data and predictive analytics, which gives AI the power to perform complex tasks.

Final thoughts

We’ve concluded that conversational AI improves customer and employee engagement, whereas RPA underlines time-intensive processes.

If you combine the power of both, there is going to be a huge transformation. Businesses can reap enormous benefits from both technologies at once.

If done well, the integration of AI chatbot and RPA can take automated processes to the next level.

The cognitive intelligence of AI chatbots can enhance the automation capabilities of RPA. Their partnership can boost process productivity and efficiency. It would help companies deliver meaningful customer and employee experiences and further generate value for all stakeholders.

Further, read:

Chatbot Vs Conversational AI

Chatbot Vs Chatbox