If you are wondering what a chatbot is, or why they are significant, or whether they should be included in your marketing strategy - have a look [here]
As a reminder, let’s recap the value of what we are talking about:
for all kinds of chatbots - reports value the chatbot market at USD 17.17 billion in 2020, and it is projected to reach USD 102.29 billion by 2026 [www.mordorintelligence.com]
Non-voice chatbots - more modest, reports predicts that chatbot marketing will grow to 6 billion USD by 2023. More modest but still significant. [www.marketresearchfuture.com]
Chatbots and likely to become increasingly significant - in improving the 'customer experience' (CX), in driving conversational commerce and in driving your sales and marketing forward.
Any company or business looking to progress in the market, to get ahead and grow, needs to innovate and plan. It needs to be aware of trends that are happening in their industry and the world that their customers inhabit. It needs to take into account new technologies, new trends, new industries, new capabilities becoming available. This should be a factor in your Risk Management, your Product Development, your Business Strategy development, your Marketing Strategy... Get this wrong at your peril. Just look at the classic examples of Blockbuster and Kodak. I think "conversational commerce" represents a 'paradigm-shift'. Yet, as significant as "conversational commerce" is, I think it is a relatively small part of a much bigger seed-change – "conversational communication". This has the potential to change all bussiness-to-customer, business-to-business and intra-business communication. It is no longer the case of, "Here's a bunch of general information, consume it and sift it for what you need." It is much more a case of, "who are you, what do you need, how can I best meet that need for you personally – and yes, here is some very specific information targetted to you specifically, and in fact, let me help you get what you need." Chatbots very easily enable this.
For this article, let's stick with "conversational commerce" and marketing. I think it is something that all companies need to look at - the state, relevance and completeness of your marketing strategy. If there are big gaps here - what are you doing, and what will be the consequence of that ... long term?
As companies and businesses up their game on the social media platforms with their increasing capabilities and reach, and as chatbots become more prevalent, with increasingly sophisticated features – one big question: who will build the chatbots? In-house with the investment in technology and skill-set required? Outsource?
It is perhaps a question that every company looking to take advantage of the advances in the technologies around us needs to answer.
This is where Chatbot-as-a-Service (CaaS) comes in. We can offer:
chatbot design, building and ongoing maintenance – catering for ongoing marketing campaigns and features
fitting all of this into your existing marketing strategy
filling gaps in your existing marketing strategy, and taking advantage of low-hanging fruit
Significantly, this highlights an opportunity for Marketing Agencies. If you are already talking to clients about any aspect of marketing, and are not mentioning current advances and developments in social media, chatbots and conversational commerce – I think that a) you are missing a significant opportunity yourself and b) missing a significant opportunity to add value to your customers.
As always, the biggest imperative for me is getting your strategy right. How will you adapt you business and marketing strategies to current advances and developments in social media, chatbots and conversational commerce?
If you find this of interest, contact me.