How to Choose the Best AI Chatbot for Customer Support

AI chatbots are all the rage. They are undeniably one of the most talked about tech products of recent times, and rightly so. Their rise has been rapid—they've immediately carved out use cases for themselves across several fields. From education and healthcare to entertainment and business, these powerful conversational tools are bringing automation and efficiency to nearly all areas of our daily lives.

Although AI chatbots are still finding their balance in some fields, one area where they’ve already proven their value is running customer support for businesses. AI chatbots in customer support can help speed up the resolution of customer complaints, automate repetitive tasks, and drive efficiency across the entire spectrum of customer support operations. If your business is not using AI chatbot as part of your customer support operations, you may be missing out.

Why Your Business Needs an AI Chatbot for Customer Support

If you’re not sold on the idea that your business needs an AI chatbot for customer support, here are a few reasons why you should be.

1. 24/7 Availability

AI chatbots are tireless workhorses—they'll work round the clock to provide your customers with assistance at any time of the day or night. While your regular customer service agents can only work for limited hours, AI chatbots can fill in for them at those odd hours of the night or during holidays when your regular customer support isn't active. This ensures that customers can get support even outside regular business hours, leading to increased customer satisfaction.

2. Cost Savings

Using AI chatbots for customer service can substantially lower your customer support costs. AI chatbots are capable of managing a high volume of customer inquiries at once, reducing the need for large teams of human support staff. This means businesses can save money on labor costs associated with customer service operations. Even when your business grows–resulting in an increase in customer support requests–AI chatbots are very scalable without necessarily requiring a proportional increase in customer support cost.

3. Efficiency

One of the biggest selling points of AI chatbots is the efficiency it introduces to your customer support operations. Although human support staff will always have that unique human advantage, the efficiency that AI chatbots bring to the table through speed, accuracy, and consistency cannot be matched by even the best human support staff. Of course, increased efficiency means satisfied customers, and satisfied customers in turn mean a happy business. It's a win-win for everyone.

4. Data Collection and Analysis

The right business data is crucial to making informed decisions for your business. Fortunately, AI chatbots are a powerful tool to help your business collect and analyze actionable business data at scale. What questions are your customers asking frequently? Which of your products are they asking about most? What do your customers love most about your business? What do they hate most? What do they want to see more of? AI chatbots can help you answer all these questions and many more through the data they collect. The data curated using AI chatbots can help your business understand customers better and make smarter business choices.

5. Multi-Language Support

If you’re running a global business with customers from different countries, be it small or medium-scale, one of the most effective ways to bridge the language barrier between your company and customers is to deploy an AI chatbot. Also, customer complaints can be resolved more effectively when customers describe their problems in the language they are most comfortable with. AI chatbots can give your business the luxury of providing multi-language support to customers around the world at no additional cost.

What Makes a Good Customer Support AI Chatbot?

So you've decided that AI chatbots may indeed find a home in your customer support operations. And you've come to embrace the benefits it could potentially offer. But how exactly do you pick an AI chatbot that meets the customer support needs of your business? What are the things you should consider? Curious?

Well, here are some key questions you should ask before choosing a customer support AI chatbot for your business.

1. What Do You Want to Use it for?

Yes, it’s meant to be a customer support chatbot, but what is the nature of the customer support work it would be doing for your business? Are you looking for a chatbot to answer simple questions about your products or services? Do you need a bot that can handle complex queries and guide the user through taking complex actions on your website? Is your goal to have a chatbot engage customers until a customer care agent can intervene? Or, are you in need of a chatbot that can perform more advanced functions, maybe assisting customers in completing transactions on an e-commerce platform? What role the chatbot will play within your customer support operations is the first and perhaps most important question that needs to guide the whole selection process–your choice of chatbot needs to fit its intended purpose. Once you have a clear picture of the role the chatbot will have in your customer support operations, you can start exploring the options that could fit your needs.

Chatbase AI chatbots are very versatile and can be configured to take on a variety of roles. This includes answering customer questions about your products or services, guiding users in a detailed manner on how to perform actions on your website, recording customer complaints that can later be taken up by human customer care agents, or collecting data that can be used to make better business decisions.

2. How Customizable Is It?

If you're introducing an AI chatbot to your business operations, you should ideally have as much control over it as possible. Remember, this is your business—a financial investment worth protecting. You must make sure you choose a chatbot you can mold to align with your brand image, voice, and marketing strategy. Your AI chatbot should be customizable enough such that you can make it speak the language of your business. So, before settling for a chatbot, find out what customization you'd love to make, and see whether your chatbot platform offers such options.

Chatbase offers a wide range of customization and personalization options. You can change everything from the welcome message to the chatbot's appearance and persona. Chatbase offers a wide range of customization options you can take advantage of to create a chatbot that matches your brand.

3. How Smart Is It?

It's an AI chatbot alright, but how smart is it? Being an AI chatbot doesn't automatically mean it is smart enough for your business—all AI chatbots are not equal. So, before settling for an AI chatbot, find out how "intelligent" it is. Depending on the AI model that powers it and how it is deployed, how intelligent an AI chatbot is can vary broadly. A good indicator is the AI model that powers the chatbot. AI chatbots powered by powerful AI models like OpenAI's GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 are great options.

In case you're wondering; but it's just going to be answering simple questions, does it have to be that smart? Well yes, it does. How smart your customer support AI chatbot is, can directly impact your business operations. For instance, if you want to sell more of your higher-priced products to customers, it's easy for human support staff to nudge customers in that direction during inquiries. But is your AI chatbot smart enough to do the same? Or potentially even outdo a human support staff in executing this strategy? Smarter AI chatbots can do this, almost flawlessly—the same can't be said of all AI chatbots in the market. So, by all means, go for an AI chatbot that's smart enough to understand the intricacies of your products and business operations as a whole.

When you create a bot with Chatbase, you get an AI chatbot that is powered by OpenAI’s GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 AI Models, which are currently the most powerful commercially available AI models in the world. In order, Chatbase chatbots are among the smartest AI chatbots you can get your hands on, with a demonstrated ability to complex customer support conversations.

4. How Many Languages Does it Support?

The primary function of a customer support chatbot is to help customers through conversation—and in a language that they'll understand. Of course, all your customers are not going to speak or understand the same language especially if your business serves a global audience. This is why choosing a chatbot that supports multiple major languages is ideal so that customers are not limited by language barriers when seeking help. The chatbot should be capable of seamless conversations in at least the core languages spoken by your target demographics. This allows customers to explain issues and ask questions in a language they are comfortable with, improving the overall customer experience.

Chatbase chatbots can proficiently handle conversations in dozens of languages. From major world languages like English, Chinese, French, and Spanish, to lesser-spoken languages like Japanese, and Korean, Chatbase chatbots can offer the best customer support experience in the language that your customers speak.

5. How Easy Is it to Use?

Most businesses probably do not have the luxury of a technical department to handle the deployment and maintenance of their chatbot. You need a chatbot that is very powerful but very easy to use. So, before settling for an AI chatbot, you need to answer some key questions regarding its ease of use. How easy is it to set up and configure? If something should go wrong with the chatbot, how easy is it to get it back up and running? How easy is it to find and use the features you need? How easy is it to add new features and capabilities to the chatbot? Complexity doesn't necessarily translate to better functionality. Go for simple yet powerful options.

Chatbase makes chatbot creation easy for any skill level. With an intuitive bot builder, users can configure powerful AI chatbots in just minutes without any special technical skills. The step-by-step interface enables anyone to build and customize bots that meet their needs through a guided process. It represents a good balance between functionality and ease of use.

The Best AI Chatbot for Customer Support

A good AI chatbot can play a pivotal role in your business's success. However, many who use AI chatbots still struggle with long wait times, limited service hours, and unresolved complaints which can be frustrating for both customers and staff.

Chatbase chatbots, powered by one of the most advanced AI technologies can help make your customer support operations faster, easier, and more effective. Chatbase's AI chatbot can act as your customer service agent that's available 24/7. It can understand complex customer questions about your business and guide users through detailed resolutions.

The features speak for themselves:

• 24/7 availability to instantly resolve customer issues anytime
• Seamless conversations in dozens of languages
• Insights into how your customers interact with the chatbots
• Mechanisms to capture leads and drive conversions
• Robust security and privacy mechanisms
• Lots of customization options
• Simple and intuitive user interface
• Integration with tools like Slack, WhatsApp, Zapier and more.

Don't lose customers due to poor support. Deploy Chatbase's AI chatbot to provide instant, always-on customer service. Your customers will love the quick resolution and your business will benefit from higher efficiency and lower costs.

See for yourself how Chatbase can transform your customer experience. Get started with a free account today!