Deploying e-commerce chatbots

When your webshop is looking for a new customer service employee, various factors play a role. Think of availability, reliability and brand fit. Our current economy dictates that we are working 24 hours a day and 7 days a week and 50% of customers expect shops to be open or reachable 24/7. This is not always achievable, though; your human staff need sleep and days off, after all. Shops are extending their opening hours, but you as a webshop owner are already enormously ahead of this, since you are open 24 hours a day. But if your webshop is open 24 hours a day, people will also want assistance 24 hours a day. Your webshop is reachable day and night, so why not your customer service? Read in this article how you can deploy an e-commerce chatbot for your webshop, and what a chatbot can mean for your company.

Chatbot software: why?

Besides the fact that a chatbot works 24/7, there are more advantages to integrating a chatbot. A webshop chatbot is the type of chat platform where your customers can easily ask questions about your products, or find out how long the shipping time for their parcel is. The chatbot software then helps your customers by looking up the information they need, and by answering repetitive questions quickly and adequately. This lets your customer service staff focus on the more complex matters, and move their attention to the right place, while the chatbot handles the repeating questions. On top of that, an e-commerce chatbot is relatively a good deal cheaper in the long term than a human employee. You can have the bot work in different languages, so a chatbot in Dutch is also easy to achieve.

Your webshop chatbot as a marketing tool

Not only can a chatbot act as a customer service employee, but also as a marketing tool. 47% of customers say they are open to buying products via a chatbot and on average users are willing to spend more than 55 dollars on e-commerce chatbot purchases. In customer service customers also give clear answers, though: 71% of customers say they are open to a chatbot as a customer service employee. When you deploy a chatbot from Watermelon you can connect it to Google Tag Manager and easily base advertisements on your customers' previous website visits. On top of that, by deploying a chatbot on your website you get unique insight into your customers' buying behaviour. You see what they are looking for, at what time, when they found what they were looking for and all sorts of other crucial information that helps with determining your target audience.

Chatbots in retail

Besides sending parcel information, chatbots can also help with finding the nearest shop. This means customers find out exactly how they can find you. On top of that, the chatbot can inform your customers of new collections or make product recommendations. This makes a chatbot the ultimate tool for raising your sales figures, and you get more insight into your customers' wishes.

eBay's ShopBot

An example of a hugely successful webshop chatbot is eBay's. This bot helps consumers search for the right items, and browses the website for them. eBay's ShopBot also helps with finding the right size, though, or shows other colour options for a product. The bot also offers personalised products to customers, based on previous purchases. Besides customers being able to chat with the bot, they can also talk to it via their Google Home or they can send photos to the bot to find a similar product.

Start building: code-free!

Building an e-commerce chatbot does not have to be higher mathematics. With Watermelon's platform you can start building your chatbot, without having to code a single line. You easily adapt your chatbot to the style of your website by personalising the CXhub completely. On top of that you fill in the content of your e-commerce chatbot yourself and that way you make it entirely in the style you have in mind. Give your chatbot a name and create its own persona for it to really let it act as a digital colleague. Together with the features Watermelon offers you adapt your bot entirely to your own branding, and get the most out of your digital colleague.

Want to read more about successful e-commerce chatbots?

Would you like to know more about successful chatbots? Download the free whitepaper and read about the success stories of Stichting BKR and Hunter Douglas (Luxaflex), among others.