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Chat bots are fast becoming established as part of the enterprise messaging mix

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Enterprise Messaging is moving beyond SMS to include new interactive and richer messaging formats as part of a mix of messaging solutions.

Our Enterprise Messaging Survey 2017 developed in partnership with Ovum, explores the business appetite for the rapidly-evolving Enterprise Messaging sector. Alongside A2P SMS and messaging based on RCS, it’s chat bots that are capturing the imagination of Enterprises, which arguably received a significant boost with Facebook’s launch of bots on its Messenger platform in 2016.

Here’s how chat bots are taking hold:

  1. 25% of respondents in the survey indicated that they are using chat bots to automate customer interactivity and a further 32% indicated that they are trialling chat bots.
  2. Chat bots are being operated across multiple channels. 84% of those that have already deployed a chat bot have done so via a chat app, whilst 76% are using social media platforms like Twitter Direct Messages.
  3. Whilst chat apps and social media are delivering a significant portion of the chat bot traffic, 48% of respondents rely on the ubiquitous, handset agnostic, SMS to deliver a chat bot experience to customers.
  4. Improving customer experience and customer service is the primary driver for deploying a chat bot: 96% use chatbots to provide easy access to content and services, 92% use them to automate customer-facing functions, 88% use them to help improve customer service and reduce churn and 76% use them to include in–message payment options.
  5. Chat bots are helping enterprises control the cost of customer interactivity with 84% of respondents using them to reduce back-end costs, and 72% indicating that they felt chat bots were cheaper and more effective than developing and distributing an app.
  6. Some enterprises are already measuring the benefits of chat bots to their bottom line. 72% have seen increased revenues, and 64% have experienced reduced customer churn.