The concept of Hybrid bot is trending in the customer service space. The customer expectations towards a business constantly evolve based on how they prefer consuming content. 90% of businesses report faster complaint resolution with bots. And 86% of customers believe that there should be an “Escalate to agent” option when talking to a chatbot. While these expectations have their ebb and flow, companies find it difficult to meet them. The omnichannel volume of messages is ever-growing. A centralised customer service management becomes imperative in this case.

With a single platform in place, various activities can be streamlined. Moreover, with the automation of conversations via chatbots, the training time of agents is also reduced. Thanks to the advancements in natural language processing, communication has now become automatic. However, chatbots can be quite disappointing sometimes. In fact, more than half of the customer requests aren’t understood well by the chatbots.

This is exactly why the chat flow needs human intervention at some point in the conversation. Most of the human requests are misunderstood by the bot which causes frustration for clients. And as a rule of thumb:

Annoying the customer any further can cause them to abandon your brand. The limitations of chatbots have made it imperative for a human to take over. Which brings us to our solution.

Hybrid Bot to Save the Day! 

There are lots of ways in which you can connect with your customers quickly to provide assistance. Here are a few popular options.

Live Chat: Live Chat is when the website enables visitors to talk directly to the human agent. The user can see a chat window pop up when they visit the website. This type of live agent chatbot helps in providing real-time support. The chatbot live agent is a great way of assisting customers within no time. The user doesn’t have to wait around to get the solution they are seeking. One quick chat with the live agent and their problems are solved. If you get the same type of queries you can also opt for virtual agent chatbot. A virtual agent is an artificial intelligence virtual character that acts like a real agent.

Messaging: You can also provide support to visitors through messaging platforms such as WhatsApp, Viber, and WeChat which helps you connect one on one with customers. Aspects like chatbot WhatsApp integration can help wherein the bot sends messages directly to the person’s WhatsApp.

In-app Messaging: In-app messaging is when you interact with the customers through your official mobile app. While using your product/service, the customers can connect with you to get the solution.

While these options are good as standalone solutions, they are not comprehensive. For instance, in a live chat option, one has to engage the entire customer support team. Likewise, in messaging, the customers cannot connect with an agent if they wish.

On the other hand, a hybrid chatbot initiates a conversation with the customer through automated chats. During the chat, if the customer needs help from humans then a human agent can step in. It is an excellent model that provides complete assistance to customers.

10 Reasons why the Human + Bot Model is a great idea

1. Improved Customer Delight

The customers certainly don’t want to be left with their questions unanswered. And you know what’s even better? When the customers get answers to their questions right away! Chatbots can be immensely helpful in providing answers immediately.

A hybrid bot makes sure that the customer queries are answered by the chatbot. Thus, only complex and important concerns are escalated to human agents. This also gives them significant time to focus on pressing issues. It is no news that the customer-centric approach helps the business in succeeding. And a well-designed chatbot can work wonders.

How about a chatbot that you can get up and running within minutes? Is powered by simple spreadsheets that you simply have to edit. And, supports human takeover which is the backbone of the human hybrid bot. Too good to be true? Well, not really! HybridChat supports the Human + Bot model and helps in boosting customer satisfaction.

2. Confining to automated chats isn’t comprehensive

If you fall back on chatbots that are only capable of automated chats then you are on a loss. This is because customers will need to speak with human agents at some point. And they will be least interested in dialing a toll-free number to reach the agent. Or to even wait for their email. You should have a hybrid model wherein the customer can talk to the human whenever they want.

Let’s say you have a job opening at your firm for which you need a chatbot for hiring. You can allocate the initial screening to a chatbot by feeding it with your questions. And for the following rounds, you can map the qualified candidates with a human agent. It’s a win-win!

3. Honing the Chatbot gradually 

Human agents can always keep tabs on the chats with the customers. So whenever a bot is unable to answer a question, the human agent can make a note of it. This way, the chat flow can be improved to be more comprehensive.

You can group the customer queries together to identify the frequently asked questions. It is recommended to update your chat flows such that the human agent can step in at the right time.

4. Right Help at the Right Time

A hybrid bot can help in real time prioritisation of requests. It can decide which aspects are to be covered by the chatbot and which part needs human expertise. As the agents can check which requests are important, they can jump into the conversation anytime. This is extremely helpful as the customer gets the right assistance at the perfect time.

They don’t have to wait for their urgent issues to get resolved. Moreover, it is handled by an expert in the field which gives power to the user. This ensures that you don’t lose customers because of not attending them on time.

5. Understand your customers better 

It has all the details about your target audience that can help you improve your offerings. You can see what type of questions your customers are asking and the concerns they express.

With a gamut of information, human agents can understand the common issues that customers face. It is an opportunity for you to learn about your customers. The chatbot human interaction is helpful that way.

6. The lesser workload for the customer support team

Apart from providing impeccable customer service, hybrid bots also help the agents in many ways. Agents can give their redundant tasks to chatbots. For instance, the frequently asked questions can be delegated to the bot. Human agents can take up queries which need their expertise.

Moreover, the business can handle multiple queries simultaneously owing to automated conversations. Human agents don’t have to dread handling 50 requests at the same time. This also saves a lot of their valuable time which can be focused on the core tasks.

7. Situational Human Intervention 

There are instances when users don’t ask to be connected with human agents, but it is required. Since customer care executives can see how the conversation is going, they can always step in if required.

The moment they feel as if the situation is going out of hand, they can introduce themselves and give the chat a new direction. At crucial times when the customer is reacting in a rather negative manner, human intervention can save the day. All thanks to the hybrid bot model.

8. A single platform for the entire communication

Let’s say a customer has a complaint about a product they bought on your website. They first type in the query and the bot answers it.

Later on, the customer requests to talk with a human and so the agents can easily assist them. All they need to do is to view the chat history and take over the conversation. Since the details are within a single chat window, the information stays intact.

9. Testing various use cases

If you are still skeptical about using a chatbot, you can always learn from the hybrid bot model. How, you ask? Simply chat with a customer pretending to be a bot and see how it goes. You can intuitively respond as there isn’t a strict script to follow.

You can do this for a variety of use cases where you wish to implement the hybrid bot model. Experimenting with the chat flows in real-time helps you decide where you would introduce the “talk to a human” option.

10. Setting up an awesome chatbot

With all the information gathered through a Human + Bot model, you can create an awesome chat flow. Moreover, the chatbot can always be improved with time.

It is even better if you can get the entire chat flow without putting in any effort. Which is when our chatbot templates step in! They are carefully curated after doing thorough research on relevant industries to build a chat flow that works.

Final Take: A hybrid bot model drastically improves customer service

Now that we understand the hybrid bot model better, it is quite apparent that it amps up the customer service! People looking for quick answers get it through chatbots. And those who have complex problems seek help from human agents for a personalised solution. Thus, both humans and bots work in sync to do what they do the best in their unique ways.

Do you wish to leverage the Human + Bot model to take your customer service to the next level? Sign up with Hybrid.Chat for FREE and experience the difference!