How to Turn FAQs into a Chatbot

Including an FAQ page on your website sounds like a no-brainer. If lots of people contact your company with the same questions day after day, list the answers on your site in one convenient spot so they can resolve the inquiry themselves. The only problem? People don’t like sifting through lots of questions that aren’t their own, trying to uncover the one that solves their problem. So what do they do? Skip the FAQ page, contact you directly and we’re back to square one. If FAQ pages don’t work, what’s the alternative? Your friendly neighborhood chatbot.

Full disclosure, chatbots are capable of far more complex tasks than just answering simple FAQs. As machine learning continues to evolve, chatbots are able to tackle far mightier requests than, “What are your hours?” but if it fits your business needs and you’re looking for a great, entry-level method of introducing AI into your company, converting your FAQs to a bot is a wonderful place to start. So let’s get started!

First, make your FAQ list and check it twice. This will be easier if your company already has a set of FAQs, but even if one exists for you, take time to review and ensure all of the information is accurate and up to date. 

From these FAQs, you can build out your question trees. Consumers won’t have just one question to ask, so find logical sequences of questions or find places to connect one response to a possible upsell or additional information. The deeper you can draw a consumer into using your bot, the more likely they are to use it again.

When writing your responses, make sure you keep the tone of your bot in mind. You want it to align with your organization’s voice, with the same personality and vocabulary your consumers are used to when dealing with your company. Be sure to also keep responses sounding as human as possible. We recommend disclosing that your customers are talking to a bot, but that doesn’t mean it has to sound like they’re talking to an encyclopedia.

If necessary, don’t forget to include responses that connect consumers to a live person. While ideally your bot will be able to answer whatever comes its way, it may be presented with some inquiries that require transferring the individual to a live staff member. With chatbots and cloud scheduling tools combined, it’s easy to use a live-person interaction as an opportunity to book demos, sales appointments, visits and more. Make sure this is an option in your dialogue trees, to avoid looping the consumer around with responses that don’t answer their question, or worse, tell them you can’t help them and leave it at that.

Once you have all the dialogue mapped out, it’s time to build the bot. Whether you want your chat solution to exist on your website, or if Messenger is the place you want to be, it’s important to choose a channel that meets your customers where they already are. Unsure about the best platform to reach your customers? At Botco.ai, we’re happy to help you work through a conversational marketing strategy that makes the most sense for your organization’s unique needs and challenges. In addition, we’re happy to guide you every step of the way if this is your first time designing your bot. Consider us your partner along every step of your AI journey.

Once your bot is built, test, test and test some more. It’s important to make sure there aren’t any broken dialogue trees or dead ends in your responses. This will also make sure you’ve covered all relevant questions and responses, thus improving your consumers’ journey.