Chatbot and Mobile Apps- Play Intelligently While Integrating
Chatbots centrally whim to make use of a customary messaging channel for its deployments like Facebook Messenger or Skype. But as Andy Groves had quoted, “Privacy is one of the biggest problems in this new electronic age,� the question regarding the security of the data always remains a matter of concern. To avoid any kind of security blunders, enterprises are reckoning to build conversational bots in the customer’s private channel. Enterprises have a common practice of employing web chat services on their websites. This serves the primary purpose of live chat with the customers or chatbot self-service. Some businesses are moving a step further in this cut-throat competition of satisfying customers with their services. They are into transferring this conversational experience straight into their mobile apps.
Before integrating a bot with the app, let us look upon the different types of app: 1. Native Mobile App By using Direct Line API, native code apps can communicate with the bot framework via REST or web sockets.
2. Web-based mobile app
Structures and web language used to build a mobile app such as Cordova may establish a communication with the Bot using similar components of that of a bot embedded within a website using with a difference which is encapsulated within the shell of a native app.
3. IoT App With the help of the Direct Line API, communication between an IoT app and the Bot Framework can be carried out. For enabling capabilities such as image recognition and speech, there might be a need for using Microsoft Cognitive Services.
The integration of Chatbots with mobile apps the companies have opted in three different ways: 1. Chatbot as an app 2. Chatbot in a tab 3. Chatbot as UI
1. Chatbot as an App Objective: Provision for a secure, dedicated, 24X7 conversational channel for the customers. As the heading goes, all you are required to do is bundling a chatbot within a mobile app. Once done, distribute to the app stores.
Advantage: 1. Data privacy is maintained as there is no data sharing with social networks or third-party companies. 2. Chatbot development is budget friendly. Therefore developing a chatbot is much preferable than building an app with similar features. 3. Chatbots help to get rid of the complexity of structuring and reinforcing complex UI screens and interactions. 4. No dependency on the limitation of external messaging providers. 5. The rich UI is completely controlled within the conversational UI completely. 6. The need for learning curves for the users is absent except for the transactional bot.
Disadvantage: 1. There is always a need to download the mobile app.
2. There is always an extra acquisition cost for establishing a user base in a new mobile app. 3. A traditional UI is much suitable for charts or shopping cart.
The right time to have a chatbot as an App:
As per the conversations with the customers who have a will to own a chatbot as a mobile app, the majority aim to implement chatbots that are focused on internal employee facing scenarios. Reason Behind this: The enterprise-grade messaging platforms like Skype for Business hasn’t tried their hands on the consumer platforms for chatbot support, adoption, and ecosystem.
Case Study: Operator | iOS Source: http://operator.com/
If you have to order a casio for your eight years old, Operator is there for you. It is an app designed in aiding people in buying things. Tell your requirement to Operator by texting it, and someone somewhere will start researching for the best deal that would suit you. In other words, the chatbot plays the role of the middleman. The role of the Operator is to read the message by the user and analyze it and determine which is the perfect fit for the user of the Operator. Click here to read more