1. Decide how you want to use chatbots
Before you start building your chatbot, you need to decide how you want to use it. Is it going to be an interactive customer support tool, or a tool to help your sales team generate leads?
2. Build a prototype
Once you’ve decided how you want to use your chatbot, the next step is to build a prototype. This is basically a working model of your chatbot that you can try out and ask people for feedback on.
It’s a good idea to build a prototype before you start coding, because it gives you a better understanding of how your chatbot will work and helps you to spot any problems in the user experience early on.
3. Don’t use canned responses
If you want your chatbot to have a more natural and conversational feel, it’s a good idea to use a combination of dynamic responses and canned responses.
Canned responses are pre-made responses that you can use in some situations, while dynamic responses are responses that are generated using your conversation history.
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4. Don’t rely on one-word answers
Even if you use a combination of dynamic and canned responses, the responses you get from your chatbot will probably be one-word answers.
To make your chatbot feel more human, you need to add more detail to these responses. For example, if you ask your chatbot “What’s your favorite movie?” it could reply with “Star Wars”. A better response would be “I like Star Wars because it’s full of action and adventure.”
5. Use analytics to track and improve your chatbot
To make sure your chatbot is getting used and to see how people are interacting with it, it’s important to set up analytics tools for your chatbot.
If you’re using the Microsoft Bot Framework, you can use the built-in analytics tools.
If you’re using Chatfuel, you can use the built-in analytics tools or use a third-party analytics tool like HotJar or Google Analytics.
Conclusion
The process of building a chatbot is straightforward, but it can be time-consuming. It’s also easy to make mistakes when you’re building your chatbot, which can mean you have to go back and redo things.
But if you follow these 5 tips, you’ll be able to build a chatbot that’s easy to use and is better than most of the chatbots you’ll find online.
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My 5 steps for creating a chatbot was originally published in Chatbots Life on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.