For a long time, putting a chatbot on a website was basically the digital equivalent of hiring someone whose entire job was to point toward the bathroom.

• What are the hours?
• Where is the business located?
• What services are offered?
• How can someone contact the office?
• Useful? Sure. Revolutionary? Not exactly.

At Rhino Precision Marketing in New Orleans, I have watched chatbot technology evolve from glorified FAQ machines into something much more interesting. Modern chatbots can collect leads, qualify prospects, schedule appointments, gather customer information, route inquiries and initiate business processes.

In other words, the chatbot finally got promoted.

The Old Chatbot Had One Job

Early chatbots were relatively simple.

A visitor typed a question, the chatbot searched through a collection of predetermined responses and hopefully produced something resembling the correct answer.

Sometimes it worked beautifully.

Sometimes someone asked about scheduling an appointment and received a fascinating explanation of the company’s return policy.

Those were exciting times.

Modern conversational technology can understand considerably more context and, more importantly, do something with the information collected during the conversation.

That changes the entire purpose of the chatbot.

Instead of simply answering a question, the chatbot can help move someone through a process.

Chatbots Can Collect Leads

Most business websites have some version of a contact form.

• Name.
• Email.
• Phone.
• Message.
• Submit.

The contact form has been faithfully performing this duty since approximately the invention of fire.

Chatbots provide another approach.

Instead of presenting a visitor with a stack of empty fields, a chatbot can gather information conversationally.

A roofing company might ask whether the property is residential or commercial. Next comes the type of roofing problem. Then the location. Then contact information.

A transportation company might ask about the date, pickup location, destination and number of passengers.

The same basic information gets collected, but the experience feels more like a conversation than filling out paperwork at the DMV.

That alone can make the interaction more natural.

They Can Qualify Leads Too

Not every inquiry is the same.

A person looking for an emergency air-conditioning repair has a different need from someone researching a system replacement six months from now.

A chatbot can identify those differences before a staff member ever enters the conversation.

That doesn’t mean allowing artificial intelligence to make every business decision while everyone heads to the French Quarter for lunch.

It means allowing automation to handle some of the repetitive sorting.

• What service is needed?
• Where is the customer located?
• How quickly is the service needed?
• Does the request fall within the company’s normal scope of work?

Once those questions are answered, the information can be organized and routed appropriately.

Humans can then spend more time handling the parts that actually require humans.

Scheduling Is Where Things Get Interesting

One of the most practical uses for conversational automation is appointment scheduling.

Think about the traditional process.

Someone submits a website form.

An employee calls back.

Nobody answers.

A voicemail gets left.

The customer calls back while the employee is at lunch.

Another voicemail.

Eventually everyone connects three days later and celebrates like Apollo 11 just landed.

Connecting conversational technology with scheduling systems can eliminate portions of that back-and-forth.

A chatbot can determine what type of appointment is needed, collect relevant information and direct the person toward appropriate scheduling options.

That’s a much bigger job than telling someone the office closes at 5:00.

Chatbots Can Handle Customer Intake

Many businesses repeatedly collect the same information.

Law firms have intake questions.

Contractors need project information.

Transportation companies need trip details.

Real estate professionals need property information.

Service businesses need addresses, appointment preferences and descriptions of problems.

A chatbot can walk through those questions one at a time.

Even better, the conversation can change based on previous answers.

Someone needing an HVAC repair doesn’t need to answer six questions about new construction.

Someone requesting airport transportation doesn’t need to answer questions about a wedding party.

That ability to branch conversations makes the process much more useful.

The Real Power Is What Happens Next

Collecting information is only part of the equation.

The interesting part comes when the chatbot connects with other business systems.

Information gathered through a conversation can potentially move into a customer relationship management system, scheduling platform or another authorized workflow.

That’s where chatbot technology starts becoming less of a website decoration and more of an operational tool.

Without integration, a chatbot can end up becoming another inbox somebody has to remember to check.

And businesses already have enough inboxes.

• Email inboxes.
• Facebook messages.
• Instagram messages.
• Website forms.
• Text messages.
• Voicemails.

Probably a Post-it note stuck to someone’s monitor from last Thursday.

The objective should be getting information where it needs to go.

Humans Aren’t Going Anywhere

Whenever artificial intelligence comes up, somebody eventually asks whether robots are replacing everyone.

I wouldn’t start packing the office furniture yet.

There are plenty of conversations that require judgment, empathy, experience and common sense.

Automation works particularly well with predictable and repetitive tasks.

People work particularly well when things become complicated.

A well-designed system understands that difference.

The chatbot can collect information at 2:13 in the morning without complaining. A human can handle the complicated conversation Tuesday afternoon that requires actual judgment.

Everybody plays to their strengths.

The Chatbot Has Grown Up

The biggest change in chatbot technology isn’t necessarily how well these systems talk.

It’s what can happen because of the conversation.

• A question can become a lead.
• A lead can become a qualified inquiry.
• An inquiry can become an appointment.

Customer information can move into another business process.

That’s a considerable leap from answering, “What time does the office open?”

Chatbots aren’t just talking anymore.

They’re becoming part of the workflow.

And after years of watching them sit in the bottom-right corner of websites answering questions about business hours, it’s about time they started pulling their weight.

Brett Thomas
Owner, Rhino Precision Marketing
New Orleans, Louisiana

How Rhino Can Help

Lead Presence combines a conversion-focused website with AI chat, booking and lead capture, so your site answers questions and starts conversations around the clock. For phone calls, see Rhino’s AI receptionist.