Is there any evidence customers prefer chatbots? The entire concept feels like it's driven by managers trying to impress their managers.
It's cost cutting. Customer contact is always treated as a cost center.
Therefore, the only relevant question for its management is "How can we provide the minimum acceptable level of service, at the lowest possible cost?"
In general, the answer to "Why does X suck?" is to ask whether the company sees it as a profit or cost center. See: HR.
"How can we provide the minimum acceptable level of service, at the lowest possible cost?"
Not with all products. Some companies understand, that good support keeps the people loyal to their products. But they are usually in a higher price segment.
Had to RMA an ultra widescreen monitor I use for work, and the experience was as smooth as silk and always in the hands of actual humans, who would follow up and push things forward.
I’ve had their enterprise support on the phone with me for a dozen hours over the course of a week trying to get this SAN working. Their support remoted into it and had me manipulating physical stuff when required. They eventually got it going through a combination of hard resetting everything and updating firmware on half a dozen components + some software updates.
Dell doesn’t always have the greatest hardware, but their support really doesn’t rest until you’re satisfied. “No one ever got fired for buying Dell”.
A chatbot is just a long way of saying "GO AWAY!".
Large telecoms do this so they get to shut down their customer support almost entirely while claiming that they are available for the customers.
a large telecom in Australia has applied this to an extreme degree in the last two years to the point that you almost can't contact them no matter how severe the issue is. Their message is clear "SHUT UP AND PAY".
And it is gone now and replaced with a much more effective app, my point is just that it clearly possible to make chatbots that aren't rage inducing.
The question is just if it is worth it, something we didn't think after the novelty wore off.
I believe one way it can provide value is when it is closely backed by competent support staff so it takes more of a receptionist role instead of the role of a support engineer.
I’m guessing that’s often not true if you’re running a Wordpress blog or some white label e-commerce platform or similar. You can probably just pase some JavaScript into an admin interface somewhere to add a third-party chatbot to your site.