Solving traveller problems is what we do here at Skyscanner, and bots give us the opportunity to solve our travellers’ problems in fresh, innovative and engaging ways. But what is the future for bots,
where can they be useful for our customers and how can we make sure that we don’t forget to talk like a human?
Here Sam Poullain from Skyscanner shares his slides presented at ChatBots and the Social Commerce Revolution 2017
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This presentation will cover three main themes:
Solving traveller problems with bots
The benefits of early mover advantage and experimentation
Getting the balance right between humans and bots
https://www.linkdex.com/en-gb/inked/biggest-twitter-brand-fails-ever/
There are no giraffes in Ghana…
Any major survey of Internet use would tell you, particularly on mobile, that people spend their time in messaging apps.
Whether measured in sessions or actual time duration, it’s clear messaging is a preferred way to communicate.
Why would anyone miss the chance to meet their audience, or even more so their potential audience, in the place those users already reside?
http://www.pulsepointgroup.com/2015/06/5-marketing-implications-of-mary-meeker%E2%80%99s-internet-trends-report
And as is often the case, the eastern markets lead the way here.
WeChat in China has proved the value of this platform for many years.
The most recent statistics available show over 800 million MAUs, which is incredible progress - and a majority of those users effectively use WeChat as their Internet gateway
Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/255778/number-of-active-wechat-messenger-accounts/
Until now, bot experiences were just you and the bot.
But that puts a ton of pressure on the bot to seem human.
Messenger Extensions pose them more as assistants or tickers rather than conversation partners, better matching what’s feasible with today’s technology.
Skyscanner was born to deliver complex answers to simple questions; “who flies cheaply from here to there”
But now, we have matured to the point where we can now offer simple answers to much more complicated ones
We believe that messaging platforms are an important and enhancement to the way people will search for travel in the future.
Our app has been downloaded 40m times
And yet despite this work, we still think we can do travel better.
For example despite our app being constantly tuned and improved, there are still approximately 11 steps you need to take, to find the flight you want.
It could be quicker if you knew precisely what you wanted but these 11 steps are not unusual.
If you think about this in terms of taps on the screen, it's more like 17.
That suddenly seems like hard work.
This new technology allows us to open up to brand new audiences and engage in a new and exciting way with our existing audience
All with the goal of making searching for flight tickets as user-friendly and intuitive as possible
Our first bot was on Telegram in 2015, before we launched Alexa in March 2016 and then Messenger in May 2016 before launching Skype Group chat bot in August 2016
In May 2016 we were the first travel search to create and launch a bot for Facebook’s Messenger platform
The first step a traveller often makes on our site is ‘everywhere’ search. So we started with this, as the first way to interact with our bot.
So, the problem we were trying to solve here is ‘where can I fly from my home airport’?
Bringing teams together
Engineering and product need to work together in a brand new way to solve a brand new problem
So, we know bots can solve travellers problems, attract a new audience and create a buzz; but how do we make sure we don’t ignore our customers completely?
Why do we use bots?
Why do we use humans?
There must be a space where we get the benefits of both end of the spectrum.
Back to our Messenger bot. Our first few days were very, very busy…
First step a traveller often makes on our site is ‘everywhere’ search.
So we started with this, as the first way to interact with our bot.
The problem we wanted to solve was two-fold: 1) Where should I go? 2) Where can I go
It got very, very busy…
Initial response to our Messenger bot was huge, thanks to the media coverage and also our existing large community
However this led to an overwhelming volume of messages coming in, many of which were from users who just wanted to a human
To say Jen had a busy few days is an understatement
It even got us thinking – how friendly should we actually make our bot?
Initial response to our Messenger bot was huge, thanks to the media coverage and also our existing large community
However this led to an overwhelming volume of messages coming in, many of which were from users who just wanted to a human
To say Jen had a busy few days is an understatement…
Have human interaction when needed - especially when critical!
Consider the bot as an extension of your help centre
We now offer the ability for users to track Price Alerts via Messenger
Could you offer an integration to alert people to stock or price updates for your product?
How can you push and pull people into the bot?
We now offer the ability for users to track Price Alerts via Messenger
Could you offer an integration to alert people to stock or price updates for your product?
Bots are in fashion now, but it doesn’t mean it’s going to work for your business
Think it through and do it for the right reasons
Bots are in fashion now, but it doesn’t mean it’s going to work for your business
Think it through and do it for the right reasons
Bots are in fashion now, but it doesn’t mean it’s going to work for your business
Think it through and do it for the right reasons
Discovery section inside Messenger will help with this
Photo credit for sad robot: http://tandsgo.com/2012/05/new-website-plus-a-contest/