Going beyond the chatter

Last month, social networking giant Facebook announced it would introduce chat bots powered by artificial intelligence. In effect, that would allow businesses to deliver automated customer support, e-commerce guidance, content and interactive experiences through chatbots at a fraction of what it costs to have call centres staffed with human beings answering customer queries. If this gains traction, Facebook’s chatbots could effectively replace the 1-800 toll-free number. That’s the scale of the ambition.

As Facebook and WhatsApp (which is also owned by Facebook), the world’s largest instant messaging (IM) platforms, push chat apps to the centre of people’s digital lives, it also creates a space where brands can become an intuitive part of the messaging conversations of their audience. No other chat app, WeChat or LINE has a serious user base in India that is close to critical mass, say experts.

Swapnil Puranik, Head of Strategy, Mumbai, Razorfish India, says as of December 2015, nearly 45 per cent of internet users used FB Messenger on a daily basis and a huge 74 per cent used WhatsApp on a daily basis. “It makes not just business sense for brands to be present on these platforms, but to use them to build deeper one-on-one relationship with their customers enabling active two-way conversations, which is considered the holy grail of all efforts digital,” he adds.

A report by market research major TNS Global states that the inherently personal nature of IM on Facebook Messenger will become a brand platform for multiple types of experiences — from engaging with content to requesting customer service to making a purchase. “Facebook Messenger’s massive reach means this change will resonate on a global scale,” says the study.

Also, with most digital marketing efforts, brand managers aspire to create content that goes viral. Chat apps work on that front as well.

As Suveer Bajaj, co-founder, FoxyMoron, puts it, “With the increasing mobile content consumption in India, brands are definitely capitalising on the opportunities provided by the instant messaging apps. The medium is most frequently used to create viral content and that’s what makes it really effective in a digital campaign.”

He adds that the medium is also enabling brands to create a loyal database, have real-time interactions across regions and engage with the consumers at a higher level.

In India, unlike the rest of Asia, chat apps are a recent phenomenon. However, there is no dearth of brands in India, from Hindi films and fast food giants to beer brands, which are riding on this platform (See page 2). Still, there is a long way to go.

“In India it is at experiment stage only, so there are no great success stories yet. While some pilots are going on, we are yet to come anywhere close to effectively using this avenue,” says Parijat Chakraborty, Executive Director, TNS India. He adds that some small brands and organisations have tried to use WhatsApp as a direct marketing platform, akin to SMS based direct messaging that we have been seeing for about a decade. “But due to the intrusive nature of the spam and lack of any meaningful connect (the messages were mostly sales pitches), it did not strike a chord with the consumers and eventually this trend did not pick up. The same is true for Facebook Messenger as well. However, the recent launch of Chat Bot is expected to open new horizon for brands to connect with consumers in a very new way,” he says.

Balancing act needed However, digital marketing experts warn that brands should be careful about where they tread. Swati Nathani, Co-Founder and Business Head, Team Pumpkin, a digital strategy firm, says, “We see many brands attempting to be present in the chat apps space, though we do not expect this to be the right platform for push marketing.”

Brands should stay away from ‘marketing’ on chat, even though chat apps have got an excellent reach. That’s because it’s a very personal space and people do not like to be intruded upon. It does more harm than good, because consumers end up blocking the ID.

Chat apps would be best suited for pull marketing (receiving complaints, queries, contest entries) than push marketing (sending updates from brands). “This way, the consumer feels connected to the brand, knows that an immediate response system is available and does not feel their space is getting compromised,” says Nathani.

Instant messaging is a more closed medium and therefore it is important to share limited content that is more relevant to the audience, adds Bajaj of FoxyMoron. “Content creators need to create cross-platform compatible content, so that it can be easily shared and downloaded on instant messaging apps,” he says. However, make sure you don’t spam people, and engage with them at a personal level, instead of pushing the brand too much.

So, it is important for brands to make sure that there is a balance between when the brand’s communication adds value, and when it becomes spam. Of course, there are lessons to be learnt from the past. Puranik says, “We all have seen how e-mail and SMS channels have struggled to keep this balance. While IM platforms provide legitimate avenues for brands to talk to their consumers, we as marketers have to be responsible to preserve their effectiveness.”

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