Conversation Chat Bots Overview

Conversation Chat Bots facilitate two-way, text-based Conversations. They are optimized to interface with users and take Actions informed by user input, giving them similar versatile functionality to Web Flows.

While Conversation Chat Bots can be used to accomplish everything that SMS Chat Bots can, they have more powerful advanced features:

• Conversation Chat Bots can be accessed not only through SMS channels, but also via web apps that contain the Chat Web Control. When used in tandem with the Web SDK, this allows Conversation Chat Bots to be incorporated into existing websites.
• Conversation Chat Bots are capable of redirecting conversations to call center agents or other external chat management systems, all while allowing the end user to reply through the same interface they used to start the conversation.

Combined, these features allow for the creation of embedded digital assistants capable of automatically answering the most common user questions while also allowing the conversation to transition seamlessly to a more knowledgable third-party when needed.

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Enterprise Feature

Conversation Chat Bots require an ENTERPRISE license. If you would like to enable this feature for your Airkit Organization, please contact your Airkit representative or contact [email protected].

The underlying logic of Conversation Chat Bots is defined by Answer Groups, which define what messages will be sent, what variables will be used to bind user responses, and what Actions will be taken. For more on creating and testing Answer Groups, see Setting Up Answer Groups.

Among the Actions that might be taken within an Answer Group are Actions that redirect the Conversation to an external system, such as call center agents or another chat management platform, like Salesforce or Kustomer. These redirections are managed through Routing Flows, which define where incoming user messages will be sent and what is in charge of generating responses. The Bot defined by an Answer Group is an example of one type of Routing Flow. Agents and Relays are the two other types of Routing Flow: Agents send user messages to human beings who work in a call center and allow them to craft custom responses, while Relays send user messages to be processed by external chat management platforms. The Move Conversation to Routing Flow Action can be used to send users from one Bot to an Agent, Relay, or even another Bot.

As Routing Flows require interfacing with external systems, they must be configured in the Console before they can be incorporated into an application. Managing these external resources and connections is done via Conversation Hubs, which are created and managed in the Conversations Tab of the Console. For more on how to set up Conversation Hubs and tie them to Conversation Chat Bots, see Configuring Conversation Chat Bots.