Turning Consumer Questions into Conversions With Chatbots

What if you were told there’s a magical tool that can help your multi-location business generate more leads while also removing some of the time your marketing team has to spend on lead generation? Wouldn’t this immediately pique your interest? Well, it’s not magic at all – chatbots can do precisely this! Chatbots allow consumers to ask questions about products or services, receive answers, and leave feedback about their experience – all in real-time. 

So what can your multi-location business do with these conversations, and how can you turn them into leads? Throughout this blog, we’ll break down what it takes to turn consumer questions into conversions and provide tips for creating a winning local chatbot strategy! 

Chatbots and Conversions: A Look Into The Data 

If you need to be convinced of the effectiveness of chatbots to drive conversions, the data speaks for itself. A recent study found that chatbots can increase conversions by 50 percent. SOCi also conducted a few case studies with our chatbot solution and found impressive results. For instance, Fogelman Management Group gained 200 new leads and engaged in 200+ unique conversations using SOCi SmartBot. Similarly, Case and Associates leveraged SOCi SmartBot to increase leads by 45.1 percent through 700 individual discussions in 60 days.  

While we’ll get more into SOCi Smarbot later in this blog, imagine all of the conversations and potential conversions your multi-location business could be missing out on without a chatbot solution. 

How to Turn Questions Into Conversions 

So chatbots clearly can help increase conversions if leveraged correctly, but how exactly can you turn your questions into conversions? There are a couple of different ways to do this that we’ll cover next. 

1. Use Your Chatbot Data to Inform Your Marketing Strategy 

One of the easiest ways to turn the questions your chatbot receives into conversions is by analyzing which questions your chatbot receives most frequently, and be proactive about making adjustments accordingly. For instance, is your chatbot receiving questions about your business’s local hours of operation? Easy! What can you do to make that information more readily available to those searching for your business online? If your local listings aren’t updated with the most accurate business information, that’s an excellent place to start. Similarly, you could consider where your hours of operation are placed on your website and local social media channels. 

The same would be true for other frequently asked questions (FAQs). Analyze the FAQs, break them into categories, decide which questions should be addressed, put plans in place to address, bingo! By doing this, you’ll streamline the customer experience (CX). Suppose a potential customer can find everything they want to know about your business without having to dig. If so, they’ll have a more enjoyable experience with your company and will ultimately be more likely to make a purchase. 

2. Capture Contact Information Within Your Chatbot Conversations 

Another great way to turn consumer questions into conversions is to capture leads within your chatbot conversations. Many chatbot solutions allow marketers to program the chatbot or decide what should be included in the discussion, allowing the opportunity for lead capture. For example, when starting a conversation with a user, your chatbot can ask for their name and email address if the chat gets disconnected. Similarly, if a user asks a question that the chatbot cannot readily answer, the chatbot can again collect information from the user and have someone from your marketing team follow up with answers. 

The more opportunities your chatbot solution has to capture contact information, the more leads you’ll be able to convert. While asking for someone’s contact information upfront is a good tactic, you can also consider ending the conversation with an opportunity for the user to leave feedback or leave a review, which provides another way to capture their contact information – a bit more discreetly. Once you collect the leads through your chatbot, it’s essential not to forget about them and streamline a process with your business’s local sales team to ensure those leads are being converted into sales.

3. Set Your Chatbot Up for Success 

Last but not least, you can turn consumer questions into conversions through your chatbot by perfecting your chatbot strategy. There are a lot of dos and don’ts when it comes to chabot conversations, and your multi-location business needs to be aware of them. For instance, your chatbot solution must set expectations at the beginning of the conversation, explaining what it can and can’t do. If a user chats with a chatbot for ten minutes before realizing it can’t help answer their question, that could lead to frustration. The user needs to understand that they’re chatting with a chatbot rather than an actual human. 

A well-thought out localized chatbot strategy is critical in turning your conversations into conversions. Check out our Localized Chatbot Guide for more insight into what it takes to create a winning chatbot strategy. 

Choose The Right Chatbot Solution For Your Multi-Location Business 

Now that you understand everything it takes to turn consumer questions into conversions, it’s time to get started. Whether your multi-location business already has a chatbot strategy in place but is looking to make improvements, or you’re just now considering chatbots, SOCi is here to help. SOCi SmartBot is the only localized chatbot explicitly built for multi-location marketers. SOCi SmartBot is the first of its kind. This Facebook, Google, and SMS Messaging chatbot delivers localized, proactive responses to commonly asked questions and can drive call-to-actions (CTAs), including calls, website clicks, appointment setting, purchases, and more! SOCi SmartBot’s proactive responses and ability to provide CTAs with lead capturing capabilities makes it easy for your multi-location business to turn consumer questions into conversions. 

Request a demo today for more insight on SOCi SmartBot and details into how SOCi can help you elevate other aspects of your localized marketing strategy!