By Aakrit Vaish
Artificial Intelligence or chatbot applications are the talk of the town. Over the last few years, more businesses and customers have collectively jumped on board with this revolution. For companies, chatbots mean transforming customer interactions and achieving customer loyalty, higher conversion rates, increased sales flow, reduced support costs, and generating more leads.
On the other hand, customers prefer chatbots to get instant replies to their queries, build a more personal connection with the brands they buy from, and enjoy phenomenal customer service.
Due to such valuable prospects, businesses from multiple industries are increasingly integrating chatbot technology into their core business operations to make processes streamlined and hassle-free with minimised human intervention.
AI conversational chatbots are especially useful for the e-commerce industry as it receives a high volume of customer service requests and the need for an engaging and personalised shopping experience on the website.
Besides the e-commerce sector, the chatbot application has gained momentum in the online gaming industry. As more people spend their valuable time and money on online gaming, gaming companies are progressively unlocking the true potential of chatbots. These chatbots provide additional support channels witnessing gamers’ tendencies to chat, get together, and organise messaging services (like WhatsApp, Line, Discord, among others.).
Reasons behind the surge in demand for chatbots in the online gaming industry
Over the past five years, the online gaming industry has recorded incredible growth due to its immense popularity among young consumers. According to a report by KPMG, the gaming market in India is expected to reach $3.91 billion by 2025. Multiple factors support this growth rate.
Firstly, the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequent lockdowns have made us use smartphones more than ever. Secondly, the affordability of mobile phones and cheaper internet/data availability have eliminated the need for investing in expensive gaming consoles like PlayStation or Xbox.
The upward growth trajectory has helped the sector emerge as a multi-billion dollar market. Young consumers’ massive demand for online gaming also marks a new set of expectations. These include 24/7 customer support & service, instant gratification, and other FAQs and advanced services (like upgrades and in-app purchases).
The expansion of online gaming has also led to an enormous increase in gaming & game development costs and server management. It is where chatbots can help. They can help save millions of dollars for the online gaming industry in the following ways.
Offer unparalleled customer service – The integration of chatbots into customer service and support presents a unique set of challenges, including where to use them in the customer or player journey. Once companies know the when, where and how of their usage, implementing AI-driven chatbots will replace customer service with the latest technology like artificial intelligence. This technology helps customers locate products in multiple ways and facilitates in-game support.
This way, players and the chatbot can understand critical factors, such as the operating system and gamers’ platform, to work more effectively. Also, chatbots provide players with personalised information and advice and perform specific actions, including changing credit card limits, updating policies, and overseeing refunds, among others.
Reduces workforce – With AI-powered conversational chatbots, companies can reduce the number of internal support staff required to process daily tickets and customer inquiries. Adding chatbot assistants into operations not only helps businesses lower overhead by using the help desk staff time but also allows them to provide unparalleled customer service when live agents are unavailable.
Minimises cart abandonment tendencies – AI chatbots are simply the one-stop efficient and automated solution to cart abandonment problems as they send timely and targeted reminders to customers. For instance, an AI-powered conversational chatbot effectively provides a seamless pre-and post-sale user experience to amplify customer satisfaction and increase the potential for repeat shoppers.
Chatbots automate the entire process – By integrating interactive chatbots in online gaming, businesses can solve problems regarding gaming through an automated process. Moreover, as chatbots are in high demand, they remarkably support omnichannel customer interactions in the gaming sphere.
Streamline internal operations – Besides upgrading customer-centric applications, AI-led chatbots streamline the internal processes of gaming operations in several innovative ways. The helpful nature of chatbots allows players to respond to orders instantly, receive general ordering support, get answers to essential questions, and quickly handle complaints.
Chatbots act as a natural language interface – AI-based chatbots act as a natural language interface for the businesses’ knowledge base. They also help customers submit tickets and resolve them without the need to exit their preferred messaging application.
Final words
Chatbots have emerged as the most efficient way to bolster the relationship with players in the online gaming industry. In this context, the abovementioned factors suggest how chatbots ignite long-term customer loyalty with in-game support. By amplifying customer experience, reducing cart abandonment problems, and automating processes, chatbots help save millions in costs to the online gaming industry. As a result, the industry expects the usage of chatbots to exponentially increase in the future as more gaming companies will explore and implement chatbot solutions in their operations.
The author is the co-founder and CEO of Jio Haptik
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