We’ve come a long way since those early days where data scientists needed to predict a customer’s needs all on their own and be lucky enough to have come to the right conclusion.
Today, more and more companies implement AI and chatbots to optimize customer service and gather data that will enable them to not just make predictions but data-driven decisions that will help them down the line.
Hence the need for email marketing and marketing automation platforms -like Moosend, which is one of the best Constant Contact alternatives out there- that can help out with tasks as large as data analysis.
And, as all businesses need email marketing, all businesses need the super-pro type of segmentation and personalization that AI can offer them.
Furthermore, chatbots have come to be an exceptional tool, both as a means to achieve interaction on a landing page, thus generating leads, and to create a better customer service department.
Chatbots, in this sense, will manage to automatically sort out the “easy” questions and leave the agents to tackle the more important issues.
Do you think that your dropshipping business should be an exception? This is a rhetorical question, of course. The answer should always be no. So, let’s begin!
Let’s start with the basics. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a pretty old concept.
AI refers to the ability of a machine to “mimic” human intelligence, thus enabling it to learn rules, remember information, apply basic principles to that information, come to conclusions and correct itself whenever necessary.
It doesn’t take an expert to understand that these traits can turn AI technology to the best salesperson you’ve ever had.
Let’s see how!
It’s not a secret anymore and it doesn’t seem like a fad that will fade within the next couple of years. Personalization is here to stay, and it’s no surprise. After all, since the beginning of time, people trusted the ones that could sell them something they actually needed.
AI can help with that, like nothing else.
As a matter of fact, it can take the data generated by the customer’s personal choices, analyze it and make the most of it by recommending something similar or something just as interesting, as is the case with Amazon’s recommendations or Apple’s famous Siri.
Of course, it can -and will- help your dropshipping business. Consider the following: You want to make personalized recommendations for people to get hooked, whether this is on a landing page of yours, or on your website.
AI can help with that, on a one-on-one basis no less, identifying and predicting behaviors and preferences creating more segments and taking into account more parameters than a data analyst could, also eliminating the human error factor.
Put a machine to the test, and be sure that it will analyze the data in a way that a human wouldn’t be able to – mainly because of the volume.
Now, all data contain patterns that could be invisible to the human eye, however, they could be more than obvious to a machine, enabling it to analyze, come to conclusions and “feed” businesses and sales teams with the leads they need to be focusing on.
These leads can be one-offs, repeaters, anything at all. AI will sort them into proper lists and check which ones need to be used by the sales team, which ones will find value in upselling or cross-selling and which ones need some more time to “mature” and convert.
Essentially, through AI, you can make educated decisions that would otherwise be partly data-driven and partly guesstimates, as far as your funnel is concerned.
With AI, your dropshipping business can lead prospects, customers and anyone and everyone in-between, further down the sales funnel.
Don’t tell me you didn’t see that coming. AI is ideal for email marketing, as I mentioned in the beginning.
Let me explain the hows and whys since your dropshipping business needs email marketing as much as online stores and brick-and-mortar stores do.
First of all, AI can segment your list faster and more effectively than any human could do, seeing as data is its main source of energy.
Secondly, list segmentation can lead to personalization when it comes to emails, from content and design to products, recommendations, upsell and cross-sell opportunities -remember the funnel I mentioned before?
AI will take various demographics like education, age, and budget into account, as well as factors like previous orders, browsing behavior and so on and so forth.
These factors will help determine the CTAs that are more appropriate and, seeing as the CTAs will be more than one, can help you with A/B testing.
But CTAs are not the only thing that can be tested, right?
AI can utilize all the information it can gather and make content suggestions, body copy and subject line suggestions, identify trends and so on and so forth.
And you already know what that means when it comes to A/B testing and an email campaign in general.
Combine all these factors and what you’ll get will be a highly segmented, highly personalized email campaign.
Now let’s move on to the second part of our article… Chatbots.
A chatbot is exactly what its name indicates: a little bot that pops up in a chatbox and holds a conversation with the user that happened to browse at that moment.
As evident, a chatbot is an AI appliance that aims to act as a customer service agent.
And how can this bot help your conversion?
It’s true. A chatbot replies to any and all people that will message it. You can just go ahead and personalize everything, from the name and picture of the bot, down to its messages and how it can distribute information.
Mind you, waiting time isn’t just a “Please hold” message. It’s also an “I’ll get back to you as soon as possible” that went amiss or even a very detailed search in blogs, posts, websites and FAQs.
A chatbot can help resolve all that and acquire valuable data at the same time, seeing as it will need to ask a question or two, in order to serve the customer.
So, the customer will be happy and you will be happy with your data as well.
Not to mention that a chatbot can be so engaging as to become, along with AI, one of your best salespeople with personalized recommendations and offers a prospect won’t refuse that easily.
Talk about a win-win!
Much like its Momma, AI, a chatbot can boost sales by walking a customer through the whole signing up and picking out an item process.
It can make the experience more fun and interactive altogether, while driving sales and revenue.
Let me put it this way: Signing up for something is a tedious process. But I’d gladly sign up if I wanted to check out some shoes with my best friend.
And I wouldn’t abandon my cart if I was chatting and doing something fun at the same time, seeing as mood can play a major part in the whole process of a purchase. And I won’t need to clarify what I’m looking for, too many times.
Not to mention that, if a great interactive quiz popped up into my screen and I answered questions with the help of a chatbot that would help me decide on the actions I should take to make the most of what your dropshipping business has to offer me, I would most likely be hooked.
Really, I would buy more and more if a good salesperson had something of value to recommend, and chatbots and a quiz are great at upsells, cross-sells and recommendations.
The great thing about chatbots is not just the fact that they’re great at selling just the right thing at the right time.
Leaving your customer service and sales alone and granting them the time and energy to tackle some real issues that could potentially be harmful is one of the realest benefits of the use of chatbots, especially in businesses like dropshipping.
Most people need to know working hours, how they can contact the business, if there is a discount on a product, delivery dates and so on and so forth. These are questions a chatbot can be great at answering.
On the other hand, not too many prospects need a refund, are angry because they received a damaged product or have never received their item. And they’re the ones in need of immediate assistance.
If they’re happy, they’ll keep coming back for more, saving you the money and effort of finding new customers.
So, let the chatbot deal with trivial things like giving out information on the company, light sales to top-funnel customers and product suggestions.
And allow your sales and customer service teams to deal with the “heavy stuff” that can drive a prospect further down the funnel and keep them happy enough to come back for a little more of you.
The use of chatbots, especially combined with AI, email marketing, and teams that are there to keep customers happy-as-a-lark and pleased with the overall service of your dropshipping business, shows a company that is transparent and can help you boost your ARR and MRR churn efforts.
There are many uses for chatbots and AI apart from conversion, of course. AI can be successfully used in medicine, for example, or engineering, or some other uses I’ll let you think of…
And tell me down in the comments!
Also, don’t forget to ask any questions and share the knowledge!
Author Bio:
Téa is a Content Writer working for email marketing software Moosend and an obsessive writer in general. In her free time, she tries to find new ways to stuff more books in her bookcase and content ideas-and cats-to play with.
