How to Make an AI Chatbot

More and more companies are using chatbots to offer customer support, sort through dense information, and make websites more engaging to their users. According to Markets and Markets, the use of AI chatbots has become so widespread that they estimate its market size will reach $15.5 billion in 2028 from $5.4 billion in 2023, growing at a CAGR of 23.3 percent [1]. 

If you want to implement a chatbot for your company, you’ll have to decide whether you’ll create it yourself or use one of the many online tools to help you start. In this article, you can explore how organizations use chatbots and the resources available to learn how to make one. 

What are chatbots used for?

Chatbots are commonly used to provide customer service, create content, or collect leads for sales and marketing teams. Below is a more detailed description of how this bot is used.

• Customer service: AI chatbot can provide customer service and support in real-time, no matter when the user has a question. The chatbot can handle simple user requests, which allows your human customer service agents to focus on more challenging problems. In addition, you can offer support in any language without hiring more employees with other language skills.

• Virtual help desks: AI chatbots can be trained to learn a website’s information, documents, databases, or more. Once your chatbot is an expert on the topic, it can act as a virtual help desk for anyone with questions. This can be helpful for customers who might have questions about your products or policies. You can also use a virtual help desk for employees by training it to become an expert in your employee handbook or other policy documents. 

• Collect leads: AI chatbot can gather information from potential customers to collect and qualify leads, allowing your marketing and sales team to work more efficiently. Chatbots are also scalable to handle more leads as your company grows without hiring more people to manage those inquiries.

How do AI chatbots work? 

Artificial intelligence chatbots leverage natural language processing and machine learning to understand user inputs and give a personalized response while learning from user feedback. 

Can I use a chatbot that doesn’t have AI? 

You can implement a chatbot for your website that doesn’t include artificial intelligence. This is called a rule-based chatbot—a chatbot trained to respond in specific ways to specific phrases. A rule-based chatbot, sometimes called retrieval-based, is a tool that requires less technology, can be easier to implement, and costs less to create. Keep in mind its ability to communicate may be limited compared to a chatbot powered by AI.

Should I build my own chatbot?

The first question you should ask yourself when deciding whether to build your own AI chatbot is how much coding experience your team has. Implementing a chatbot on your website or other documentation doesn’t always require extensive coding experience; however, having some can help you decide exactly how to implement it. 

You can decide how to make an AI chatbot using two main strategies: from scratch or using a white-label chatbot service. 

Build a chatbot from scratch.

If your team has some coding experience, you can build a chatbot from scratch. You can also use a chatbot platform such as IBM Watson Assistant, Azure Bot Service, Amazon Lex, or open-source code options to help you build a chatbot from scratch. Frameworks like Microsoft bot framework or Wit.ai are also available to help you customize your chatbot and implement AI and other tools. 

While building your chatbot yourself offers more freedom and flexibility in how it performs, it can also be time-consuming for teams without programming skills. 

Read more What Is Programming? And How To Get Started

Use a white-label chatbot service. 

Just like building a chatbot from scratch, you can find different tools to create a chatbot that require varying levels of effort. You can find turnkey, white-label solutions for AI chatbots that can be personalized before implementing them on your website. There are also drag-and-drop editors available to customize your chatbot without any programming necessary. 

A white-label chatbot service can make it faster and easier to create an AI chatbot, but you may spend more money to maintain the service compared to building a chatbot from scratch. 

How to make a chatbot

No matter how you choose to create your chatbot, you will follow four basic steps. 

Step 1: Plan your chatbot.

The first step is to determine what you want your chatbot to accomplish and where you want users to interact with it. Understanding what your chatbot will be used for and where will help you wade through the tools available. The backbone of an artificial intelligence chatbot is natural language processing and machine learning. If you are building from scratch, you’ll need to consider these components. You can also elect to use ready-made options to provide AI technology. 

Step 2: Create the backend and user interface.

You may need to create the backend and user interface of your chatbot. The backend refers to the part of the program that gives your chatbot functionality to work. The user interface is the designed and branded part of the chatbot that users will interact with. This step is more intricate depending on which set of tools you selected for your chatbot. A chatbot built from scratch will take more time and skill than a white-label chatbot but offers you more freedom in how your chatbot will look and function. 

Step 4: Test, train, and integrate with other tools.

Once your website is created, it’s time to make sure it works. First, you’ll need to train your chatbot on the data it will be an expert on, commonly your website, company policy documentation, or other data. Next, you’ll need to conduct testing, consider how your chatbot works from the user's standpoint, and look for bugs and improvements. 

If you’ve elected to use a chatbot that doesn’t contain AI, you may need to conduct testing on your decision trees to ensure that the chatbot communicates in a way that users will expect. You’ll also need to integrate with other tools, such as data and analytics software. 

Step 5: Deploy your AI chatbot. 

The last step is to deploy your AI chatbot. Even though this is the last step, you can still collect feedback and data from users to understand how to improve your chatbot or ensure it works more effectively. You will need to monitor your chatbot over time to make sure it’s still working as you intend.

Learn more with Coursera 

The growing chatbot market offers businesses a valuable tool for providing customer service, answering questions, and collecting leads. You can build your own chatbots from scratch or use existing services to get started.

One way to learn more about how to make an AI chatbot is to take a course online. IBM offers a beginner-level course called Building AI Powered Chatbots Without Programming on Coursera, which covers how AI chatbots work, how to plan a chatbot that accomplishes your goals, and the tools and frameworks you can use to build your own AI chatbot from scratch. After you’ve completed this course, you can continue learning with the AI Foundation for Everyone Specialization or the IBM AI Developer Professional Certificate.