Why Chatbots Have Faces

One of the things we learnt from when we had to wear masks during the pandemic is that humans are social creatures and we like to see people’s faces!  

Humans like faces

When you’re greeted in a shop, it is not just about hearing them say hello - you’re seeing their facial expressions, hearing their tone of voice and creating a connection.  There is reason customer service is about 'service with a smile' – we like to see and hear that smile.

Previously chatbots have struggled to offer the human touch, but now technology such as conversational AI which utilises natural language processing (NLP) and natural language understanding (NLU) means that digital humans that can interact with people and create an emotional connection.

Digital humans are more than chatbots

Digital humans can have customised facial features, expressions, skin tone, clothing as well as gender and language to provide a more human-like interface.  The digital human can understand sentiment and intent.

Check out our video of our digital human limbering up for a customer interaction:

Why you need a digital human

Customers prefer them with the vast majority of users say they prefer to interact with a digital human over a chatbot.

But there are other added benefits to using a digital human. Customers are more forgiving of mistakes made by a digital human than a chatbot.  They expect the chatbot, as an automated machine, to be correct every time.  However, when confronted with a human face they endow the chatbot with human frailties and are more accepting if they ‘make a mistake’.  At the same time customers are likely to be more polite than they might be with a chatbot that they are getting frustrated with,

All of this means that the customer comes away feeling happier and more satisfied with their interaction even if it did not go as smoothly as it could have.

Digital Humans can deal with emotions

Depending on your business you may have customers that are feeling emotional when they call, for example insurance or healthcare where a pet or person may be ill, it’s important to understand how users are feeling during these interactions and act appropriately, even if you will ultimately hand the off to a live agent.

Simply put - giving your chatbot a face, a voice and a personality and thereby creating a digital human makes it easier for people to connect with them.

Humanizing your chatbot

This involves building a personality – and that personality can be build specifically to either represent your brand or to create recognition and rapport with your target audience.  This is not just about the words, but also tone of voice, facial expressions and body language – the biggest parts of human communication.

Because people are interacting with more and more machines in their everyday lives, giving AI a human face in the form of a digital human is a vital part of the human-machine interaction, not just for the future, but for the present as well.

Contact us or call us on 0333 6000 360 and we can show you see how a digital human can transform your business.