What’s next for the website chatbot? Reading emotions, predicting purchases and more

Chatbots and voice recognition systems have come a long way in a relatively short period of time. Gaming chatbots emerged in the 1990s, and speech recognition capabilities and advanced conversation agents started to become common on websites in various industries in the 2000-2010s.

The American Bankers Association Journal reports that modern bank chatbots have been showcasing the impact of applied machine learning and deep learning capabilities, including:

Erica – A large bank’s chatbot, Erica has served more than 19.5 million customers and processed more than 230 million requests since its launch in 2018, showcasing the technology’s ability to scale and evolve, learning from user interactions.

Eno – Another large bank’s chatbot, Eno delivers personalized insights about clients, fraud detection, and account management across voice and text channels.

Chatbots allow institutions to be available 24/7 with instant responses, managing customer care during off hours and collecting customer insight data. With artificial intelligence (AI), more interaction results in more learning and better future interactions.

What does the future hold for chatbots as AI continues to make leaps forward? AI chatbots are already anticipating customer needs by analyzing transaction behavior and internet browsing histories, predicting economic trends, and finding and leveraging financial patterns. On the horizon is the regular use of “Emotion AI,” which is “a powerful tool that allows companies to analyze customer emotions and stress levels during interactions, enabling real-time adjustments to improve service quality.”

Read more from the ABA’s senior director of innovation strategy in their Office of Innovation by clicking here.