The Basics of Facebook Messenger Bots for Your Small Business

A couple of years ago, Facebook announced the launch of its innovative Messenger Platform. The idea of direct access to 1.3 billion monthly active users worldwide was tantalizing to business marketers everywhere. Facebook offers the ability for businesses of all sizes to implement custom chatbots on the Messenger platform. Don’t let the seemingly space-age verbiage fool you – the process is actually pretty straightforward!

What is a bot?

The term “bot” is used to define any software that automates a task. Chatbots are a specialized version of this – they are designed to automate your messaging, using artificial intelligence, to allow you to converse with people on Facebook Messenger. The practice of using bots has been around for quite a while, but Facebook has taken it a bit further.

Facebook Messenger bots are generally programmed to understand questions, provide answers, and execute specific tasks. To the customer, they seem friendly and serve as a great time-saver. To the small business owner, it offers a scalable solution to actively communicating with their audience.

Why Should I Use Bots in My Business Marketing Strategy?

The biggest attraction for small business marketers is the time-saving feature of Facebook Messenger bots.

For example, using bots, you can give a personalized experience to a potential customer asking about your business hours. For lead generation, you can use bots to qualify your leads through a series of questions. You can tailor the conversation to ensure that your potential customer only receives the information that they are looking for – instead of a lengthy write up on all your service offerings.

This can cut back on your audience feeling spammed by information – and keeps you from having to answer messages at 1:00am.

How Do I Create a Facebook Messenger Bot?

The more intentional you are about your marketing practice, the more efficient your Messenger bots will be. Before you build, you’ll want to identify repetitive tasks or conversations that don’t necessarily require a human being. You’ll also want to identify how your Messenger Bot will work with the rest of your marketing strategy. Consider your human interaction, your website, your email marketing, and your social media outreach – these components should work together as an integrated strategy.

Once you have your marketing strategy clearly defined, you’ll need to decide how you want to build your Messenger bot. There are a variety of bot-building platforms to choose from. Look at the popular ManyChat and Chatfuel for examples. Both are good options if you’re new to bots.

What Do I Do When I Launch My Facebook Messenger Bot?

As with any inbound marketing strategy, don’t open a communication channel with your audience if you’re not prepared to support it. Remember, you’ll still need to promote your chatbot, monitor your messages for any questions that your bot cannot answer, and closely track your overall customer experience as it relates to your bot usage. You’ll also want to have a plan for ongoing communication after someone has connected with your brand.

Not sure where to start? Heeren Content & Strategy offers 15% off all services for veteran and military spouse owned businesses.

Guest Contributor: Erika Heeren is the founder of Heeren Content & Strategy. With 14 years of experience marketing and public relations, she has a professional focus on integrated media spanning 16 different industries.

Heeren works with small businesses and non-profit organizations to provide affordable, professional-quality content development, marketing, and public relations services. Her clients include local small business owners, marketing agencies, public universities, media outlets, Huffington Post-published authors, IT firms, and non-profit organizations.

A military spouse herself, Erika is an outspoken advocate for veteran and military spouse education, employment, and entrepreneurship. As a volunteer eMentor for the Military Entrepreneur Program, she works one-on-one with aspiring military-affiliated entrepreneurs to help them grow their business. She also volunteers as a digital marketing instructor with Treasure Valley SCORE.

Heeren is an award-winning writer and has been featured on NextGen Military Spouse, Veteran on the Move, Wright Stuff Radio, and Social Media Week.