Putting the zing into messenger apps
OPINION: Summer has finally arrived in Wellington. True there are just a few months to run before winter, but lets not grumble.
Yesterday Oriental Bay was packed and the day before that some kids were selling homemade lemonade at our local hall out in Ohariu Valley.
Homemade lemonade is one of the great delights of summer and bears no relationship to the stuff sold in shops.
The best lemonades have two features. First they start by making a sugar water syrup so no sugar is left undissolved. Second they have lemon zest grated into the mixture to give it extra zing.
Another type of lemonade is delivering zing in the United States at the moment.
Lemonade is a peer-to-peer insurance company that harnesses artificial intelligence to power its risk engine and gives left over premiums to good causes.
The piece that attracted my attention was when it set an apparent world record for settling and paying an insurance claim.
Over Christmas Brandon Pharm in New York lodged a claim via a message from his iPhone after losing his goose-down parka.
Within three seconds ‘‘Jim’’, Lemonade’s chat bot, had reviewed the claim, crossreferenced it with the policy, ran 18 anti-fraud algorithms, approved the claim, sent wiring instructions to the bank, and informed Pharm his claim was paid.
Now to be fair New Zealand insurance firms have got a lot better on paying out claims, but my last experience was three weeks rather than three minutes.
What the Lemonade experience shows is how far bots have progressed.
Internet bots, also known as web robots, are nothing new. Essentially they are just a piece of software that runs automated tasks (scripts) over the web and have been around for years.
Chat bots are the evolution of these web robots with sharpened artificial intelligence and focused on consumers rather than geeks.
While they operate in a number of ecosystems – including Twitter,
Two things happened last year that saw chat bot numbers really take off.
Facebook and Weibo – they work really well in messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger, Whatsapp, Wechat and Viber.
Two things happened last year that saw chat bot numbers really take off. First the four largest messaging apps overtook the four largest social media apps in terms of active users.
Second Facebook switched on bot capability to the 1.1 billion people using Facebook Messenger. Since then an estimated 75,000 bots have been built for this medium.
These bots can do everything from providing you with financial advice, through to getting traffic updates and ordering a latte.
Here in godzone, we’re still catching up. Some applications are very specific and nicely successful. An example is the Snow Centre – an Auckland- and Ohakune-based ski and snowboard retailer.
The Snow Centre bot allows you to book a boot fitting or gear tuning online via Facebook Messenger, dropping the booking straight into Snow Centre’s booking system. It’s simple but it’s well executed.
At the other end of the spectrum, four weeks ago Air New Zealand launched Bravo Oscar Tango (BOT – get it?). Bravo harnesses artificial intelligence to answer customer questions – initially quite simple ones about airpoints and air lounges. But it has loftier goals such as finding lost property and ordering taxis.
As a Fairfax Media journalist found out recently, Bravo is still a work in progress. But it’s a credible start and another example of Air New Zealand pushing the digital boat out.
Looking across the local landscape, the opportunity for chat bots in New Zealand is obvious. For the MetService it would provide a scalable way to offer up on-demand weather reports based on a person’s individual location.
For the New Zealand Transport Authority, it would provide a way to get instant updates on traffic before you drive as well as during the drive, with live advice about conditions and re-routing.
Meanwhile for regulators who want to enable action rather than enforce compliance, it seems a nobrainer.
Looking at the Inland Revenue Department as an example, it has probably got much of the workflow and inquiry pathways already sitting inside its interactive telephony system. All it would need to do is bolt on a messenger bot front end and we’d be away.
Lastly for the likes of insurers it would provide a distribution channel not just for giving quotes, but also for signing up clients without ever putting a piece of paper in front of them. Ever.
The nicest thing about homemade lemonade is that it works out cheap. Sadly that’s not the case in New Zealand right now. If your business wants a chat bot you won’t end up with much change from $80,000.
But that’s going to change. And when it does, bots will take off and apps will be yesterday’s news.
Mike ‘‘MOD’’ O’Donnell is an e-commerce manager and professional director. His Twitter handle is @modsta and he’s currently down with a bot.