What is Conversational Marketing—And Why Does It Matter for Business?

If you’re trying to leverage your platform to connect with customers, how do you pull it off? The key is conversational marketing. With a combination of artificial intelligence, cutting-edge digital solutions, and a talented sales team, conversational marketing can redefine your brand in powerful ways.

Take it from Campbell’s—a company that leverages conversational marketing and their artificial intelligence system to combine knowledge of recipes, culinary traditions, and common likes/dislikes to organize an entire recipe database. By interacting with the fictional character of Chef Watson, users reap the rewards of AI implementation by asking questions, inputting the ingredients they have on hand, and providing information about their tastes.

Chef Watson responds by giving highly personalized user recommendations based on this information. This resulted in 10,000 user interactions and a 1.9x increase in ingredient submissions throughout the campaign.

That’s the power of conversational marketing at work. If leveraged properly, it can redefine your entire brand by forging an unbreakable bond with your customers.

In the wake of COVID-19, marketers everywhere are trying to figure out how to adjust to a hybrid world. Customer buying patterns have undergone a precedented shift. From dealing with the aftermath of a global pandemic to taking advantage of resurging Y2K trends to serving a new generation coming into their buying power, marketers are always looking for new engagement techniques.

As a form of inbound marketing, conversational marketing prioritizes brand-customer dialogue, making communication a two-way street. By providing instant support, site visitors can get their questions answered without waiting on the phone or sending an email.

There are typically two approaches to conversational marketing. In some instances, there is a 24/7 live customer support team. In other instances, it’s entirely run by artificial intelligence.

In most cases, the most successful approach to customer service is a hybrid one. This involves filtering out straightforward FAQs with chatbot customer service. If the question is more complex, or the customer would rather talk to a live agent, the chat is transferred.

Since 2019, the number of customers that feel frustrated with a lack of brand responsiveness across different channels is 5.7 times higher. Eliminating this frustration with conversational marketing is key to building brand-customer relationships.

Conversational marketing can result in stronger customer relationships, a smoother sales funnel experience, and improved data retention that can inform future marketing efforts.

Customer loyalty is founded on trust. Will you take care of them as a consumer and consistently meet their needs? By providing instant support in a preferred channel, customers know that you have their back.

Are you still offering a certain promotion? Do you accept returns? What is your brand’s advice for this customer’s unique purchasing dilemma? These are questions that could translate to immediate sales. But in today’s age of instant downloads, customer patience is at an all-time low. If your answer is delayed, interest wanes while frustration spikes.

One of the primary benefits of leveraging AI in customer interactions is data. Ethical data-gathering practices can revolutionize your marketing efforts since AI saves every keystroke made by customers. What are customers asking most frequently? What product developments are they asking for? What issues do they have?

Sometimes, customers don’t know what product would best meet their needs. That’s why you’re there—to listen to their needs and match their desires to your product offerings. What upgraded package might best anticipate their future needs? That’s why a well-trained customer sales team is so crucial. By being able to cross-sell and up-sell, you’re doing yourself a big favor.

Post-COVID, hallmarks of the traditional retail experience continue to wither. However, many shoppers miss casual bonds—a term coined by psychologists to cover the social bonds formed with people like our mail carrier or cashier. That’s what many people are lamenting when they talk about the downfall of traditional retail experiences. Mimicking that real-time human interaction is the best part of a conversational marketing experience.

Generating leads is fantastic—but when it comes to the follow-up process, lots of people end up getting lost. When they fill out a lead capture form, it’s a salesperson’s job to follow up.

But by the time that happens, the interest could be lost, they may have purchased from another company, or your email gets lost in their spam folder. Leaving the success of your sales cycle to chance is the last thing you want to do. To combat this, the combination of around-the-clock sales personnel and chatbots can capture real-time leads, initiate lucrative sales conversations, and schedule follow-up calls, without ever dropping the ball.

This approach makes all the difference when it comes to making marketing plans. With the right data, you’ll be able to target your customers with high precision.

With an increased focus on instant, digitalized experiences, 88% of customers expect improved digital experiences post-pandemic. Part of an improved digital experience is speed and accuracy, two things provided by conversational marketing.

With a focus on empathetic, one-on-one dialogue, customers know that you care for them and have exactly what you need to meet their needs on time, every time. Whether that’s serving up digital marketing solutions or finding the perfect recipe that goes with a can of Campbell’s soup, you’ll be ready!