In the next part of his Professional Adviser series, our Chief Commercial Officer Mike Morrow, explores chatbots with some insight from Parmenion Chief Architect Chris Falconer.
Read the full article below...
Artificial intelligence is opening up all kinds of opportunities to create products and services that enhance your business processes and the service you provide.
Our regulator is embracing transformational technology with open arms. But they, and we, recognise that you should proceed with caution if you're experimenting, and that's especially true when you're creating a client facing tool.
Here, Parmenion Chief Architect, Chris Falconer, shares his word of wisdom on thinking before you act, and five simple steps to building your own chatbot.
Building a simple chatbot for your website can be a strong commercial and customer-experience move. It but it comes with some important considerations, especially in a regulated industry.
Before you get started…let's be clear
- Be clear on your positioning – this is an assistant, not an adviser. Steer well clear of any decision-making language. Your chatbot is not a replacement for you – it must never give, or appear to give, personalised advice
- Be clear on what it's for – keep the end in mind, eg tell me about a product, book an appointment or explain the difference between ISAs and pensions
- Be clear on when ‘the human' kicks in – set strict guardrails on responses when questions get complex or action is needed. Financial advice is inherently human and anything sensitive, emotional or where an understanding of the wider context is needed requires your unique skills
- Be clear on its limitations with simple and direct disclaimers, eg "This chatbot provides general information only and nothing it says constitutes financial advice."
Eyes wide open to the pros and cons
While an AI chatbot can be a brilliant way for you to offer always-on support for your clients, helping you answer common questions, respond to requests for documents or information and make meeting appointments 24/7, even the simplest chatbot will need to be fed with appropriated content and constantly monitored to sure nothing it says could be misleading or just wrong. You'll also need to keep it updated as your service or regulation changes.
If you want more than a static question-answering tool, you might also want it to integrate with your relationship management or booking systems.
That said, once you've built it, your admin workload will lighten, and you'll have a valuable source of insight on what your clients are concerned about.
How to create a simple chatbot
If you want to experiment safely with AI, it's easier than you might think.
There are a lot of products available to help you create a custom chatbot. ChatBase and Dante AI are worth a look, but there are many more. Look for free plans for a limited number of messages per month while you explore what's possible.
Once you've chosen the one that suits you best, all you need is ten minutes, a clear description of your chatbot's purpose and tone of voice, and the appropriate links to your trusted sources of information to share, whether that's documents, files or websites.
Then you're ready to go.
- Log in to your chatbot platform and follow the instructions to get started
- Describe what you want your chatbot to do in simple, direct. eg answer frequently asked questions about our service in a friendly and helpful tone
- Add your information sources. You can usually upload files (PDFs or word documents) or link to websites for your chatbot to reference when it's answering questions
- When you've done that, test it out and make sure that the responses it's giving are correct and appropriate. If you need to make any changes, just update your instructions
- It's a good idea to test this with your team in a closed environment before you invite anyone else to use it. Once you're happy with it – completely happy - click publish. Your chatbot is live! Your job's not over though, you need to keep monitoring, testing and learning to make sure it really is a valuable tool for you.
Missed the previous articles?
To read the first part in the series, visit here: Adventures in AI: separating hype from reality.
The second part can be found here: Adventures in AI: managing security and data risks.
This article is for financial professionals only. Any information contained within is of a general nature and should not be construed as a form of personal recommendation or financial advice. Nor is the information to be considered an offer or solicitation to deal in any financial instrument or to engage in any investment service or activity.
Parmenion accepts no duty of care or liability for loss arising from any person acting, or refraining from acting, as a result of any information contained within this article. All investment carries risk. The value of investments, and the income from them, can go down as well as up and investors may get back less than they put in. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future returns.
