Should You Have a Chatbot on Your Website?

This week, I want to share a few thoughts about digital business development.

I've been working with financial advisor websites since 2021 and have seen a lot of different marketing ideas and strategies.

One of my favorites?

A custom-built, automated chatbot:

When creating the new OlsonFP site, we wanted a way to help qualify visitors and send them in two directions:

• Apply to get a financial plan
• Enroll in Advice Residency (a financial education class)

So after doing some research on different tools, Landbot was the most affordable & functional option.

We thought through the different prompts, messages, and information that would be most helpful to guide someone through the process and ended up with this:

The chat starts by asking what stage of the medical career path they're in and depending on their response, it asks their familiarity with financial planning & what kind of service they're looking for.

As they go through the chat, their responses qualify them into different replies.

Ultimately they land on call-to-actions to either "Schedule a Call" or "Enroll in the Class".

I never thought much of it, other than knowing it was performing well, until I saw this tweet from another designer the other day saying he had success with a similar strategy:

The chatbot I created isn't interactive like the one above, so the advisor isn't responsible for being a customer support rep.

The messages are preset, visitors can't reply, and it was created to convert.

The Takeaway: If you have a niche, or an intentional direction to send visitors, and you're looking to improve website conversions—I'd strongly consider it.

But if the flow isn't well thought-out, I think it could feel very clunky and hurt someone's impression of your brand. Because if someone's never communicated with you before, the automated messages may be the "first" time someone's engaging with you.

They should be custom, in your voice, and speak to your ideal client.

Some possible tools to use:
• Landbot
• Intercom
• Crisp