Considering the present competitive business environment, companies have emerged as one of the foremost incorporators of technology so as to enhance efficiency, production and even satisfaction of customers. One such tool is the AI ChatBot. These smart bots are capable of fixing customer problems, performing repetitive activities, and facilitating one’s teams’ interaction. Implementation of an AI ChatBot into a communication channel such as Microsoft Teams will add significant value to your company’s productivity and efficiency.
In this blog we are going to show you how to build an AI ChatBot and connect it with Microsoft Teams. This will also include the use of backend applications, like Ruby on Rails, which allows the system to use APIs to pass data to the consumers.
What is AI ChatBot?
An AI ChatBot is a computer program that mimics conversations with people using Artificial Intelligence and Natural Language Processing (NLP). For example chatbots interact with users‘ input rather than simply outputting information, they perform a range of functions: answering user queries, booking appointments, delivering corporate communications to staff, etc. The most amazing part of AI Chatbots is that they do not adhere to a strict work schedule of some days of the week and certain hours of the day. This means that once deployed, them and their services are available to customers and employees on a 24/7 basis.
What is the Importance of AI ChatBots?
AI Chatbots can help businesses in a number of ways:
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No Timings Constraints: AI Chatbots take no delays. They can help customers or even employees all day long, which is particularly important to companies that offer their services in countries with many time zones.
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Doing Things Repetitively: Answering a set of questions to ask for the help in booking an appointment, Chatbots can do all these and many other simple jobs ensuring that the human resources are used on a far more important agenda.
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Speedy and Effective: Because Chatbots are able to deal with numerous questions at the same time, the speed of the response is quicker, enhancing customer and employee satisfaction at the same time.
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Pocket-Friendly: Rather than employing a large workforce specifically for customer service or support, enterprises can integrate AI chatbots which significantly cuts expenses while maintaining high service standards.
Stages of Building an AI ChatBot
Creating an artificial intelligence chatbot can turn out to be a technical endeavor. Nevertheless, it is much easier than you may think if you divide the task into several components. That is how you can go about creating one.
1. Choose a Chatbot Development Platform
The first step is to decide on a platform to design and build your studies on ChatBot. Some of these include:
- Dialogflow – by Google. A great natural language understanding tool for building Conversation interfaces.
- Microsoft Bot Framework – Ideal if you wish to build a Conversational agent that runs on Microsoft Teams.
- IBM Watson Assistant – Features deep AI for communication bots.
For this blog, we will take a Microsoft Bot Framework since it is compatible with the Microsoft Teams environment.
2. Create a Chatbot Conversation Flow
Decide on what functions your ChatBot will perform.
- Will it be providing answers to customers’ questions?
- Assisting users in organizing their work schedules?
There are different applications designed for mapping conversation trees, for instance, Bot Framework Composer.
3. Create the Correct Settings and Code for the Backend using Ruby on Rails
After creating your wireframe of the ChatBot the next task would be to install the backend section of the program. We will set this up using Ruby on Rails. The backend is what receives and processes all the requests that involve real time data. For instance, in case the user makes an inquiry about the order status, the backend, through APIs, will go to the database, query this piece of information, and relay it back to the ChatBot.
Create APIs in your backend for performing different types of functions such as:
- Checking order status
- Requesting for customer details
- Getting and canceling appointments
4. Give Intelligence to your ChatBot
There is Necessity of feeding the Chatbot with content for it to become smart, selfish as it may sound. This can be achieved through inputting, common inquiry questions, normal user’s profile and their responses. Such process is easy with the help of some applications I.e. Microsoft Bot Framework as they come with ready-to-use skill training units.
5. Conduct Tests on the ChatBot
If you are done designing the Chatbot system, do not proceed to the integration phase just yet. Evaluate the System and ensure that everything is in order. Assess its performance under different queries, its reporting accuracy and its tolerance for errors.
Steps to be Followed to Integrate the ChatBot with Microsoft Teams
Having finished developing your ChatBot, let’s extend its reach by incorporating Microsoft Teams which is widely used for intra-team communication and collaboration among many companies in India. Team ChatBot integration allows deploying it for your employees or even customers through their Teams.
Step 1: Register the ChatBot in Azure
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Create a Bot Service: To begin with, navigate to the Azure Portal and create an Azure Bot Service. This service allows you to publish and host your ChatBot.
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Get App ID and Password: Along the process, while creating a Bot Service, Azure will generate an App ID and Password which will be useful after when integrating the Bot into Teams.
Step 2: Set Up the Microsoft Teams Application
- Work with App Studio within Teams: You are able to set up your bot via App Studio within Microsoft Teams. This application makes it easier to create and deploy apps in Teams.
- Connect to the Azure Bot Service: When preparing the Teams application ‘configuration file’ (manifest file), there is a field for the App ID which will have to be filled with your Azure bot's App ID.
Step 3: Integrate the ChatBot into the Teams Application
Having configured your bot, constrain it into a package, and deploy it into Teams. You may try implementing it first within a specific team or department before making it available across the organization.
Benefits of AI ChatBot Integration with Microsoft Teams
Benefits of integrating your AI ChatBot with Microsoft Teams include the following, which can be of much importance to the companies:
Just like all your members, even the ChatBot can be engaged directly within Teams hence making it less cumbersome to access information without having to move across platforms .
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Increased productivity: Routine work automation in Teams ensures that your employees can focus on more critical tasks and, thus, boost overall productivity.
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Quick Access to Information: Be it checking the meeting schedules, fetching customer details, or just giving any updates, ChatBot can quickly ease out your team's work without any delays.
Other Tools to Integrate with AI ChatBots
Besides Microsoft Teams, even more scope is there of integration of AI ChatBots with other platforms in action:
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WhatsApp Business: Businesses use WhatsApp to communicate with customers. AI chatbots can be integrated automatically to answer the customer queries on WhatsApp.
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Facebook Messenger: Companies that drive customer engagement on the channel would succeed.
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Slack: Similar to Slack, which is a team collaboration tool, where ChatBots can automate many tasks to enhance levels of productivity among teams
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Your Website: Place the chatbots directly on your business website to provide real-time assistance to visiting customers.
To Summarize
Developing an AI ChatBot and linking it with Microsoft Teams can be a great addition for corporates looking to enhance customer service and internal functioning. Thanks to AI Chatbots, the repetitive work is eased and information is readily available, hence, time is saved, costs are cut and productivity is increased in the business. In other words, if you are in retail, education, finance, and so on, an AI chatbot will change the way you work for the best by enabling easier interaction and providing adequate customer service.
Now is a great opportunity to look into AI Chatbots as they will help propel your enterprise to further heights.
