Chatbots – What Consumers Think

Artificial intelligence has found its way into many areas of modern life, especially digital practices. The number one machine-learning application in eCommerce are chatbots. The automated AI-powered customer support bots have advantages for the vendor and the customer side in eCommerce. The automated tool helps online retailers to process a greater amount of customer inquiries in less time, which can help cut operational costs remarkably. Consumers, on the other side, profit from a 24-hour availability of customer support and quicker answers to simple questions. Leading a conversation with a humanoid computer – even if it is only in written form – still gives a strange feeling to many people, though. Most consumers thus still prefer to converse with a real person when they contact customer support in eCommerce. This is what the Statista Global Consumer Survey found out in its latest Content Special eCommerce update. In the UK, 61% of online shoppers exclusively want or at least prefer contact with a real person. In the U.S. and China, the share is even greater, with 71% and 74%, respectively. With 8% of answers, however, China is also the country where the greatest share of consumers state that they exclusively want chatbot contact. In the end, the acceptance of a bot conversation partner seems to highly depend on the type of inquiry:

Around half of respondents in the three countries would accept a response by a chatbot when they have a question concerning the shipment tracking of their orders, with China showing the highest percentage with 55%. For inquiries on order information, a chatbot response would be okay for an even slightly higher share of Chinese online shoppers, namely 56%, while UK and U.S. respondents accept chatbots significantly less on this matter. Payment is a topic on which a substantial share of consumers would also converse with a chatbot – around one third in each country. The least “chatbot-friendly” type of inquiry in the eyes of U.S., UK, and Chinese consumers are complaints. Only 26% of U.S. consumers would accept a chatbot response if they have a complaint. In China, the share is as low as 19%. In general, the acceptance of chatbots seems slightly higher in China than in the other two countries, as all answers in the survey except “complaint” reached percentages of at least 34% in China. By the way, at least around one in ten respondents checked “doesn’t matter” when asked if they preferred a chatbot or a real person response in eCommerce customer service in all three countries in this comparison. Considering that chatbot experiences are becoming ever more natural, thanks to the rapid progress in AI development, the acceptance among consumers is likely to rise.