Intercom Launches Video Bots

Intercom today launched video bots, a sales tool that combines the humanity of video with the automation of bots, with an eye on capturing the attention of website visitors and accelerating sales.

“Just three weeks ago we released a new product called custom bots, [so] video bots are a natural next step for us,” says Matt Hodges, vice president of commercial product strategy at Intercom. “Video is probably the most personal, human, and engaging way to connect with people online, so with video bots you can now engage more visitors proactively on your site with video.”

Video bots allow sales and marketing teams to automatically send customizable video messages featuring humans to website visitors via a business messenger. The video bots are built on Intercom’s app platform, allowing for automated workflows and ensuring that there are always concrete next steps. For example, after the video message, website visitors can be automatically prompted to begin a video call, sign up for a newsletter, or speak with a salesperson, all within the messenger.

“Certainly, sales and marketing teams use video as a medium through a number of different tactics like recorded demos and personalized videos in emails, but I don’t think anyone has connected the dots until now and thought, ‘Well, wouldn’t it be amazing if we could use video as a medium [to provide] more engaging and personal experiences with bot interactions?’” Hodges says. “While video is a known tactic, a known medium, and is used heavily by sales and marketing teams, I think this is a really new innovation.”

Intercom sees the video bots as a way to not only catch the eye of new customers but build stronger relationships with existing customers. “We want to help our customers and future customers grow faster through creating better relationships with their own customers, and that’s something that we think about across the entire customer life cycle. Our customers have the need to acquire customers, engage them, and support them,” Hodges says. “By adding video, [you have] a way to interact with a visitor for the first time on your website and then enter them into a bot workflow where you can put them down the right path for success, without having the burden on the business to have people there to make sure that visitors are getting the right experience.”

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