5 Best AI Chatbots to Automate Customer Support

It’s 2024 and customer support, a key part of any successful business is no longer what it used to be. It’s the era of short attention spans and customers with little patience. Fewer people have the time and patience to endure the time-consuming, complicated, and often error-prone customer support systems that were the norm a few years ago.

Picture this: a customer runs into a problem with the color of the product he ordered and reaches out to customer support. The question is simple: I got a blue headset instead of the red one I ordered. How do I get it replaced? The answer is simple as well: just bring it alongside the receipt within 24 hours of delivery and we will gladly replace it. But of course, when the customer reaches out to customer support, he gets an automated message saying: “Thanks for reaching out. We will get back to you within the next 48 hours” The customer’s email eventually reaches a customer service rep who reads the question and replies. But it's too late, the 24-hour return window has expired and the customer is now stuck with the blue headset.

You can read this in different ways, but I see a customer who might never buy from that company again. But here’s the thing: if this exact scenario plays out with a company that uses a customer support automation chatbot to answer questions and resolve issues, there’s a great chance the customer got the right answer at the right time and made the swap just in time. The result? A happy customer willing to stick around and order again.

If you don’t innovate, your competitors will, and when they do, they’ll take away your customers and the business they bring with them. It’s a harsh unforgiving business environment out there, so you can either be on the cutting edge, or you can be left behind. You have to put a lot of effort into finding new, efficient ways to support your customers.

So what customer support innovations are your competitors using to get ahead in the game that you aren't using?

The 5 Best Customer Support Automation AI Chatbots

AI chatbots are a powerful tool to automate your workflow and free up your team's time. But with so many choices, picking the right one can be tricky. Let's dive into 5 of the best AI chatbots to automate your customer service operations:

1. Chatbase

Chatbase is an AI-powered chatbot solution that businesses can deploy to automate their customer support operations. What makes Chatbase a stand-out option in the market is its simplicity and ease of use.

Unlike most of the chatbot solutions that are sandwiched with complex CRM systems, Chatbase is a focused, standalone support automation solution that lets you build and deploy in just minutes.

Chatbase AI chatbots that can stand in for your customer support agents. Because of its natural language processing abilities (powered by OpenAI’s most advanced language models) and a wide range of integration options, Chatbase can fit into various customer support automation use cases.

You can use Chatbase to automate customer service on a wide range of platforms including Slack, WordPress, Weebly, Shopify, Webflow, Wix, Bubble, and dozens of others. If you are looking for a simple chatbot solution that will not cost you a fortune to set up and maintain, Chatbase is a great choice.

Chatbase has a free option that lets you build and deploy chatbots for free. When you are ready to scale up your customer support automation efforts, you can upgrade to a premium plan that starts at $19/month or lower when billed annually.

Key Features:

Lead qualification tools
Integration with automation tools like Zapier
No-code AI chatbot creation
Teams feature for collaboration

Pros:

Very easy to use and deploy
It has a teams feature that lets you invite other team members to collaborate on chatbots
Heavily AI-powered, with room for training your chatbot on your business data
Quite flexible and can be deployed for dozens of customer support tasks
One of the cheapest AI-powered chatbot in the market
Little to no hallucination when compared to other options in the market

2. HubSpot Chatbots

HubSpot is more of a general CRM automation tool than a customer support chatbot. It offers chatbots as part of its wide toolkit, but it focuses more on general engagement than deep customer support automation. You won’t be far off the mark if you think of HubSpot as a jack of all trade within the sales and marketing automation space.

HubSpot offers a standard chatbot builder that businesses can use to build chatbots to automate live chat conversations for sales, support, and marketing services. Although HubSpot chatbots are AI-powered in a way, their chatbots are primarily rule-based. The chatbot's capabilities are limited in the free and lower-tier plans, with advanced features like custom branching logic only available in the Professional and Enterprise plans.

Key Features:

Robust lead qualification
Task scheduling
Support ticket generation
No-code custom chatbots

Pros:

Integration with HubSpot's marketing, sales, and service tools
No-code chatbot builder
Lead qualification and scheduling capabilities

Cons:

AI capabilities are limited, most of HubSpot still relies on rule-based systems
The free and lower-tier plans don't have advanced customer support automation features
HubSpot chatbots lack the power of dedicated customer service solutions
The cost of setting up and managing the HubSpot customer support automation ecosystem can be very expensive for small businesses.

3. Intercom's Fin AI Chatbot

Fin is a customer service AI chatbot by Intercom which is heavily powered by OpenAI’s large language models. It can understand complex queries, ask clarifying questions, and break down complex topics. Fin pulls information from a provided custom knowledge base to ensure it has deep knowledge of a topic it is discussing with a customer seeking support assistance. It also has a way to hand off complex queries to human support staff. Generally, Fin is quite a reliable customer automation chatbot you can deploy to automate customer service for your business.

Features:

Conversational AI features powered by OpenAI
Uses a provided custom knowledge base to answer questions about your business
It is easy to install and doesn’t require lengthy periods of use to understand.
Handoff to support teams for complex queries

Pros:

Advanced natural language understanding capabilities
Prevents hallucinations by referencing only provided knowledge base
Easy setup and maintenance
Integrations with Intercom’s larger CRM ecosystem as well as other CRMs like Zendesk

Cons:

Building certain chatbot flows can be a huge problem. This is probably one of the most highlighted downsides of using Intercom’s Fin.
Expect to do without some of the features you find in other CRM-backed chatbot

4. Zendesk

Zendesk is one of the most popular customer service automation tools in the market. It has a robust suite of features that help businesses automate customer support alongside an AI-powered chatbot that can be configured to perform a range of customer service tasks.

Beyond chatbots, Zendesk also has a range of AI-powered automation tools that all work together within the larger Zendesk CRM ecosystem to help you automate customer service.

Key Features:

No-code bot builder for easy customization
Omnichannel deployment (web, mobile, email, social media)
Integration with several third-party systems.
Intelligent routing and handoff to live agents
Robust reporting and analytics

Pros:

Pre-trained for common customer issues
Easy to set up and use with no-code builder
Integrates seamlessly with the Zendesk ecosystem
Offers omnichannel support

Cons:

Pricing is on the high side, and goes up with the number of agents that have access to the tool
Requires set up of additional tools for complex workflows
Steep learning curve for new users
Complex to manage without a dedicated team

5. Salesforce’s Einstein GPT

Einstein GPT is Salesforce's AI-powered chatbot that combines Salesforce's proprietary AI tech with OpenAI's AI models to drive customer support automation for businesses. Einstein GPT can collect and unify customer data across various teams making it possible for your customer support unit and other departments to work in sync. However, configuring and deploying Einstein GPT can be quite technical, making it a bit challenging for an average small business to deploy.

Key Features:

Generates answer and reply suggestions based on the data in your Salesforce CRM.
AI features like natural language processing which helps in providing automated replies
Intelligent case classification and routing

Pros:

Advanced natural language capabilities powered by OpenAI
Powerful AI with features like reply suggestions and case routing
Unifies customer data across departments

Cons:

One of the biggest issues with Salesforce’s Einstein GPT is the difficulty in configuring and deploying it
Limited pre-trained models, making setup and updates difficult for average users
Additional cost on top of Service Cloud products

Ready to settle for an option? Here is a recap to help you settle for one.

Need a customer support tool that has all the right features but also easy on the wallet? Chatbase is your sidekick! This user-friendly option is perfect for startups and small businesses looking for a quick and affordable way to answer common customer questions. It's also ideal for scaling businesses that need a chatbot that can adapt to their needs.

Want a chatbot that can be tethered with a CRM system? HubSpot Chatbots is your secret weapon! This versatile platform offers a range of features, and fits well into the larger HubSpot CRM systems.

Looking for a tool for complex support automation? Intercom's Fin is your A-student! Fin is packed with a range of features to deal with a complex support operations.

Do you crave cutting-edge technology for your customer service? Zendesk and Salesforce's Einstein GPT are your future partners! These advanced chatbots utilize the latest AI advancements to provide hyper-personalized and intelligent customer experiences. They're perfect for larger companies seeking to stay at the forefront of innovation.

Remember, no matter your business size or budget, there's a perfect chatbot waiting to transform your customer service!