CXone Bot Builder

CXone Bot Builder enables you to create your own virtual agents, or bots, even if you have no coding knowledge or programming expertise. If you can carry on a conversation, you can create a working bot. These bots can do a wide variety of things, including:

  • Answer common questions.
  • Help a customer change their information in your system.
  • Gather information before transferring to a live agent.

The help desk at Classics, Inc., handles more than 100 calls a day for users who need to reset their passwords. The administrator, Akela Wolfe, wants to create a bot to assist users with this task so agents can concentrate on resolving more complex issues. She decides to create the bot using CXone Bot Builder.

Conversational AI

CXone Bot Builder uses an approach called Conversational AI to design and train botsClosed A software application that handles customer interactions in place of a live human agent.. This approach combines technologies that let computers:

  • Recognize human language.
  • Decipher different languages.
  • Comprehend what is being said.
  • Determine the right response.
  • Respond in a way that mimics human conversation.

Traditional bots are completely scripted. A developer must try to account for every keyword a customer might use in a given scenario. Then the developer has to script a response for the bot for each of these keywords. As a result, these bots can be very time-consuming to set up and maintain.

When you create a bot with CXone Bot Builder, you train it using real conversations. Your bot retains context throughout an interaction. You give the bot the data it needs to respond, and it uses artificial intelligence to do so—and to get better at it over time.

Here's how the key concepts of Conversational AI work together in CXone Bot Builder.

Conversational Bot Concepts
Concept Definition Example
Message envelope icon

Message

Anything a contact says in an interaction, whether question or statement, written or spoken.

"I lost my password."

"What is my balance?"

"Are you a bot?"

Magnifying glass icon

Intent

What the contact wants to communicate or accomplish.

"I lost my password" has the intent of "reset password".

"Hello" has the intent of "greeting".

Information icon

Entity

Defined piece of information in a contact's message. Person or product name, phone number, account number, location, and so on.
Slot icon

Slot

Entity extracted from a contact's message and saved for use in bot responses. Similar to a variable. Creating a slot for contact name lets the bot use that name in responses during an interaction, making it more personal.
Rule icon

Rule

Used to define a bot's response to messages that don't change with context.
  • Single-turn interactions with fixed responses: What are your hours? What is your address?
  • Conversation building blocks: Greetings, good-byes, thank yous and transitions; simple yes/no questions; and acknowledgments. CXone Bot Builder comes with default intents and rules for several of these, including greetings, handoverClosed Any contact message that should trigger transfer to a live agent requests, and more.
  • FAQs
  • Insults and classic bot challenges
Story icon

Story

Used to train a bot to handle an interaction based on message intent and conversational context In an interaction about a forgotten password, the bot would respond to, "How do I do that?" in one way. If the interaction were about creating a new account, the response would be quite different even though in both cases the contact is using the same words with the same intent – to get more information.
Action icon, notated by three cogs

Action

Anything a bot says or does while handling an interaction. Bot messages are one kind of action. Bots built with CXone Bot Builder can also send images or multimedia files, call an API, or handover the interaction to a live agent.

Key Facts About CXone Bot Builder

CXone Bot Builder and Rich Content

Rich content like quick replies and multimedia can be sent through any channel, but it may not display to the customer correctly. For channels that don't support the delivery of rich content, your bot will use rich messaging fallback.

Use the following table to determine which channels will send which types of rich content. Any cells with a red X and any channels not specifically listed will use rich messaging fallback.

  Buttons Cards Multimedia* Quick Replies Rich Links List Picker
Apple Messages for Business Red X, indicating "not supported"

Red X, indicating "not supported"

Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"
Digital Chat Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"
Facebook Messenger Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"
Google Business Messaging Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"
Twitter Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"

images only

Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported"
WhatsApp Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported" Green checkmark, indicating "supported"
Other Channels Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported" Red X, indicating "not supported"

*Multimedia file type and size restrictions apply:

  • Images: PNG, JPG, GIF, or BMP format; 5 MB or smaller
  • Videos: AVI, MPEG-4, or WEBM format; 200 MB or smaller
  • Audio: MP3 format; 15 MB or smaller
  • PDF, Microsoft Word, Excel, or Powerpoint: 15MB or smaller

Tips for Getting the Most from CXone Bot Builder

  • Build multiple botsClosed A software application that handles customer interactions in place of a live human agent. for different use cases, channels, or audiences. You can then have them work together with live agents in your routing queues. Since CXone views your bot as a user entity, routing works the same way for a bot as for your real agents.

  • Let bots handle your night shift to provide 24/7 customer service. Use the date and time filter in a routing queue to send incoming interactions to a bot overnight. The bot can either handle the interaction or route it to an agent for handling the next morning.

  • Use sub-queues to drive a small percentage of traffic to start. Raise the percentage over time as the bot gets smarter and more capable of handling more use cases.

  • Use sub-queues to split traffic between two different bots for A/B testing. This helps you validate which bot performs better.

  • Take advantage of as many features as you can.

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