The automotive industry has undergone rapid transformation in recent years because market forces have induced a radical shift in both manufacturing and digital practices.

Automotive manufacturers started adopting new ways and innovative technologies to connect and communicate with buyers online. 

One such strategy has been the adoption of Conversational Customer Experience through a combination of AI and Virtual Assistants. The Conversational AI assistant strategy considered by marketing teams of automotive companies is driving greater personalization, increasing revenue opportunities, and helping automotive organizations to expand and scale across new international territories.

In an increasingly digital world, customers want information easily accessible and questions answered at any time of day or night. Conversational AI can immediately engage visitors to the website because capturing potential customers in a virtual environment is all about compelling, sustained engagement. The deployment of virtual agents promises to create an experience where customers can engage 24/7, when, where and how they want. 

Importance of Conversational AI in Auto Buyer Journey 

With the rise of artificial intelligence, virtual assistants and conversational AI emulating a human mind are gaining popularity in the automotive industry. A conversational AI is an attempt to enable a computer to mimic and carry out the same experience as a human. The technology modernizes interactions between customers and organizations to enhance customer experience, customer engagement, and overall operations with increased efficiency at a reduced cost. Conversational AI can also efficiently carry out lead generation, lead conversion, operations, and customer support, surpassing human intelligence to add value to digital experiences.  

Conversational AI platforms and virtual assistants are becoming a comprehensive avenue for customers to save time and yet involve themselves to know or explore more. 

Let’s take a look at the benefits that conversational AI assistants provide in an auto buyer journey -  

1. Awareness

The concept of walking into a car dealership showroom is alluring and loved by many. However, the zeal of the car enthusiast has been capped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, businesses are increasingly dependent on artificial intelligence to deliver comprehensive and provide more inclusive services to all of their customers. Automobile dealers are using Virtual assistants and Conversational AI-powered bots to engage customers and help them relive the good old times. Thereby, assisting in driving increased revenue, decreasing churn, and eliminating frustration. Additionally, the deployment of Conversational AI technology with voice assistance allows businesses to create an enhanced and innovative digital experience that mimics a dealership and test drive visit.

For instance, a global 2 wheeler brand improved visitors to lead conversions by 33% through the use of human-like virtual sales assistants.

The full case study is here. 

2. Customer Engagement

Consumers expect an individual approach and personalized content. 

Conversational AI can reach out to customers proactively at crucial touchpoints along the customer journey based on behavior signals to provide information at the precise moment of relevance. After a short get-to-know-you interaction, the user can be guided unnoticed through predefined questions to receive a customized product offer according to the conversation.

The personalized content increases interest, builds trust, and convinces the undecided user to share his preferences and details with the Conversational AI assistant.

3. Boosts Lead Generation

Using conversational AI, customers can interact with the company via the website or through a range of popular messaging apps. Facebook offers many social marketing tools, and a conversational AI tool can utilize the data and insights collected from conversations to create substantial leads for a car dealership and accelerate the process for your sales team. It is often observed that customers prefer to communicate with an automated chatbot rather than with a human agent, where they have to undergo repeated conversations each time they connect with a new agent. 

4. Automate common FAQs resolution 24/7

It is important to create an experience that enables customers to engage 24/7, wherever they want, whenever they want. Businesses typically have 5-7 different types of customer service questions that account for more than half of the total inquiries. A powerful AI can comprehend the multiple ways people might ask the same query. 

Conversational AI offers round-the-clock assistance to customers and answers their frequently asked questions. This may be quite beneficial to automotive businesses in terms of improving customer satisfaction.   

5. Scheduling Test Drives for Interested Customers

Several potential customers want to test drive the vehicle they are interested in before making a final purchase. Acknowledging and scheduling these requests can be hectic for the staff. The conversational AI assistants take the request for test drives and schedule them without any human interference.

This can go a level deeper where scheduled test drives are seamlessly mapped to the closest dealership creating a swift customer to dealership to HQ sync. 

Here is how Bajaj Auto used conversational AI to accelerate their test drive conversions by 14X! 

6. Quick Loan Calculations

If a customer chooses to obtain loans to purchase the vehicle, the virtual assistance offers assistance in associated calculations. The virtual assistance will mention the loan amount, term, and interest rate to the customers. Thus, generating a personalized report. It captures the customer's personal contact information to send these reports and figures to send them directly. Additionally, the feature can be integrated with the virtual assistant for a fixed loan type and amount.

7. Seamless After-sales services

Automotive businesses must offer after-sales services to their customers. Conversational AI assistants integrated with Messaging Apps can alleviate these requirements easily by reminding customers of their upcoming vehicle service requirements or insurance renewal dates and creating a streamlined post-sales experience for the customer. Customers can schedule maintenance on time while dealers get repeat business. Thus, creating a healthy customer-business relationship. 

Reinventing Auto Buyer Journey with Conversational AI & Virtual Assistants 

Today, the most meaningful experiences are those that are tailored to each individual and are connected to their individual needs. Nowadays, people demand such experiences across all of their brand interactions, whether it’s ordering groceries online, paying for coffee, booking travel, enrolling for insurance, or buying a car. The way people shop for cars has changed remarkably, as digital customer experience is the new battlefield for competitive advantage.

Almost all consumers prefer interacting with a chatbot over waiting in a queue for a human agent. Undoubtedly, Conversational AI-based virtual agents allow businesses to scale and can help manage a spike in demand. They also have the potential to enhance and standardize the quality of services provided in the automobile industry. 

Future of Conversational AI in Auto Buyer Journey 

Many automotive manufacturers and dealers globally are making significant investments in a variety of consumer-focused digital technologies. These technologies range from tablet-based product guides to virtual reality (VR)-enabled applications to increase customer engagement. The deployment of technology through digital investments by manufacturers is to drive overall mobility strategies aimed at reshaping the way consumers engage with their brand. 

Dealers, on the other hand, are often aiming for immediate digital solutions to drive operational efficiencies, empower sales staff, reduce overhead, and increase transparency in the sales process. The focus is on tactical solutions that integrate disparate data systems to ease information flow across the dealership.

The lack of mutual understanding causes disagreements between manufacturers and dealers on the best approach to digital implementation. However, both parties could benefit from thinking more collectively about digital transformation. 

The future of conversational AI in the auto buyer journey is very bright, with the rising demands of the customers. All leading automobile brands throughout the world are deploying virtual agents because it helps in the selling and buying process. This reduces the overall time to reach the customers. Also, customers receive good and quick responses to their queries, which successfully increases their satisfaction rate. 

However, the most crucial task is to select the right conversational AI platform for your business. Although you have a lot of alternatives, meeting your business needs might be daunting. And this is where we at ORI have introduced Convert AI. 

Benefits of Adopting Convert AI in the Auto Buyer Journey 

Convert offers all the features and customization options to help gain your customer satisfaction and engagement rates. The following are notable features of the platform that promise to help you simplify your business with a wonderful client experience - 

1. Omnichannel: Wherever your prospects and customers are, be it on social media or instant messaging platforms, our omnichannel automotive bot helps you connect with your prospects and customers in real-time. Available on 70+ channels, we nudge the customers in the most optimized way, when they are most likely to respond. 
2. Vernacular language support: Be it engaging customers belonging to a specific region or globally as an automotive brand, use our multilingual model. We offer Convert in 117+ native languages. It's easy to set up and deploy once you're ready to interact with your customers across channels in their preferred language. 
3. Customer Analytics: Derive precise insights from conversations and provide value to the customer. Convert AI offers the insights required to improve customer experience and sales by benefiting from the conversations from consumers and recognizing triggers to engage consumers. Get to know your customers better 
4. Easy Integration: Hassle-free connection with 100+ CRMs, marketing automation stacks, CDP’s, and several other important apps. 

Convert efficiently captures and engages with contacts and helps with product discovery while being fully automated at scale. All of this is possible due to Convert's Key intervention in the auto buyer journey, leading to accelerated results. 

If you want to take your business growth to the next level, feel free to contact us. We’ll help you with a detailed guide to conversational AI along with its benefits, implementation, demo, and more.