Chatbots — or automated conversational agents — have been
around for a few years. However, chatbot hype only took off in early 2016 when
major social and messaging companies began investing in the area. Their
reliance on artificial intelligence (AI), as opposed to prerecorded responses,
generated a lot of excitement in the industry. Much of this was centered around
the concept of “conversational commerce” — i.e., the ability to transact or
make purchases using a conversational interface — usually within a messaging
app. The premise behind this was that chatbots would enable a frictionless
experience as users would not need to open or download another app. But by the
end of the year, it became clear that expectations were far higher than
existing capabilities could deliver.
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