How should an SDR interact with a bot? When to take over the conversation from the bot? What happens when someone gets stuck in the bot conversation?
If someone gets stuck for two minutes, an SDR can take over the conversation. The SDR will most likely never get routed into the conversation – and that’s not good. SDR team leads will go in where people get stuck and try to keep the conversation going with the buyer.
Most SDRs treat chat like a phone call. You feel like if you don’t get a meeting from that one chat, you failed. What really should happen is the best reps will try to get the most number of separate conversations in the shortest amount of time. For example, if you can have at least three conversations in a given month, you might have a higher chance of booking a meeting with that buyer or turning them into a customer that month.
That’s why bot monitoring is important. If you think about conversations with bots like a call, you start and then just hung up, you would follow-up. A phone conversation starts and then ends. Hard to remember everything that was said and quickly jump back in. That’s not the case with bots.
You can always pick back up the conversation thread at a later time. But if you treat it like one of many conversations and keep the conversation going, you could have three conversations in a month.
Provide a great website experience if the bot isn’t quite getting it, a human like YOU is needed.
Pro Tips
- You should expect people to have a quick chat, get a couple of questions answered, and then come back for more.
- The key is to follow up with a CTA that will get them coming back to chat with you. Most reps will follow up and ask to get on the phone when people aren’t ready for that yet. People assume that because it’s about NOW, that this is their one and only chance to book a meeting. But what it really requires is patience and persistence. Sometimes the magic is all in the follow up (email sequences i.e. Outreach, SalesNav integration). And if an SDR learns enough to qualify and pass off, why make the buyer even go through an extra phone call if it’s not needed?
- Have sequences for each stage. Are they just starting their research? Great. You should have a long term monthly sequence that recommends high level resources for them. Are they starting to compare you to other options? You should have a weekly sequence that helps them compare you to others to make their decision and offers to connect them with technical resources on your team. Are they ready to buy or decide now? Then it’s time for the CTA to book a meeting.
- Our most sophisticated customers have figured out that the number of separate conversations drives the likelihood to close. If you see a lead with three or more chats in a given month, they are 50% more likely to close in that month (source: Keap).
Here’s a bad example of trying to book a meeting:
