Building and Selling AI Chatbots

Jun 26, 2024

Lecture Notes: Building and Selling AI Chatbots

Introduction

  • Instructor: Liam Otley
  • Background: Built and sold chatbots worth hundreds of thousands using no-code platforms.
  • Goal: Teach comprehensive AI chatbot building for freelancers/business owners.
  • Recap: Hundreds of consulting calls, conversations within Discord community – no existing comprehensive course for AI chatbots until now.

Course Agenda

  1. AI Chatbot Opportunity
    • Macro factors: Trends driving AI chatbots.
    • Types of Chatbots: Overview of chatbot types and their pros/cons.
    • Software Analysis: Best tools and software for building chatbots, from prototyping to fully-fledged builders.
    • Key Concepts: Core principles of AI and chatbot building.
    • Practical Builds: Building nine different chatbots from basic to advanced.
    • Selling Chatbots: Strategies to sell chatbots to businesses.

AI Chatbot Opportunity

  • Market Growth: AI, and chatbot sectors are booming.
  • Applications: From new communication channels to personalized shopping experiences.
  • Trends: Moving from point-and-click to natural language interfaces due to AI’s understanding of text and voice.
  • Psychological Basis: Humans prefer energy-efficient methods – speaking/chatting over manual input.
  • Business Impact: Chatbots reduce costs, increase revenue, 24/7 availability, customer satisfaction.
  • Knowledge Gap: Business owners need experts to build and integrate chatbots.
  • Historical Contexts: Similar to the adoption of websites, mobile apps, social media.
  • No-Code Platforms: Accessible skills for non-developers.
  • Career Paths: Become a chatbot developer or start an AI automation agency.

Types of Chatbots

  1. Old School Chatbots
    • Decision trees, binary choices.
    • Examples: ELIZA (1966).
  2. Pure AI Chatbots
    • Freeform conversation, based on large language models.
    • Examples: ChatGPT, using GPT-3.5 API.
  3. Modern Chatbots
    • Combine old school + AI features, perform external actions.
    • More flexible, valuable for businesses.

Software for Building Chatbots

  1. Prototyping Tools: Chatbase, Dante AI, Kodi AI.
  2. Complete Builders: Botpress and Voiceflow.
  3. Tools and Integrations: Zapier, Make, Stack AI.

Key Concepts

  1. Knowledge Bases: Store data in chunks, retrieve relevant info to answer queries.
  2. Fine Tuning: Chat models (GPT) can’t be fine-tuned yet.
  3. Prompting: Instructions for the AI to behave in certain ways.
  4. Intent Classification: Identify user requests and route them to specific actions.
  5. Chat History: Use previous messages to maintain context.
  6. Deployment: Web chat, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, SMS.
  7. APIs and Agents
    • APIs: Application Programming Interface, allows apps to talk to each other.
    • Agents: Autonomous programs to complete tasks.

Practical Build Sessions

  1. Prototyping
    • Chatbase: Quick AI prototyping from documents/websites.
    • Dante AI: Similar to Chatbase, but with more customization.
    • Kodi AI: Add folders and integrate with Slack, Discord.
  2. Voiceflow Builds
    • Customer Support Chatbots: Basic loop + Advanced using intents.
    • Staff Training Chatbots: WhatsApp deployment, basic + advanced features.
    • Lead Generation Chatbots: Add placements, lead capture.

Building Customer Support Chatbots

  • Basic: Pure AI chatbot with knowledge base loop.
  • Advanced: Adding intents for specific actions (order tracking, leave a review).

Building Staff Training Chatbots

  • Basic: Training document integration.
  • Advanced: Incident reporting, API integration, deployment on WhatsApp.

Building Lead Generation Chatbots

  • Basic: Knowledge bases for niche-specific questions.
  • Advanced: Ads, lead capture automation, API integration using Make.

Selling Chatbots

  • AI Automation Agency: Combine chatbot building and automation skills.
  • Niche Focus: Specialize in specific industries, create packaged offerings.
  • Community & Resources: Discord, free Hub, premium accelerator, newsletters.

Final Thoughts

  • Comprehensive Skill Development: From building to selling chatbots.
  • Community Support: Opportunities to join discussions, access templates, and continuous learning.
  • Promotional Activities: Offer consulting calls, tutorials, keep engaging with community.

Note: All templates and resources available on the instructor’s resource hub.