Remember Rusty from Cars the movie? I do, I watch that movie so many times with the little ones that at some point I knew by hard almost half a movie. In Cars, Rusteeze is the brand that is sponsored by the main character and as a car, you never want to be rusty. Chatbots are pretty much the same. A chatbot isn’t a tool you can simply launch and leave. It’s a digital representative; a highly visible ambassador of your brand. As such, it requires ongoing review, maintenance and optimisation. And as in Cars the movies and in real life inattention can make your chatbot a liability, causing customer frustration and casting a shadow on your brand. So what would be your Rusty Rust-eze for your chatbots?

Monitoring how your users are interacting with your chatbot, where are they getting frustrated in the conversation and when are they leaving the chat will give you insights in the parts that you need to improve to keep your chatbot updated and provide a seamless experience for its users. The first sign of rust in your bot is when is not monitored for a little too long. Users are getting used to the presence of chatbots, so the expectations are getting higher. And your bot is supposed to grow along with those expectations. It needs to be smart, stay relevant and helpful to the purpose it was created. You need to have a plan for integrating you bot with new tools and breakthroughs as they come. App integrations, sentiment analysis, natural language processing, you name it. You need measuring tools and review interactions. And you can also add feedback to your bot, add way for your users to tell you their frustrations in comment form and not only selection options. The common symptoms that start showing when your bot is getting rusty is frustration from users, misunderstandings, bad responses, not able to reply to common questions. Be like Lightning McQueen, keep your bot updated, and without rust. Ongoing maintenance and monitoring should be your goal.

I love Disney movies, here’s a wiki with more from the characters of Cars:

http://pixarcars.wikia.com/wiki/Rusty_Rust-eze

https://chatbotsmagazine.com/preventing-bot-rot-how-to-keep-your-chatbot-healthy-18b6724e47a3