HubSpot’s Operations Hub (OpsHub) has added a number of new functionalities, including custom-coded bot actions for marketing tools. Previously, the majority of HubSpot developers were only interacting with content management systems (CMS) or application programming interfaces (APIs) to create custom HubSpot apps. With OpsHub, developers and power users can leverage what have traditionally been marketer-only tools, and specifically workflows and automation tools within the HubSpot suite.
OpsHub automation within the workflow tool itself allows developers to actually listen for HubSpot triggers and do the advanced logic APIs using other systems directly within the tool. Power users can also go through and include additional control to add flexibility and new capabilities to marketing activities.
In this article, you can learn more about custom-coded bot actions and the many benefits they provide to developers.
The Benefits of Custom-Coded Bot Actions
Chatbots have existed in previous iterations, but with a limited capacity that often created friction between the chatbot and the user. With new functionalities within OpsHub, developers and users alike can benefit from the following:
Data Collection and Lead Scoring
Being able to gather more information on users through messages with the chatbot without asking specifically for the information removes friction between the user and platform. Developers can collect the information and store it in a single platform rather than utilizing several tools.
Improved User Experience
Users can receive more useful information quicker through HubDB’s suggestion of useful content and automatic status updates on tickets.
More Efficient Responses
As an alternative to the “if-then” responses of previous chatbot iterations, the advanced automatic responses provide interactions that are as close to human-sounding as possible while remaining on autopilot. This creates a leaner customer service team.
Examples of Custom-Coded Bot Actions
Here are a few examples of the new functionalities.
Build a Page Based off of Collected Messages
The custom-coded options essentially provide a full arsenal that allow developers to suggest content and update certain records in a more efficient way. This also avoids requesting input directly from users, which can create unnecessary friction. Instead, developers can perform calculations that distribute the information to be logged within the customer relationship management (CRM) platform or another tool that has an API.
With these new data-collection functionalities, developers could theoretically build a page based on collected information from chat conversations. With this page in HubSpot, a chatbot could provide this resource page to a user based on information provided by previous users that requested similar information. Although this might not be something that all developers decide to build, it illustrates the power of the new data-collection functionality.
Dynamic Data
HubSpot’s ServiceHub, a ticketing software that provides users with tech support, is an excellent example of the dynamic data-collecting feature.
Setting it up dynamically, if the keyword “ticket” is in the request, the function looks up the ticket with that name. The response template then provides the status. In other words, there is one setting to bring in this information with a customized message. Plus, developers can write in “personalities” to replicate a human-to-human interaction.
With previous chatbot iterations, developers would need to set up a response setting for every single ticket, and each response would need to be edited based on the status of the ticket.
Chatbots Advanced Beyond “If-Then” Approach
The automations in chatbots previously existed in a more simplified iteration that functioned based on an “if-then” approach. So, if a user were to send a certain message, the chatbot responded with an applicable response. These tended to be boilerplate responses, limited in capability.
Now, with custom-coded features, the chatbot takes arguments, uses logic in the back end, and then suggests responses rather than a one-to-one match.
For example, if a developer had a HubDB table of premium contact resources and wanted to suggest certain resources to a user based on what they wrote into the chatbot, a developer could write a function that takes the message or request from the user, looks for certain keywords, and then queries that database to dynamically figure out what the best option is for them. From there, the chatbot provides a customized message.
What Else is New in HubSpot?
Beyond custom-coded bot actions, HubSpot continuously develops to ensure its users are provided with the latest functionalities that allow their digital operations to perform at optimal capacity. To stay up-to-date and maximize your HubSpot investment, follow SmartBug’s bi-monthly webinar series SmartTake: What's New with HubSpot.
