Botnation AI Review

Botnation AI is chatbot software for building a chatbot for your website, Facebook Messenger and Google Assistant.

Do you want to know whether this chatbot software is worth it to invest in? Let’s find out!

Sneak peek: Yes, it is 😉

I based my review on my ultimate guide on choosing the best chatbot software.

User Interface

If you log into Botnation AI, the first thing you see is the dashboard:

Here is the overview of all of your chatbots, the templates that you can use to build a chatbot and on which channels you can put them.

When you are going to build the actual chatbot, it is possible to go through a complete tutorial (if it is your first time):

This is a really useful feature, especially for people who are not familiar with the platform or for people who don’t have much experience with building chatbots.

In Botnation AI the interface is structured in the following way:

1. On the left-hand side, you have all the blocks (or flows) of your chatbot
2. On the right-hand side, there are the contents of your blocks

Next to the content of your actual flows, it is also possible to set certain variables (or custom fields) for your chatbot:

This is really useful if you want to use the same information in different parts of your chatbot. For example, the name of your restaurant, the street name, the street number and the zip code.

Besides, it is possible to test your chatbot in Facebook Messenger.

In general, the interface is pretty easy to use. But I must say this interface has a higher learning curve than most other chatbot software. Because Botnation AI puts all the variables and content of the flows in one interface, the interface becomes a little bit overwhelming.

But if you go through their tutorial and use one of their templates, it still is pretty easy to set up a chatbot.

• Visual Flow Builder

  Create chatbot dialogs with a visual flow builder.
• Test chatbot

  Is it possible to test the chatbot before putting your new flows or changes live?
• Interface easy to use?

  Is the chatbot platform easy-to-use?
• Easy to setup a chatbot?

  Is it easy to set up your chatbot with this chatbot platform?

Chatbot elements

Botnation AI provides all the elements you need. They only do not provide Files, but this is certainly no deal-breaker:

Next to the “standard” elements, it is also possible to do Games and Polls in Botnation AI! This is a great way to make your chatbot more fun and engaging:

What I really like about their elements is the Date & Time element. Instead of just filling in a date in normal text, this automatically opens a Webview in which you can select a date and time on a calendar:

Furthermore, Botnation AI is one of the only chatbot software that provides location sharing in Facebook Messenger. Facebook disabled this feature in Facebook Messenger itself, but Botnation AI made a work-around for this by using their own location sharing feature in a webview:

• Delays

  Use delays between messages in your chatbot
• Images

  Can you send images via your chatbot?
• Video

  Can you send video via your chatbot?
• Audio

  Can you send audio via your chatbot?
• Attachments

  Can you send attachments via your chatbot?
• Gallery (Horizontal list)

  Show a gallery of cards inside your chatbot. A card consists of an image, title, subtitle and button.
• Vertical list

  Show a vertical list of items inside your chatbot
• Emojis

  Can you use emojis inside your chatbot?
• Persistent Menu

  Can you add a persistent menu to your chatbot?
• Quick Replies

  Can you add quick replies to your chatbot where users can click on?
• Buttons

  Can you add buttons to your chatbot where users can click on?
• Free text input

  Can chatbot users freely type text to your chatbot whenever they want to?
• Location sharing

  Can users share their location inside the chatbot?
• Email validation

  When a chatbot user gives their email, can the platform validate it's a correct email address?
• Phone number validation

  When a chatbot user gives their phone number, can the platform validate it's a correct phone number?
• Date validation

  When a chatbot user gives a date, can the platform validate it's a correct date?

Users

With Botnation AI it is possible to assign custom fields to specific users and then segment these users based on those fields.

What is a little disadvantage is that you cannot assign tags to certain users, but this not a deal-breaker. You can still use a custom field as a tag, by setting the value of the custom field to “Yes” or “No”.

• Custom fields

  Store information from your chatbot users inside fields. For example, you can ask for someone's email and store it inside the "email" custom field.
• Tags

  Add tags to users in your chatbot flows to organize and categorize contacts.
• User segments

  Can you create user segments based on custom fields and tags?

Messages

With Botnation AI it is possible to send broadcasts to all your users or a segment of your users.

But there is also a disadvantage, you cannot send sequences.

Furthermore, it is possible to use conditions and make a chatbot in any language you want. It is, however, not possible to easily translate your chatbot to another language.

• Broadcasts

  Send a message to all or a part of your chatbot users at a specific date and time
• Sequences

  Send messages on a pre-defined schedule with a certain time interval between those messages
• Conditions

  Make checks in your chatbot flow based on if-then logic. For example, if the user has not given their email, ask for their email.
• Multiple languages

  Is it possible to create a chatbot in multiple languages?
• Easy to translate

  Can you translate text to other languages without using a third-party platform and without creating duplicate flows?

AI & NLP

With Botnation AI it is possible to recognize keywords with your chatbot.

Also, it is possible to grab the intention of the user, which they call the “context”. This is extremely useful. With this feature, it is possible to send different messages depending on the context of the user.

• Keywords

  Trigger chatbot flow based on certain words or phrases a user says to the chatbot.
• Intents

  Trigger a chatbot flow by understanding the intent of the user.
• Entities

  Capture specific information from sentences. For example, if a user says "veggie pizza", the chatbot can understand it's not a regular pizza, but a veggie pizza.
• Dialogflow integration

  Does the chatbot platform provide a direct integration with Google's AI Platform?

Channels

With Botnation AI it is possible to make a chatbot for Facebook Messenger, your website and for Google Assistant. I must say that I did not use the Google Assistant integration because you need to apply for this with Botnation AI. This is because Google asks requirements to apply to the program.

If you want to place a chatbot on your website, you can make use of a website widget or you can put your chatbot for the full width on your website. I will explain this further in the Marketing section.

Next to websites and Facebook Messenger, it is also possible to send text messages to your users with the Twilio integration of Botnation AI. So, in general, Botnation AI provides two channels, but you can add SMS by using their Twilio integration.

• Website

  Can you publish your chatbot on your website?
• Facebook

  Can you publish your chatbot on Facebook?
• Instagram

  Can you publish your chatbot on Instagram?
• Whatsapp

  Can you publish your chatbot on WhatsApp?
• Telegram

  Can you publish your chatbot on Telegram?
• SMS

  Can you publish your chatbot on SMS?
• Slack

  Can you publish your chatbot on Slack?
• Skype

  Can you publish your chatbot on Skype?
• Email

  Can you publish your chatbot on email?

Integrations

Botnation AI has a live chat integration, which is the most important integration that a chatbot needs. But it has a little different approach than most chatbot software. Instead of using their own live chat feature, it is using Facebook Messenger itself to handle the live chat. This is great, because you can use Messenger on your laptop and mobile phone.

Next to this integration, it provides integrations with Zapier, Google Sheets, Twilio and Webhooks.

So you have plenty of opportunities to integrate your chatbot with other software applications!

• Livechat

  Direct integration with live chat, either via a built-in live chat functionality or a third-party live chat platform.
• Zapier

  Direct integration with Zapier, one of the largest integration platforms in the world.
• Make (formerly Integromat)

  Direct integration with Make (formerly Integromat), one of the largest integration platforms in the world.
• Google Sheets

  Direct integration with Google Sheets, to store or retrieve data from sheets.
• Webhooks

  Can you call a webhook inside your chatbot flow to send data to other applications?

Marketing

Botnation AI does pretty well on this one. It is possible to have a native website widget, a landing page, Facebook Ads, automatically reply to Facebook Comments and to create “Send to Messenger” buttons.

There is, however, a drawback: it is not possible to use the One-Time Notification. For a chatbot software that is primarily focused on Facebook Messenger, it is a huge disadvantage that they do not comply with the latest Facebook Messenger Policy.

If you want to put your chatbot on your website, you can make a website widget which you can fully customize to your identity:

It is also possible to make these widgets full screen, so the chatbot really functions as a complete landing page.

• Facebook website widget

  Embed your chatbot as a Facebook Widget on your website.
• Native website widget

  Embed your chatbot as a native widget (your own branding & colors) on your website.
• Landing pages

  Can you create a simple landing page to drive users to your chatbot?
• Facebook Ads

  Start a conversation with your chatbot when someone clicks on a Facebook Ad
• One-Time Notification

  Send one-time notifications via Facebook Messenger for a topic that a chatbot user has opted-in for
• Facebook comments auto-reply

  Automatically reply with your chatbot to users who comment on your Facebook Posts
• Button creator

  Add a button to your website to drive users to your chatbot
• Custom URLs for your chatbot

  Generate a simple URL that can be shared anywhere to send users to your chatbot

Pricing

Botnation AI provides a free plan in which you can make your chatbot. But, you need to be careful. Because it only allows you to build your chatbot, not to actually use it on your Facebook page. To actually use it on your Facebook Page, you need the paid plan.

This seems a bit weird to me because you cannot actually see your chatbot on your Facebook page/website before you are paying for it.

The first paid plan is 29 euros per month, which seems like a really fair price for the features that they are offering. This plan comes with 1000 users per month:

• Free trial

  Does the chatbot platform provide a free trial?
• Free plan

  Does the chatbot platform provide a free plan?
• Price per month

  What is the lowest price per month for creating a chatbot on this platform?
  29
• Monthly pricing available?

  Is it possible to pay monthly?
• Money back guarantee

  Is there a money-back guarantee in case you are not satisfied with the platform?

Analytics

The Analytics of Botnation AI are pretty standard. They show the number of users, the number of sent messages and the number of messages the chatbot could not handle.

Next to this, they also have the Recommendation Engine. This is a feature that shows you all the messages the chatbot did not know how to answer. With this engine, it is really easy to improve the answers of your chatbot:

If these chatbot analytics are not enough for you, it is possible to integrate Botnation AI with Chatbase or Dashbot to get more analytics.

• Dashboard

  Dashboard that provides general analytics of your chatbot.
• User input

  Get the input from users that your chatbot didn't understand.
• Sent messages

  The number of messages that were sent by your chatbot.
• Open rate

  The percentage of chatbot users that opened a message inside your chatbot.
• Click rate

  The percentage of chatbot users that click on a button inside your chatbot.
• Conversion rate

  The percentage of users that converted through your chatbot. For example, the percentage of users that gave their email address
• Fall back rate

  The percentage of interactions where the chatbot did not know an answer to a question.
• Custom dashboards/reports

  Can you create your own dashboard or reports?

eCommerce

Botnation AI does not have any eCommerce integrations.

• Payments

  Collect payments inside your chatbot
• Shopify

  Direct integration with Shopify to get products, order information and cart data.
• WooCommerce

  Direct integration with WooCommerce to get products, order information and cart data.
• Buy directly within the chatbot

  Ability for chatbot users to buy products or services directly from a chatbot
• Cart abandonment

  Trigger messages in the chatbot when a user abandons their cart on a website or inside the chatbot

Templates & Cloning

Botnation AI provides 8 templates to help you to get started right away.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to make templates yourself and share them with others.

Also, it is not possible to duplicate chatbot flows, but on the other hand, you can duplicate chatbot elements within your flows.

Optimization

With Botnation AI it is possible to A/B test your buttons:

 

With this feature, you can see which button is clicked more often, the red one or the blue one.

But, that is not it. You can also A/B test on multiple things, like the text of the button and the color:

• A/B Testing

  Can you optimize your chatbot flows by performing A/B tests?

Support

Botnation AI provides great tutorials and documentation to help you to use their platform.

And of course, they have customer support via email.

• Tutorials

  Does the chatbot platform provide tutorials on how to use its platform?
• Documentation

  Does the chatbot platform provide documentation on how to use its platform?
• Customer support

  Does the chatbot platform provide customer support?

Conclusion

So, should you buy Botnation AI?

Yes, I think you should.

Botnation AI is great software for a fair price. They provide many chatbot elements, it is possible to save custom fields and make user segments, it has decent AI & NLP, have many integrations (including live chat) and the necessary analytics to improve your chatbot.

But there are also some disadvantages that you need to take into consideration:

1. Their interface has a high learning curve. But if go through their tutorial and use one of their templates, you will be fine.
2. They only provide website and Facebook Messenger, so it is not possible to provide an omnichannel experience for your users. You could build this by their Twilio/Zapier integrations.
3. It is not possible to send sequences and One-Time Notifications