Menselijke chatbots: een zegen voor online klantcontact? Het effect van conversational human voice door chatbots op social presence en merkattitude

Chatbots for customer service purposes are advancing fast. However, little was known about the communication style brands should adopt in chatbot communication. From the literature on organizational communication between brands and customers, the concept of conversational human voice (Kelleher, 2009; Kelleher & Miller, 2006) was incorporated in chatbot communication. In a 2x2 between subjects experiment, 125 participants engaged in conversations with a customer service chatbot in the travel sector. Besides the presence or absence of conversational human voice, the chatbots also differed in brand familiarity. The results revealed customer service chatbots with a conversational human voice increase one's brand attitude and perceived warmth via social presence, without affecting the perceived brand competence. Furthermore, we did not find evidence for brand familiarity to moderate these findings. Our results support the theory of Computers are Social Actors (CASA) and indicate the perceived humanness of computers could increase by means of the adopted communication style.