The goal of every demand gen marketer has always been to increase demos, accelerate sales funnels, and connect with potential customers faster and easier. So what if you could access an entirely new and untapped channel rich in high intent leads ready to convert?
And what if you could book a meeting with those leads without them even making it to your site? The good news is you can, through this emerging mar-tech.
Chatbots (used in a brand new way)
For the sake of this article, we will assume that as an organization, you are one of the 78% of organizations that have adopted some type of chatbot on your own site. Each organization uses chatbots differently, but ultimately, a chatbot's goal is to provide prospects access to your team to ask questions and allow qualified prospects to book meetings without filling out a form.
Don't have a chatbot on your site yet? Errr, uhhh….
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but am afraid that means you can't use this new technology. Once you have one, drop back in and we’ll chat!
Do have a chatbot on your site?
If you have a chatbot, Helium allows brands to use their current chatbot platform to engage with prospects on third-party articles, review sites, and major affiliate organizations.
It's pretty neat. For example, this article you are reading now is on the Future of Sass, but if you click the button below, you'll be able to chat with a Helium representative, get automated answers about Helium's platform, or schedule a demo without leaving the page.
That's why this new chatbot expansion tech is fascinating. If your marketing team writes a contextual article for a specific segment of users, you no longer need to coral them to your site.
Although contextual landing pages are cool, the truth is that articles alone are typically good enough to convert a prospect to either a demo or a conversation (and if your articles aren’t converting, you may want to consider writing better content!).
The exciting part is that although your salespeople are chatting on a 3rd party site, it's your very own chatbot platform, so your salesforce routing and all your chatbot integrations will still work.
What are all the places my company's chatbot can now be used off-site?
Demand generation folks are excited about Helium as it creates a new channel whereby to have conversations with your prospects that can convert to a demo. This shortens the funnel and increases the quality of prospects, as you’re reaching those who are already reading about your product, niche or service.
Said otherwise, they are “high intent” prospects. Some have referred to it as  intent data meets real-time interaction = "The holy grail for marketers."
Using chatbots on earned media
Every good marketer knows earned media is the foundation for curating backlinks and exposure. However, getting those readers to leave the online periodical to visit your site is the challenging part.
Once the prospect is on your site, marketers hope said prospect fills out a form or interacts with the chatbot to book a demo.
Helium reduces the friction from this process, allowing brands to pay a flat fee to have a conversation with their prospects on earned media content.
Think of it as a new type of Ad Unit - a conversational Ad Unit that both drives brand awareness and direct engagement with prospects you normally wouldn't have been able to reach.
Using chatbots on sponsored content
Sponsored content is another great way to converse directly with prospects in a specific segment of niche. For example, what you’re currently reading is a piece of sponsored content we wrote for the Future of SaaS site.
Why? We have thought leadership to share about the chatbot industry. Also, most of the users reading content on this site are SaaS marketers or executives. Given we work directly with that audience, it only makes sense to post an article on this site.
If you’re looking to deliver results with B to B marketing today, you need to be where your customers are. And for many businesses, that means being on articles and review sites. Helium allows you to do just that, thereby abolishing the redirect and getting into conversation with high intent prospects.
Using chatbots with partners and affiliate sites
Affiliates and partners can be a great source of revenue. Normally how this model works is that the site owner writes an article that ranks for one of your target keywords.
You provide partner with a banner, a form to place on their site, or a UTM connected to a backlink. When users complete the form or click the banner/ad/link, they are redirected to your site.
Here’s the question marketers need to ask themselves: “Does the prospect need to come to my brand site to get qualified and convert? Or is the content good enough that a prospect will book a meeting on the 3rd party affiliate or partner site. If the answer is probably, you are in good shape.
The good news is that the chat interaction that’s occurring on the 3rd party page still uses UTMs, so tracking, attribution and affiliate payments won’t change.
Prospects want real-time communication in order to facilitate their buying decisions. Helium allows Brands to connect with these prospects anywhere their brand, product or niche is being discussed.
And lastly, Helium allows affiliates/publishers to improve their user experience, keep readers on their site and create an additional revenue stream.
In reality, Helium is just the natural progression of chatbots, allowing you to “lift and shift” your chat bot onto non-owned sites. Driving increased conversion and shortened sales funnels, it's easy to see why this chatbot expansion tech has marketers excited.
Not only does it allow salespeople to connect with prospects on articles and reviews, but it also allows brands to engage with customers anywhere they are mentioned.
Want to see how this new tech works? Click on the image below, and you'll be able to chat with The Bot Lab, the founders of Helium, without ever leaving the Future of SaaS site. The future is about to get very connected.
