Times are changing. Today we are increasingly using technological devices in order to communicate. Indeed, trends in communication indicate that text and audio have become socially acceptable. And this isn’t only true of the younger generations: WhatsApp and other messaging apps are used by people of all ages.

This, together with the accelerated progress in natural language processing technologies and Artificial Intelligence, has led to the chatbot revolution. A chatbot is basically a computer program that can have a conversation with the user via textual and/or audio. The bot understands what the human user wants and is able to answer.

"Innovation must be a condition, a permanent state of the people."

Ernesto Doudchitzky, CEO and co-founder of Chattigo

Chatbots, which are available 24/7, are changing the interaction between clients and service providers. That’s why many companies are betting on this new technology to transform the customer experience. One of the most interesting startups that offers this service is the Chilean startup Chattigo.

Chatting is the new speaking

“Chattigo is an integrated, controlled and efficient real time messaging SaaS (Software as a Service) chat platform that enables companies to improve the quality of their customer service through human and automated bots with natural language,” explains Chattigo’s CEO and co-founder, Ernesto Doudchitzky. Chattigo aims to “improve the quality of the responses companies provide customers through the integration of the main sources of information and the uninterrupted availability of digital channels,” Doudchitzky adds.

Chattigo is made up of four modules: human attention, bots, reportage and semantic analysis of the conversations, which can be configured to offer a personalised service in order to satisfy their clients’ needs and fully automate their customer service. Doudchitzky says: “We offer the most complete platform on the market. It can integrate human attention, own chatbot and semantic analysis of conversations,” he says.

"Being an innovator means not being limited by paradigms, but allowing your imagination to fly and search for new solutions or uncovered needs, thereby enabling you to create something new."

Ernesto Doudchitzky, CEO and co-founder of Chattigo

The founders of Chattigo were working in the call center industry, delivering technology and implementation services with a focus on voice when they came up with this idea. With Chattigo “we experienced first-hand, the transformation of these call centers into contact centers where social networks and digital channels were increasingly important,”  Doudchitzky details.

The Chattigo service is already being used in 11 countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Spain and the United States. Clients include 170 companies in a broad range of categories: insurance, e-commerce, health, services, banks and telephone operators. “We firmly believe that customer service is undergoing a total transformation and both the automation and the attention of digital channels will shape the future of the industry,” affirms the CEO.

A special relationship with Enel

“Enel was one of the first large clients to have faith in Chattigo. That gave us great confidence as a team and it encouraged us to demonstrate the product to other potential clients. In spite of not having much experience at the time, we were looking for – and prepared for –  great challenges,” explains Doudchitzky. In 2016 Chattigo was invited to the Energy Start, where it was selected by Enel to work together. The two companies have been collaborating ever since.

Chattigo has been able to improve and technologically update the service by working with Enel’s innovation area. This partnership has led to a strong and long-term relationship that the CEO describes as very special. “The experience of working with a large international company and adapting to its needs has provided continuous learning opportunities.  We’ve been able to apply what we have learnt to other large organizations that are using Chattigo services.”

The product is already a success and it is clearly very effective. Proof of that came during the big snowfall in Santiago, the Chilean capital, in 2017. “While all Enel's telephone services were saturated due to high demand, the digital channels did not stop working, and were able to attend to more than 400 people simultaneously,” says the CEO. This magnitude of customer support would have been impossible with a more traditional contact center.

Over the last year Chattigo has opened offices in Mexico and Peru, and is planning to open another four over the course of 2019 in Colombia, Spain, Brazil and the USA. Within this expansion process, Doudchitzky shares that Chattigo is “strengthening the development team and the commercial area to manage the growth, while at the same time supporting partners”.

He concludes by saying that at Chattigo innovation is seen as “the generation of value from the development of a new solution that solves a problem, and this value must be expressed through actual use.” And yes, we can confirm that this innovative solution has been put to use in an interesting way in the energy sector.