Bots are the toast of the town in the technology world right now. From the launch of Microsoft’s Bots Framework to the unveiling of bots for Facebook Messenger at this year’s F8 conference, these agile assistants are attracting big buzz from consumers and enterprises alike.

And, this is all great, especially when consumers use these platforms to message each other. But the real news will be when the enterprise space fully integrates their operations with the bots world, rather than just using these automated assistants to merely set up meetings or send calendar reminders.

In July, The Verge recognised that there are 11,000 bots built for Facebook Messenger – a massive number in just three months. Could too much choice add more unnecessary complexity though? How can businesses cut through the clutter and help employees know when to use a bot in order to more efficiently do their job?

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Managers can help their workforce cut through bot hype by curating their own enterprise bot store that dishes out the high-value, corporate-approved bots for teams to use. Basically, it would simplify the ecosystem so people can more easily window shop for the work-specific bots they most need.

For example, a sales manager would only offer a mobile sales rep the options of Salesforce, Concur, Google Calendar, SAP SuccessFactors and personal bots for LinkedIn and news services, while the engineering lead only gives his team access to the Asana, Jira and ZenDesk bots. An IT service desk team might have the ServiceNow bots and others at their disposal.

Talking bots

Today’s companies must ensure a consistent employee experience with all bots – pre-built bots, the ones customised to their business processes, and the ones they build from scratch. Businesses must also be mindful to allow bots to exchange information with each other, reducing the workload of employees.

For example, a sales rep submits an urgent case on behalf of their customer via their Salesforce bot. This action triggers the Salesforce bot to notify the customer support team, who can then instantly create an incident report through ServiceNow.

The customer service rep doesn’t re-enter the case data – it’s simply carried from one bot to the other. It is seamless workflow and allows people to focus more on the tasks that require human interaction. And, as employees continuously test a bot’s functionality, personality and utility, the IT team gets instant feedback into how to best address user needs or concerns.

>See also: Bots, brands and why we need to start trusting AI

Security is always one of the big questions that comes up. By offering workforce bots through an enterprise bot store, administrators can control more action and keep more data safe. Any bot store should be encrypted for all messaging between bots and users, have enterprise-grade controls, and allow for regulatory compliance.

When it comes to bot access, function and monitoring, businesses can control a lot at the administrative level, too. They choose which channels their bots can live in (email, web, mobile apps, SMS, messaging apps, collaboration software etc.), who has access to their bot store, and which bots they can use.

Overall, organisations can monitor the analytics and insights related to their bot store to ensure granular corporate oversight.

Sourced from Kore