ChatBot is now a common term being mentioned in almost every realm of every industry. It represents Artificial Intelligence to the layman. A machine being able to have a legitimate conversation with a human being is what is called Artificial Intelligence. ChatBots are a small section of AI. They are the rage and every company of every industry wants to dabble in this field to keep up with the competition and rising market demand.

Today, ChatBots are responsible for a large part of the customer satisfaction rates companies are receiving. Gartner predicts that, by 2020, 85% of the consumer interactions will be supported without human interaction. ChatBots have pretty much taken over every domain, such as healthcare, finance, e-Commerce, insurance, sports, entertainment, leisure, travel and many others. While companies of these industries are leveraging the benefits of automated conversation system, many are still contemplating over the adoption of it.

Top brands have already integrated into their chat systems. Big names such as Facebook and Telegram have already advanced in this arena by creating their own ChatBots and ChatBot platforms. With a large number of tools at our disposal, creating a ChatBot from scratch does not seem difficult, but it is no easy feat. There are tools available for coders as well as non-coders. For those of you toying with the idea of jumping on to the ChatBot bandwagon, these are the top 10 tools to build a ChatBot.

API.ai

Dialogflow (formerly Api.ai, Speaktoit) is a Google-owned developer of human–computer interaction technologies based on natural language conversations. It allows you to build text and voice-based bots in 14+ languages.

Once the initial inputs have been provided to the bot, it uses Machine Learning to improve the quality of interaction automatically. This tool also contains a performance tracker. It identifies latency issues, high/low performing intents and more so as to monitor these details and improve performance.

Bots built with API.ai: Giorgio Armani, Hubspot, Comcast, The Wall Street Journal
Supported Platforms: Facebook, Google Assistant, Slack, Alexa, Cortana
Pricing: Free

ChatFuel

Chatfuel provides a self-serve platform for building Facebook Messenger ChatBots. The platform has an intuitive visual interface that enables non-technical and business users design and build ChatBot flows and establish conversational rules.

ChatFuel began its services in the year 2015 and today, this tool is used for developing ChatBots for almost every industry. This is a no-coding type of platform for building a ChatBot. It enables the users to link to external sources for information via plugins.

Bots built with ChatFuel: British Airways, ABC News, Adidas, TechCrunch, Persona, MTV
Supported Platforms: Facebook, Telegram
Pricing: Free. However, to remove ‘Powered by ChatFuel’ attribution from the persistent menu, you can upgrade to the Pro plan ($30/month).

Microsoft Bot Framework

The Microsoft Bot Framework provides just what you need to build and connect intelligent bots that interact naturally wherever your users are talking, from text/sms to Skype, Slack, Office 365 mail and other popular services.

It consists of a bot-builder which has tools within it. The bot-builder is an open-source SDK that offers support to .NET, Node.js, and REST. It will enable you to start bot building in minutes and documentation is available for every step. It is ensured that you get the desired output.

Bots build with Microsoft Bot Framework: Stubhub, Skyscanner, Azure bot, Solitaire
Supported Platforms: Facebook, Slack, Kik, Cortana, Bing, Skype
Pricing: Free

Facebook’s Bot for Messenger

Facebook is the second most used instant messaging platform as it has 1.2 billion active monthly users. Facebook lives up to its brand name and offers the best development tools to the businesses for creating bots.

You can access Facebook’s guide, case studies, developer forum, and more to create a professional ChatBot. Through full-fledged guides, case studies, a forum for Facebook developers, and more, you are sure to be a ChatBot creating professional in no time.

Bots build with FB’s Bot for Messenger: Skol, Sephora, Snaptravel, Globe
Supported Platforms: Facebook
Pricing: Free

ChatScript

ChatScript was initially designed for creating ChatBots, but it is now also used for different forms of Natural Language Processing. It is an amalgamation of Natural Language engine and Dialog Management system. It is written in C++ and the engine is an open source project and available publicly at GitHub and SourceForge.

Opting for ChatScript is a feasible idea if the goal is to provide the users with a natural conversation flow. It is a rule-based engine, wherein the rules are defined by humans in the form of program scripts through a process called dialog flow scripting.

Pricing: Free

ChattyPeople

ChattyPeople is the best ChatBot platform for creating text and voice-based bots for enterprises. It is apt for creating AI ChatBot on Facebook with integrated Facebook commerce. It facilitates creating, testing, deploying, measuring and managing the bot. This helps in creating a personalized experience for interaction between businesses and their customers. It is a no-coding type of platform. It uses Machine Learning technologies to build data-driven applications. 

The simplicity of this platform makes it perfect for entrepreneurs and marketers in smaller companies, while its technology makes it suitable for enterprise customers.

Supported Platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Slack, Skype, Amazon Echo, HTML5
Pricing: Free

Botsify

Botsify is another Facebook ChatBot platform that can be used to create conversational forms, have WP-integration, and create ChatBot for website. It has a paid subscription that helps in five easy steps: Log into the botsify.com website, Connect your Facebook account, Set up a webhook, Write commands for the ChatBot you wish to create, Let Botsify handle the rest. 
There is a WordPress Integration feature that enables adding your users into Botsify and sending them a daily digest to keep them informed and connected.

Bots build with Botsify: Shazam, RemoteInterview, Apple, Unicef-NZ, Grin
Supported Platforms: Facebook, Website
Pricing: The Free plan enables building one ChatBot. You can switch to Basic, Golden, or Pro plan for building more number bots, for more number of unique users, and other amazing features.

Wit.ai

Wit.ai is another tool that is used by over 120,000 developers for building ChatBots. Intents, Entities, Actions, and Contexts can be used and it also allows the incorporation of Natural Language Processing to offer a seamless conversational interaction between the bot and the user.

It is available for the developers to use with Raspberry, C, Python, Android, Windows, iOS etc. and it has support inculcated for over 50 languages.

Supported Platforms: Facebook, Slack, Telegram etc.
Pricing: Free

Beep Boop

If building a ChatBot for Slack is the goal, then there is another paid platform call Beep Boop. It is a hosting platform that is designed for those developers who are looking for Facebook messenger and Slack specifically. This tool relies on GitHub for creating code and Docker for Deployment. 

Developers can choose any programming language to add the required functionalities.

Supported Platforms: Slack, Facebook
Pricing: Building a bot for up to 3 Slack teams is absolutely free under the Tall Plan. You can upgrade to Grande Plan or Venti Plan according to your requirements and set of features available.

Meokay

Meokay enables non-developers or non-coders to build a bot and enables businesses to interact with customers to accept product orders from them and to update them on the status of the orders. It is one of the best tools to create a conversational messenger bot as it is easy for both skilled developers as well as non-developers to follow the required steps.

You can integrate Stripe, PayPal, bKash, and many other payment options within the bot. Meokay smartly push offers or deals to the users on demand (in between the conversations).

Supported Platforms: Facebook, Skype, Slack, Viber, Hangout
Pricing: Free