Your phone rings while you are up a ladder, and a WhatsApp message lands at nine in the evening. The same five questions come round ten times a day, and every missed reply can be a booking that goes to somebody else. Conversational AI (Software that understands everyday questions and answers from your own business information.) answers those questions in normal language, on the channels you already use, day and night.
Key takeaways
- Conversational AI understands questions written or spoken in ordinary words and answers them from your own business information.
- Start with the channel where customers already contact you, and with the five to ten questions that take up most of your time.
- Write the answers yourself, and keep a person ready to take over complex or unhappy conversations.
- Tell customers they are talking to AI, and look after their details the way you would look after a paper form.
- The Local Enterprise Office Grow Digital Voucher may part-fund new off-the-shelf software with its set-up and training.
On this page
What conversational AI means in plain words#
Imagine Oisín, who runs a small plumbing and heating business in Letterkenny with two vans and no office staff. His phone rings while he is under a sink, his WhatsApp fills up in the evening, and he answers the same questions about call-out areas and waiting times again and again.
Conversational AI is software that reads or hears a question in ordinary language and answers it from information you have given it. That information might be what you do, the areas you cover, what a call-out costs and how a booking is made. Nobody has to learn a special way of writing to use it.
That makes it different from the old button-menu bot on a phone line, which only offers the choices somebody programmed into it. If a caller picks the wrong button, or simply says a sentence, the menu cannot help. Conversational AI works from the words the customer actually uses.
Note: The assistant is only as good as the notes behind it. It cannot know a price, an area or a rule that nobody wrote down.
It is different from a staff assistant too. Microsoft 365 Copilot for Business is sold as a business AI add-on for Microsoft 365, according to Microsoft, and it helps employees draft, summarise and search inside their own work. It does not talk to customers.
Where a small business loses conversations#
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Oisín loses enquiries in the same few places as many Irish trades, clinics, shops and small online stores.
- Phone calls. He cannot answer with wet hands, and a missed call rarely rings back.
- Website chat. If his site has a chat box, nobody watches it after six o’clock. A website chatbot (Software that replies to customer messages automatically.) covers that one channel, and the guide to the website chatbot deals with it in full.
- WhatsApp and Messenger. Customers send photos of a leaking radiator at half nine at night, when Oisín is sitting down for the first time all day.
- Email. A quote request arrives, waits for a quiet moment and goes cold.
- Out of hours. Weekends, bank holidays and the hour before opening.
Each of those is a conversation that started and then stopped. They usually turn on the same few questions, which is exactly the kind of work software can take over.
Conversational AI for customer engagement and customer experience#
For Oisín, a good reply means three things: it comes quickly, it is correct, and a person takes over when the job needs one. Conversational AI helps with all three.
What it can do:
- Answer common questions: call-out areas, waiting times, opening hours, what a visit includes and whether he services gas boilers.
- Take bookings and enquiries: ask what the problem is, when the customer is at home and how urgent it feels.
- Collect contact details: name, phone number, Eircode and a short description of the job.
- Hand over to a person: anything complex, anything about safety, and any customer who is unhappy or making a complaint.
The handover rule matters more than the answering, and it is worth writing down. Oisín’s version is short:
- If someone mentions a smell of gas or a leak, the conversation goes straight to him.
- If a customer is annoyed, the assistant stops and passes the message on.
- If a question touches money in a way he has not written down, the assistant offers a call back.
Conversational AI for ecommerce and retail#
Shops and online stores feel the same pressure with different questions. An online store hears about order status, delivery addresses, returns and stock all day long. A shop with a counter hears whether it is open on Sunday and whether an item is in stock in the right size.
Three answers are worth getting right first in online retail: where the order is, when it will arrive and how a return works. If the assistant can read the order system, it answers from the real record instead of a guess. Stock, opening hours and delivery areas work better when those details sit in one place that both the website and the assistant use.
Oisín sells a few parts over the counter, so his list includes whether a part is in stock and when he can fit it. Where the assistant cannot see the stock list, it should say it will check and then take a message.
Two rules hold in both cases. Answer only from information the business has checked, and pass anything about money, refunds or a damaged item to a person.
How to choose where to start#
Choosing a tool comes last. The first job is to decide which conversation to fix.
- List every place customers contact you: phone, WhatsApp, Messenger, website chat, email and the counter.
- Write down the five to ten questions that take up most of your time. For Oisín, that means the areas he covers, the call-out charge, how long a wait, whether he services gas boilers, and how a customer sends a photo.
- Find out where the answers live today: the calendar for appointment slots, the customer records for previous jobs and the stock list for parts.
- Choose one channel to begin with. WhatsApp Business suits written messages, and a phone voice assistant (Software that answers calls and speaks with the caller.) suits calls that would otherwise be missed. Switching on three channels at once leaves nobody able to check the answers.
- Run it beside your normal routine for a few weeks, read the conversations and add the missing answers to your list.
Tip: Pick the channel where the same questions already repeat, rather than the newest channel or the one a supplier is talking up.
Oisín starts with WhatsApp Business, because that is where his evening messages arrive. An answered question only pays off when the enquiry becomes a job, so the details the assistant collects should go into the same lead generation process as calls and web forms.
Putting conversational AI to work in an Irish SME#
Choosing the channel is the quick part. The work sits in the details behind it.
Prepare the answers. Write them in your own words, the way you would say them on the phone. One short answer per question beats a long page of policy wording. Oisín writes his first set of answers himself, in the words he uses on the phone.
Connect the systems you already use. A booking assistant is far more useful when it can see the calendar. A message assistant is more useful when it can see the customer’s history in the CRM (Software that holds customer details, calls and sales notes.). Where a connection does not exist, the assistant should offer to pass the question on rather than invent an answer.
Decide who checks it and who takes over. Name one person to read the conversations every week and fix the weak answers. Put the handover triggers in writing so everyone knows when a person steps in.
Look after customer details. GDPR (EU rules on how businesses must handle personal data.) applies to a chat conversation just as it applies to a paper form. Collect only what you need, keep it no longer than you need it, and be able to explain what happens to it. The Data Protection Commission is the Irish regulator for data protection, and its guidance covers what to tell a customer who asks.
Tell customers they are talking to AI. A short line at the start is enough, such as telling the customer they are chatting with the booking assistant. Keep a visible way to reach a person.
Watch out: Do not let the assistant guess. If an answer is not in your notes, it should offer to pass the question to a person instead.
A business that would rather not build this itself can hand the set-up over. The AI chatbot service covers writing the answers and connecting the calendar and the customer records.
The Local Enterprise Office Grow Digital Voucher is a grant that helps businesses adopt digital tools, including AI, according to the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment. It may part-fund new off-the-shelf software subscriptions along with their set-up and training, and the guide to the Grow Digital Voucher explains how an application works.
Ireland launched its AI – Good for Business initiative on 28 May 2026. It was set up to help businesses adopt AI and to make the supports easier to find, as announced by the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment.
How Baikou uses AI to answer its own enquiries#
Baikou uses the same idea for the enquiries that reach its own website. When someone sends a request, an AI assistant sees which page the enquiry came from and what the person is asking about. It then writes a reply by email that answers the request and asks a few follow-up questions about the business.
Those answers give a fuller picture of the business, its customers and what it actually needs before the work starts. The service that follows is built on that context rather than on a one-line form message.
For a business like Oisín’s, the same approach would mean the assistant asks for the Eircode, a photo of the problem and how urgent it is, so he knows what the job involves before he rings back.
Start with one conversation#
The decision in front of you is not which tool to buy, but which channel and which questions to fix first. Write the questions down, prepare short answers, connect them to your calendar and your customer records, and keep a person ready to step in. One channel done properly beats four channels nobody has time to check. Baikou helps Irish businesses with conversational AI for calls, messages and enquiries, and its work is set out on the Baikou home page.
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See AI chatbotFAQ#
Can conversational AI work in an insurance business?
Yes, for the routine part. It can confirm opening hours, explain which documents a customer needs when claiming, and take a message with the policy number and the best time to call. It should not discuss cover, exclusions or whether a claim will be paid, because that advice belongs with a qualified person. Keep the conversation record so the customer file is complete.
Do I need a developer to set this up?
Usually not for an off-the-shelf tool. Most messaging and website chat products are set up through a dashboard, where you add your questions and answers, set the hours and choose the handover rules. A developer becomes useful when the assistant has to read from a system with no ready-made connection, such as an older booking or stock system. It is worth testing a simple version before paying for that work.
What if the AI gives a wrong answer?
Treat it as a gap in your own notes rather than a fault in the software. Read the conversation, correct the answer the same day, and contact the customer if they were given wrong information. Ask for conversations to be stored so you can review them, and read the weak ones every week. Each wrong answer you catch becomes a better answer for the next customer.
How long does it take to set up?
It depends on how many answers you prepare and how many systems the assistant has to read from. One channel with ten written answers and no connections is the quickest version, and it is a sensible first step. Adding the calendar, the stock list and the customer records takes longer, because those connections need the most testing. Plan for regular reviews in the first month rather than a single launch day.
