Making a chatbot is HARD, but this is probably the quickest way into a really, really good one!
January 18, 2020

Making a chatbot is HARD, but this is probably the quickest way into a really, really good one!

Anonymous | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with IBM Watson Assistant

We used IBM Watson Assistant to design and prototype a "proof of concept" chatbot for our senior management to use to interact with a large database of internal business information and markets data (like interest rates and stock prices). It addresses a business need for senior people to be able to interact with large datasets with minimal data-munging skills (and quickly, so not needing to ask for others to provide that data).
  • Gives a comparatively simple (for a chatbot/machine learning system!) means to construct a chatbot.
  • Very clear framework and component sets
  • Important to recognise that creating a chatbot is HARD. IBM Watson Assistant does a great job of making this a bit easier, but it's still a complex and time-consuming experience! I wonder if that can be improved somehow. For example, by applying some smart means to take smart guesses at the form of the data to be used, or a more visual (Scratch-like) interface.
  • The prototype was a success, and execs were impressed.
  • Hard to identify an RoI, but execs are now much more aware of the data available because of this different way of working with it.
No alternatives considered this time!
Didn't need to use the support per se, however, the tutorials and documentation were excellent!

Do you think IBM watsonx Assistant delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with IBM watsonx Assistant's feature set?

Yes

Did IBM watsonx Assistant live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of IBM watsonx Assistant go as expected?

I wasn't involved with the implementation phase

Would you buy IBM watsonx Assistant again?

Yes

IBM Watson Assistant is well suited if:
- The user is a competent programmer with plenty of time to learn the framework.
- They are familiar with JSON and have the means to generate JSON structures efficiently and cleanly.

Less well suited if:
- The expectations of creating a chatbot are not well managed, this is not a "simple" task.