For those who don’t already know, bots are programs created by search engines to crawl through websites and assess their data for determining the website’s rankings. Some bots are created to replace humans for various tasks such as customer care etc. They are automatic, hence don’t always need a human to manually start and guide them each time these bots visit a website.
Mostly, the software is designed to imitate or replace human behavior, and perform repetitive tasks much faster than a human could.
Broadly speaking, there are three types of bots:
- Spam bots
- Web crawlers
- Chat bots
Spam Bots
Spam bots send spam messages. They may also post spams in various websites and interact with users. Spam messages are inappropriate, unwelcome and annoying at times. These messages are pushed out to a huge chunk of users, and comprise product advertisements, malware downloads, or backlinks.
How do Spam Bots Work?
These automatic programs create accounts under fake names on various platforms such as social media, messaging applications or even email hosting providers. Although many platforms make use of CAPTCHAs or similar challenges to prevent these bots from crating accounts, they still have managed to cheat the system.
After the bots have created an online presence, they start pushing out spam messages as per the requirements of the bot creator.
Email Spam
This is one of the most common types of spam. Almost all of us have received a spam mail at least once in our life. Spam emails are sent to working email addresses. The bots search for the email ides by scanning web pages and copy the text into the data base of the spammer’s target.
After the spammer has established a strong database of email ids, they blast out spam messages. These emails can be used to steal personal data, spread malware, and even hack a personal computer.
Other sources spammers rely on for getting email addresses is the Dark Web.
Comment Spam
This is another common type of spam, which many of us have seen on social media handles. These comments look genuine. Sometimes spam bots post comments in sections that don’t need a user account for participating in the thread. At times they create fake user accounts and leave comments. If the account gets shut down, they create another one.
Can You Tell Whether the Message is from a Bot or a Real Person?
As I told you earlier, the bots are programmed to act like humans. However, they are not as smart and sophisticated as humans, and can be detected.
Grammar and Spelling Mistakes
Usually, spam messages contain excessive spellings mistakes, and grammatical errors.
The Message is Too Good to be true!
We sometimes see offers that are hard to resist. The spam bots generate comments that offer incredible deals on products, services or other purchases. That could be your cue.
The Messages are Irrelevant
Spam bots will comment anywhere anytime. Their messages are not relevant to the posts.
Unexpected Sources
You might know this person, but have hardly ever contacted them. This is another cue of spam bots. Perhaps, the account got stolen, and the first thing the bot does is to send you promotions of a certain product or services.
These Messages Show Urgency
Spam bots are designed to generate traffic to a website and increase their profits. Their messages usually have a sense of urgency. Such as, “quick before they run out”. Similarly, their messages are also have an aggressive tone, and might demand the reader to take a certain action.
Web Crawlers
Also known as spiders, these bots crawl through and index content from all across the internet. Their goal is to learn what is on every webpage, and retrieve information when needed. These web crawlers automatically access a website and obtain their data through software.
Search engines usually employ these bots to determine the search engine ranking of a website.
Search Indexing
The bots index a website’s data to help the search engine know where a certain piece of information can be found. Indexing can be considered the same as the index present in the back of a book, where words are mentioned for the reader to know where it is mentioned.
Indexing is concerned with the text present on the page. A search engine indexes all words except for the Articles: a, an, and the.
How do the Web Crawlers Work?
The world of the internet is huge. The number of websites are innumerable. Hence, the web crawlers have a task that goes on almost indefinitely.
However, they don’t have much time to spend on each website, and therefore, don’t crawl the entire internet. Instead, they decide the page they want to crawl based on the number of backlinks and leads, the traffic and the content quality.
Since websites keep on updating the information on their websites, the crawlers revisit the website periodically to make sure the latest content is indexed. They also rely on robots.txt protocol (please enter the link to the blog regarding ROBOTS.TXT). The protocol specifies the rules for the bots for accessing any page on the website.
Should You Allow the Crawlers to Access Your Digital Property?
It is up to you. But mainly it depends on a few factors. Whether the page has become public, or whether the information will affect your rankings? You should also consider how the information will affect the ranking that is positive or negative. There are some pages that are of no use to the crawlers and might be time consuming for the bots. Hence, while they might be crawling through those irrelevant pages, they might miss out on important data present on your website.
What web crawler bots are active on the Internet?
Every search engine has its own crawler. Following are the bots from the major search engines:
- Google: Googlebot ( Google actually has two crawlers, Googlebot Desktop and Googlebot Mobile, for desktop and mobile searches)
- Bing: Bingbot
- Yandex (Russian search engine): Yandex Bot
- Baidu (Chinese search engine): Baidu Spider
Chat Bots
Chat bots are an AI software which can simulate a chat or a conversation with a user in natural language. They have been employed by various businesses owing to their useful applications. Chat bots can act as personal digital assistants, and provide customer support.
Types of Chat Bots
There are two types of chat bots when it comes to functionality.
Rule-Based Chat Bots
Rule based chat bots give responses by following a set of predetermined rules. They scan input for keywords and provide responses on the basis of those keywords.
For instance, you can tell a rule-based chat bot that “My favorite season is the summer”. The chat bot will then scan the word “summer”, and respond with a question like, “What do you like the most about summer”.
Artificial Intelligence Chat Bots
AI chat bots uses machine learning (PLEASE INSERT A LINK TO MACHINE LEARNING BLOG) to interact with users. Unlike rule-based chat bots, AI bots understand language and full sentences. They have the capacity to initiate human like conversations. However, they are not easy to design or manage. Furthermore, they can lead to unwanted and odd behavior. The notorious Tay released on Twitter in 2016 by Microsoft was taken down within 24 hours of launch due to the inflammatory and offensive comments it made.
Uses of Chat Bots
Chat bots have a wide array of uses. They can be used for the following purposes:
Providing Customer Support
Digital marketing has made it easier for the customers to access websites and businesses. However, they cannot always respond timely. Chat bots can be a good option for providing customer support. Many businesses including Facebook have employed chat bots to direct users towards product pages, and support articles. They can also be used to walk customers through difficult technical problems.
These bots have replaced automatic telephone menus which were hardly ever useful.
Digital Personal Assistance
Another great use for chat bots is DPA. They are voice operated and administer tasks for people such as create calendars, and provide information. Renowned examples include Alexa, Siri and Google’s Assistant.
They also come with other features such as playing games, music, and controlling smart home devices.
Emotional Support Chat Bots
For many, chat bots can provide emotional and therapeutic support as well. They give companionship to the user.
Educational Purposes
Many chat bots are being used for teaching children language skills. For instance, a new Barbie toy comes with a built-in chat box.
Are Chat Bots Safe?
Just like everything else, chat bots have also been employed for spamming and abusing people. There are several types of chat bots such as spam chat bots, harassment bots and disinformation bots that distort the usefulness of chat bots.
Spam bots
These bots are designed to push unwanted ads into social media conversations.
Harassment bots
Harassment bots can also be used for bullying and harassment purposes. They can send obscene and nasty messages to the victim to harm their self-esteem and confidence.
Disinformation bots
Many chat bots are used to spread false information. Many believe the US elections of 2016 were harmed by disinformation bots.
Conclusion
Bots are programs that can change the way we interact with one another. These programs have lifted off a huge chunk of burden off our shoulders. The bots can perform tasks in seconds, which a human would need ages to execute. The three major types of bots include: chat bots, web crawlers and spam bots. Each of these bots serve a different purpose and are designed to perform certain activities.
However, as it has been discussed each type of bot has its pros and cons. Depending on the user and designer of the bots, these programs can help your business generate leads, improve the SEO rankings, and increase the traffic on your website.
