Multimodal chatbot

A multimodal chatbot is a type of chatbot that interacts with users using not only text but also images, voice, and video. It enables businesses to understand various inputs and provide more natural and intuitive responses automatically.

In this article, we’ll unveil how multimodal chatbots work and why businesses use them. We’ll also provide you with use cases and a guide for implementing a multimodal chatbot for your business.

How does a multimodal chatbot work?

Automated messages work based on different types of input and output, including text, voice, images, and video. With their help, these chatbots can ensure more natural conversations that meet customer needs and provide relevant answers. By using AI, multimodal chatbots can better comprehend users’ inquiries and deliver more human-like messages, whether customers send images, voice messages, or videos.

The process begins with chatbots identifying the type of input users provide and determining the best way to process these inquiries. They can analyze messages using natural language processing, speech recognition, computer vision, or video frame analysis, depending on the input. After interpreting the input, chatbots move on to intent recognition. During this stage, bots focus on uncovering users’ objectives, key details of the intent, and sentiment. Once chatbots finish reviewing these inputs, they decide what action to take and which type of response to use.

Finally, multimodal chatbots generate responses using a variety of communication types, including text messages, images, charts, infographics, video tutorials, and other interactive elements. These answers are optimized based on the channels customers use to connect with a specific business.

Now that you have a basic understanding of how multimodal chatbots work, it’s time to unveil why many businesses implement them for communication with their customers.

Why do businesses use multimodal chatbots?

Faster, more natural, and more relevant responses are just a few reasons why many entrepreneurs are turning to multimodal chatbots. They help deliver a seamless customer experience, boost conversions, and improve team productivity. In the next section, we’ll dive into the key benefits and why more brands are choosing to use them.

• Human-like interactions. By allowing users to combine text, voice, images, and videos in their inquiries, multimodal chatbots can better understand customer needs and provide more relevant answers. Users no longer need to type long texts to explain to the chatbot what to do. They can simply add a photo that describes the issue and include a brief text mentioning the details. This way of communication lets users feel like they are communicating with people without friction.
• Higher engagement. By being visually appealing and interactive, multimodal bots help foster longer conversations with users and yield more positive outcomes. These chatbots can showcase various types of elements, including product images, demo videos, and allow prospects to ask questions using voice messages. This results in longer chatbot sessions, providing more time for chatbots to attract additional customers to businesses.
• Better understanding of customer inquiries. Since users can communicate with a chatbot using different types of messages, it enables bots to get a clear understanding of customers’ problems. When chatbots have a clear picture of users’ situations, they can provide relevant, accurate, and human-like responses.
• High adaptability and flexibility. Multimodal chatbots easily adapt to different channels and devices, allowing brands to deliver a consistent customer experience across multiple platforms. They also adjust to users’ inputs when reaching out to businesses.
• Better accessibility. Multimodal chatbots make interaction with brands available to everyone and promote inclusivity. When users have vision impairments, they can make inquiries using voice, while those with hearing impairments can use images and text for their input. With these chatbots, companies can expand their audience and ensure their products are easily accessible to everyone.
• Cost-effectiveness. These AI-powered chatbots can resolve various issues and handle different types of inputs, resulting in improved productivity. By managing even complex interactions independently of human agents, these chatbots eliminate the need for business owners to hire additional customer support staff, even as the number of customers and prospects increases. This approach reduces support costs, optimizes customer assistance, and enhances problem resolution through technology.
• Competitive advantage. Businesses that effectively incorporate multimodal chatbots can stand out from the competition. Natural, relevant, modern, and intuitive conversations consistently attract customers because they receive prompt answers to their questions. A positive experience with a chatbot encourages these clients to remember and stick with your brand, resulting in higher customer loyalty and retention.

Now that you have essential reasons to consider multimodal chatbots for your strategy, it’s time to explore the industries where they can be effectively applied. So, let’s dive in.

Multimodal Chatbot Use Cases

Multimodal chatbots are making waves across all kinds of industries—and chances are, they could be a great fit for yours too. In the next section, we’ll walk you through some of the most popular use cases so you can see exactly how they work and how your business might benefit from using them.

Retail and e-commerce

Multimodal chatbots are perfect communication channels for retail and e-commerce businesses. With their help, customers can conduct a visual search for products. It means that users can upload a photo of a product they want, and the chatbot will provide links to items similar to those in the image. They can also function as guided shopping assistants. These chatbots walk leads through relevant products using product videos, customer reviews, and voice commands. As a result, customers enjoy interactive experiences and find the right products faster.

Healthcare

Businesses in the healthcare industry can also successfully implement multimodal chatbots to help customers check symptoms and receive notifications about medications. For instance, when patients experience issues, they can upload photos and provide a brief description using voice messages. The bot analyzes this information and suggests connecting with specific specialists. When clients have already visited a doctor and received prescriptions for some medications, they can use multimodal chatbots to remind them to take these pills. Patients receive voice alerts, images of the pill, and confirmations through touch or voice response.

Travel and hospitality

Travel agencies use multimodal chatbots for various purposes, including visual travel planning and conversational booking. With their assistance, users can upload a photo of a specific location to identify it precisely. Subsequently, the chatbot recommends nearby hotels, restaurants, and attractions and shares video tours to help customers find the right option for them. Clients can make bookings using text, voice, images, or videos. Additionally, they can upload documents, and chatbots confirm their bookings through various output types.

Banking and fintech

Customers can check the details of their bank accounts using chatbots. They enable users to create account summaries through voice commands and other types of input. The bot responds with text, charts, and voice summaries. Additionally, with this technology, customers can check transactions for fraud by simply taking a screenshot of the suspicious transaction and asking the bot to analyze it. The chatbot verifies the transaction and provides results to users via text or voice messages.

Customer support

Multimodal chatbots efficiently manage customers’ issues and offer relevant answers. They can troubleshoot software errors after customers send screenshots and messages requesting help. The bot analyzes the image and the question, providing a detailed guide to resolving the problem without any human involvement. This can take the form of a text guide or a tutorial video, enabling customers to address the issue as simply as possible.

Education and learning

Education and learning processes can also be simplified using multimodal chatbots. They enable students to upload the points where they struggle with their homework and ask the chatbot to explain a specific task. The bot will use images and voice to present the solution clearly. Furthermore, this technology can facilitate interactive learning. Schools can leverage multimodal chatbots to share quizzes, videos, text summaries, and voice responses with learners. This results in more engaging lessons and encourages students to acquire new knowledge and skills more effectively.

Now that you’ve seen the use cases and why a multimodal chatbot could be a great fit for your business, let’s move on to the next step—how to actually bring it into your strategy.

How to implement a multimodal chatbot for your business?

There are plenty of guides out there on how to add a multimodal chatbot to your business, but not all of them guarantee results. That’s why we’re sharing the essential steps you need to get started the right way and deliver a smooth, consistent experience for your users.

1. Identify key goals and use cases for your chatbot. Consider the tasks you want to assign to the chatbot. Whether you want to manage product recommendations, tech support, or appointment booking, it’s essential to understand which modalities your target audience prefers the most. For this purpose, it’s better to conduct brief research to identify the most effective options among text, voice, and image uploads.
2. Outline user flows. After understanding which modalities users prefer most, it’s time to design how the bot interacts with your audience. You need to show the chatbot the types of input customers can use and the actions they can perform (such as speaking, typing, or adding visual elements).
3. Select the right tool. Choose a chatbot builder based on the features you want to add to your chatbot. If you want your chatbots to understand text and user intent, using tools that enable you to create AI-powered chatbots like SendPulse will suffice. With its help, you’ll be able to provide users with effective automated replies. When you want your bots to comprehend and send voice messages, it’s worth considering Google Speech-to-Text or Amazon Lex. If you are involved in e-commerce and retail businesses, it’s always beneficial to process visual elements. This is possible by using platforms such as OpenAI Vision, CLIP, Google Cloud Vision, and OpenCV.
4. Integrate special platforms and tools. For the proper operation of your chatbots and the secure storage of customer data, you should integrate your bot with the right tools, including CRM systems, product databases, appointment scheduling systems, and other essential tools. This will help your bot understand user inputs and provide relevant answers, ensuring that the messages are tailored to your audience’s needs.
5. Test your chatbots across channels. When you combine multiple types of input in your chatbot, run it before launching. Check each modality for errors. Consider sending voice commands to the chatbot to determine whether it understands everything clearly and accurately. If your bot allows image uploads, send the bot product images to check whether it can detect them. After that, combine several elements in your input. For example, you can upload a product photo and add text asking the bot to find similar products. Finally, don’t forget to test your multimodal chatbots on different devices, including laptops, smartphones, and tablets.
6. Monitor performance and optimize your chatbots. Once you've ensured that your multimodal chatbot clearly understands various types of inputs and has been launched, you should continue to monitor its performance. Information about the most commonly used input modes, completion rates, and drop-off points will provide insights into emerging problems and new opportunities for optimizing your bot.

The brands that lead are the ones that listen, and multimodal chatbots let you do just that, in every format your customers prefer. By embracing this tech, you're not just improving support, you're transforming how people connect with your brand.

Last Updated: 23.04.2025