The term ‘avatar’ has become part of our daily vernacular. Essentially an avatar is the digital representation of a character, person or concept. Avatars can be used as online personalities that – through a combination of visual and textual cues – convey a specific ethos, personality or brand image.
Currently many businesses are opting to create online avatars as part of an intelligent self-service functionality, in order to project brand personality and to deal with enquiries, both internal and external, more efficiently. But what do B2B brands need to consider when using such a tool?
Is an avatar suitable for my brand?
Generically speaking, B2B sites that are geared towards avatars are those targeting the mass business market, such as utilities, B2B retail and telecoms. They may want to provide a more ‘conversational’ interaction for users.
Other sectors – such as financial services – may not feel that their business’ brand can be reflected by a persona, but instead prefer to rely on high quality natural language search. This does not reflect upon the quality of information on their sites: many businesses in the financial services sector, such as Barclays and Standard Life, have extremely advanced help portals for both B2B and consumer customers.
Yet in the B2B space, avatars are now increasingly being used as the face of the customer service section of a business website. For many businesses, giving a face to this section shows that they are trying to provide a more personable online service. As websites have grown in size and complexity an avatar can provide a helpful visual guide to customers and stakeholders trying to find information on a site.
Best practice guidelines
Adding an avatar may not always be appropriate, but in the instances that a business does decide to proceed, it must adhere to guidelines to ensure it is following best practice.
Firstly, a business must ask its marketing and branding department to be involved in deciding the appearance of an avatar. The avatar will be portraying the face of the brand, so it is important that it identifies with the audience, rather than alienate it. This can make choosing the sex, race and age quite an involved task. The marketing department may also suggest that the avatar’s outfit and background are in line with the company’s brand image and colours.
Furthermore, a business must also consider whether it wants the avatar to look corporate or relaxed, depending on how it thinks this will identify with its customers. This can make it difficult if the business has a split customer base. Royal Mail overcame this by having a more corporate avatar for its business section and a more relaxed avatar for its general public section.
Businesses must also decide whether or not they want the avatar to be animated. Some businesses have found that if an avatar is too animated customers find it distracting, as it becomes more like entertainment rather than the face of an information tool. However, small movements can make it more lifelike, especially if a business opts for a cartoon avatar. An example of a business doing this well is Scottish Power, whose avatar blinks and makes small movements whilst the customer browses the help section.
Deciding on the appearance of the avatar is just the first stage. If a business opts for using a photo-realistic persona then it will then need to source the image. Some businesses actually do casting calls and get a professional photographer, whilst others advertise for a member of staff, which can have a positive effect on staff morale and involvement. If a business decides to use a cartoon, sometimes they will use its own in-house creative teams to design it, or alternatively rely on the company that is also providing the search application for its customer service portal.
Is your B2B avatar genuinely useful?
Whatever route is selected, it is important that the user interface provides not just an avatar, but methods of finding information. After all, this is the point.
Ultimately, the content and functionality of the knowledgebase underpinning the self-help function is more important than whether an avatar is used or not. An avatar should just be one of many possible interfaces for underlying content that the customer can easily access. The customer experience should be enjoyable and successful whether the avatar is there or not. Functionality should not be sacrificed because a business chooses to use an avatar. However if used cleverly, an avatar can boost a brand and increase credibility with B2B audiences.
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