If you haven't heard of chatbots yet -- or your experience is limited to novelty programs like Cleverbot -- chances are you'll be seeing more of them in the coming years. Because companies are slowly starting to leverage chatbots as a way to manage basic communication tasks that used to belong solidly to the realm of human capabilities. In this piece, Hristo Borisov, the Director of Product Management at Progress, helps illuminate what chatbots are, how to build them, and their role in the future of business. In short, chatbots are robots programmed to respond like humans. According to Borisov's definition, "A chatbot is a computer program that is capable of having a human-like conversation with a user by receiving and sending text messages for the purpose of automating a business process."

Facebook is expected to announce chatbots, among other things, at its annual F8 developer conference in San Francisco this week, in pursuit of its continuing goal of luring back younger users. Chatbots are programs that largely use artificial intelligence to simulate conversations with humans; the technology will likely be included in the company's Messenger app. The goal is to change the way we communicate with businesses, and with each other, on the Internet. "Bots are conversational so they are a natural extension of how we like to communicate and what we like to do," said Julie Ask, an analyst with Forrester. You can chat with the bot, ask the bot to do things for you, like order take-out or get a new lipstick." Since F8 is a developer conference, Facebook will also likely show off API tools so enterprises and third-party developers can build chatbots and Live Chat plug-ins for business users. These announcements are not getting as much buzz as the chatbots at this point. Think of chatbots as digital assistants that could help enterprises do away with 1-800 numbers, by taking customer questions, helping users find products and even handling problems. "Bots will give consumers, who are more comfortable chatting with someone, the ability to buy products and services and get customer service," said Patrick Moorhead, an analyst with Moor Insights & Strategy. "I personally don't like getting on the phone and would love for Messenger to be able to validate my identity and provide information I need.