Today you can learn a language, get customer service, or access details about a product or service with the help of a chatbot. But have you ever thought about the customer experience when some of the nearly 60 million people in the U.S. who try to buy your product or service don’t speak English? Spanish is the second most spoken language in the U.S. and the third-most used language on the Internet (after English and Chinese). By 2060 the U.S. will be the second largest Spanish-speaking country in the world, after Mexico.

According to analyst firm Forrester research, 63% of customers will leave a company after just one poor experience, and almost two-thirds will no longer wait more than two minutes for assistance. A conversational AI chatbot that speaks Spanish can make an enormous difference.

Organizations are rushing to implement bilingual chatbots across owned, earned, paid, and social media. Industries like fintech, manufacturing, retail, and tourism, are reaping tremendous rewards by helping customers make decisions, manage spending, eliminating bottlenecks, improving access, and supporting rapid response rates and offers.

As the use of AI chatbots has exponentially expanded, they are increasingly being integrated into the technology platforms customers, employees and other stakeholders use most. Integrations into messaging services like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are increasingly common and have the added benefit of providing consistent messages and gathering the data necessary to optimize their functionality.

Some basic chatbots prompt callers through a phone tree. Others, like Siri or Alexa, understand complex questions and even deliver jokes. Spanish speaking chatbots, like their English-speaking counterparts, can answer up to 90% of inquiries in a fraction of the time of human agents, any time of day or night – increasing sales and satisfaction.

B2B companies are using chatbots across the supply chain to improve compliance, reduce routine questions, and query massive databases. Backend AI powered engines are making instantaneous decisions about credit and access while the chatbot responds to questions and makes suggestions.

Chatbots are being deployed at a breakneck speed across functional areas as well, qualifying prospects and closing sales. HR departments are screening candidates and moving them through hiring, onboarding and retention processes. Sales and marketing organizations are qualifying leads, helping customers find products, and removing barriers to purchase by approving credit, and answering key questions about shipping, delivery, returns and more.

Why don’t all organizations have a Spanish-speaking chatbot? There actually is no reason. But even large banks, public transportation organizations and multinationals promising customers Spanish-language communications options still have messages such as “sorry, I don’t speak Spanish yet, but I’m working on it.”

Through dozens of engagements, NDS Cognitive Labs has learned how to program, teach and enable continuous learning in Spanish, English, Portuguese speaking conversational AI chatbots around the world. Thanks to Natural Language Processing, conversational AI chatbots can learn how questions are posed in any language and work in every platform from WhatsApp to a company website and they integrate easily into legacy systems.

Organizations serious about doing business in the North and South American markets offering conversational AI only in one language (English, Spanish, Portuguese) risk of losing customers, falling behind competitors, and missing expansion opportunities. Companies leveraging AI, automation, cloud computing, and conversational AI across channels are increasingly including critical capabilities like Spanish language proficiency to ensure that experiences are tailored to the needs of the customer, meet expectations, and close sales.