In our ongoing quest to enhance user experience, we are excited to introduce a new AI assistant, powered by cutting-edge OpenAI technology and designed with Rapport to give it a friendly, approachable interface. This AI assistant, integrated directly into our website, is here to help you explore and navigate with ease, making your journey more personalised and efficient.
Why not listen to it instead:
Why did we build Aiden?
Iguazu is always forward-looking and excited about integrating new technologies into pharmaceutical marketing. We were particularly enthusiastic about creating an AI assistant to explore its potential benefits and drawbacks for our pharma and healthcare clients. The following article provides an in-depth exploration of the process and the lessons we learned from this experience.
How the AI Assistant works
Aiden is our AI Assistant, and he knows almost everything there is to know about Iguazu. Aiden takes your questions and, using his extensive knowledge, gives you an answer that not only helps educate and inform, but can also set you on the right path to learn even more!
The AI assistant is built using the OpenAI Assistants feature, which gives it a robust foundation to understand and process queries effectively. This means that the assistant listens carefully to what you ask—thanks to JavaScript-based voice recognition technology—and provides relevant, accurate responses based on your queries. Whether you’re looking for specific information or need guidance on your next steps, the AI is always ready to assist.
What sets this assistant apart is its ability to leverage the information we have uploaded into its system. This data helps the assistant answer queries with a higher degree of specificity, ensuring that you get the most relevant and tailored information. By using this contextual knowledge, it acts as a smart guide that knows the ins and outs of our site, making your browsing experience both informative and efficient.
This image shows the set-up of Aiden in Rapport, and some of the options available. As Aiden is an assistant, there is no need for a script here.
It’s worth noting that the Assistant is based on a model already trained on some amount of data from the internet, however there is no further connection to the internet afterwards - relying only on the documents we have uploaded to the system.
Giving Aiden some personality
Incorporating Rapport into our AI assistant not only gives it a friendly, human-like face but also enhances the overall interaction quality. Rapport allows the assistant to respond in a warm and engaging manner, making your interactions feel more conversational rather than mechanical.Â
Rapport allows you to visually build your assistant, choosing outfits, hairstyles and accessories. This is similar to video game character customisation.
This feature bridges the gap between technology and user comfort, ensuring that even as you engage with an AI, it feels approachable and intuitive.
Smooth integration for ongoing assistance
This AI assistant isn’t just a search tool—it’s your companion throughout your visit to our website. From helping you find the right content to assisting with product inquiries, it’s designed to be dynamic and responsive to your needs. You can ask it for help as you navigate, and it will seamlessly guide you to your desired destination.
Here you can see Aiden integrated in the homepage. This is a placeholder image as the assistant is yet to be initiated.
Overcoming challenges
Working with a new technology is always going to be a challenge, and we won’t lie, this put our development team’s knowledge to the test. There were a few struggles along the way, but we have learned to overcome them.
- Designing a new user experience: In search of the ideal user experience, we wanted to integrate the assistant with no microphone requirement, which added the complication of user interaction needed to initiate the assistant. In order to achieve the right UX, it was important to add a prompt to the user to click anywhere and initiate the assistant.
- Restrictions of AI-voice models: There are many words and phrases that an AI voice can struggle with, including SEO, omnichannel and Iguazu – it was obviously important to have the company name pronounced correctly! We solved this with a combination of strategies including selecting a voice that best pronounced Iguazu, as well as changing the way that we write words in the document that the assistant learns from. For example, splitting acronyms and initialisms into their constituent letters – SEO to S E O – can help the assistant pronounce words correctly.
Lessons learned
We’ve spent plenty of time working on getting the assistant to a good place – learning a lot about the text-to-speech integration, improving the user journey by integrating a call to action on certain queries and managing some difficulties around beginning the interaction with the assistant. We now know how to leverage the constituent parts of the assistant set up to work best for integrating a high quality experience, and look forward to bringing assistants to more websites.
Applications in pharmaceutical marketing
You might be wondering how an AI assistant could benefit your pharmaceutical website – and that’s a great question.
- Easily answer questions about product indications and prescribing: AI assistants can be programmed to deliver MHRA-compliant responses about medicines, adhering to the Summary of Product Characteristics (SmPC) and Patient Information Leaflets (PIL). This ensures that all communications stay within the boundaries of regulatory guidance. The AI can be programmed to only deliver approved, compliant messaging, reducing the risk of miscommunication or the dissemination of unapproved promotional material.
- The future of website search: AI assistants help website users find what they are looking for with ease, in a more personalised way, aiding efficient delivery of support materials to HCPs or patients.
- Accessibility: With voice recognition chat AI assistants like Aiden, it’s a great way to overcome accessibility barriers for users who struggle with using websites in the traditional way.
Ready to meet Aiden?
In essence, this AI assistant marks a new era in user-centric website design. With its integration of OpenAI’s intelligence, Rapport’s personable interface, and JavaScript’s smooth interaction capabilities, we have created a tool that offers you the guidance and assistance you need—at your fingertips.
A Personalised Experience Awaits:
Aiden, our AI assistant, will be constantly improving, especially as the capabilities of AI increase. To help improve Aiden, we would love to hear any feedback. If you have any, please let us know. Contact us for more information.
Tools used:Â Rapport, OpenAI, Elevenlabs
Iguazu specialise in strategic marketing for healthcare and pharmaceuticals industries. Interested in your own assistant, implementing AI, or our other services?
Author:
Dylan Harman
Technical Lead
