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Facebook has\u00a0been putting a big\u00a0effort into growing Messenger as a bot platform this year. Now\u00a0there are 34,000 of these bots\u00a0in existence, built to automatically feed you news and entertainment, let you shop, and more \u2014 expanding Messenger\u2019s use\u00a0beyond simple chats with friends. And today, that strategy is getting a significant boost: Facebook\u00a0says<\/a> it will now let developers track\u00a0bots on its free analytics platform, alongside ads and apps. At the same time, Facebook\u00a0is also opening up\u00a0its developer program, FbStart<\/a>, to bot developers.<\/p>\n Both potentially give bot makers\u00a0more reasons to build and monitor how their new widgets\u00a0are working.<\/p>\n Josh Twist, a product manager for Facebook Messenger\u2019s bot efforts, who is an Englishman based in Seattle but is in London today to debut the tools at a developer event, tells me that Facebook expanded the analytics and FbStart tools after a lot of requests from the developers.<\/p>\n \u201cGetting bot support for messenger is the most frequently requested feature from bot developers,\u201d he said. This\u00a0shouldn\u2019t be too much of a surprise. Messenger may have over one billion users<\/a>, but it remains to be seen whether bots will be a sticky and useful service for them in the longer term, or whether they are a flash in the pan.<\/p>\n Facebook already provided analytics\u00a0to other developers on its platform, and bots have seen a massive\u00a0surge of interest since they first made their debut earlier this year. That interest has not just come from users curious about\u00a0how they work; developers are also very keen to see if bots really are\u00a0the next big thing.<\/p>\n Twist tells me that for now, the analytics will cover bots built just for Messenger. But given how bots are making their way to other communication platforms, from competing messaging apps\u00a0like Viber\u2019s<\/a> through to enterprise-focused platforms like Slack<\/a>, don\u2019t be surprised if Facebook expands its bot\u00a0analytics\u00a0to other platforms beyond Messenger.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is\u00a0something we have talked about and haven\u2019t ruled it out,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s possible, absolutely, since we already support analytics for other platforms for apps. But right now we\u2019re\u00a0prioritizing\u00a0support for Messenger bots.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Analytics, of course, is an essential tool for a developer, both to be able to track how well something is working and other kids of feedback. Here Facebook says that features that will be included are reaches across mobile and desktop devices and measurement of customers\u2019 journeys across apps and websites.<\/p>\n Developers also will be able to\u00a0view reports on messages sent, messages received, and people who block or unblock your app. And they will also get access to anonymized data reports on bot demographics, which include details like age, gender, education, interests, country and language to figure out who is using your bot.<\/p>\n FbStart, meanwhile, currently has some 9,000 members who\u00a0get feedback from Facebook on their apps, ads and bots, as well as Facebook ads credits and other free tools from\u00a0partners like Amazon, Dropbox, and Stripe. If Facebook was looking at ways of swelling those ranks, tapping 34,000 developers could be one way of doing that.<\/p>\n Twist points out that while there are a lot of standalone bot developers coming to Facebook for the first time, there is a lot of crossover with other Facebook services like apps and ads.<\/p>\n![\"message-received-252112\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.rsoftsolution.com\/blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/RSSPoster_PRO\/cache\/dd14d_message-received-252112.png?resize=640%2C563\")
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