FleishmanHillard HighRoad (FHR) has teamed up with Wysdom.AI on Open Dialogue, an AI platform for community management.

The marketing and communications agency, which has offices in Vancouver, Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal, saw a need in the market that could be fulfilled by a partnership with Wysdom, a company focused on virtual assistants and conversational AI.

Open Dialogue aims to offer brands an effective way to engage customers on popular social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. With an ability to provide instant responses and answer complex questions, AI-powered virtual assistants have become increasingly popular with companies looking to save time and money interacting and engaging with customers on social channels by using an automated system, instead of human staff.

“While Canada is a global leader in AI development, recent studies indicate many Canadian businesses are woefully behind in AI adoption,” said Patrick Gladney, partner, chief strategy officer at FHR. “Through our partnership with Wysdom.AI, we’re excited to offer brands, who may feel unsure or hesitant about AI, with an easy way to get started with proven technology that will deliver results.”

And FHR, which is part of Omnicom, notes in the press release that consumers are open to interacting with brands via chatbot, instead of an actual human customer service rep, so long as it saved them time.