Ever since I put myself back into the Welcome Bot rotation in middle 2021, ive been periodically watching as the messages arrive and a few things strike me as WelcomeBot isn’t getting more action. Although its welcoming new folks, time and time again, i get the thank you’s, then rarely do i ever get any other questions for these folks. I tend to notice these same folks asking on the Help Team page- stuff that i could’ve answered and taken the extra workload away from them.
Those who do respond tend to give me responses that i cant answer to - such as issues with Wikihow Pro - or they just ask stuff that is out of the realm of what the Talk page is for - collaboration.
I dont want to call out any part of the feature as not essentially working the way it was designed, but maybe someone needs to look into getting it to deliver them to those who tried to start the collaborative messages to start the conversation going when those users need help. We stick around for some time and aren’t getting the responses the bot was designed to catch.
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JayneG
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Hi @EpcotMagic
, could you help us understand what you think might be wrong? Are there improvements that you think may help engagement with welcomebot messages?
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That’s something id have to noodle on. Im really disappointed that users tend to forget all about the one who’s welcomed them could be used to ask questions to and what could draw them back. Maybe others would have some ideas - because I’m not even sure.
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I might say I partly agree. But I’ll admit – I don’t think when someone doesn’t respond, they’re trying to ignore us or anything.
I think some newbies – like me when I joined wikiHow – are just too “shy and scared” to reply. Maybe they “don’t know what to say”. Maybe they’re having trouble navigating wikiHow. Maybe they’re confused where to respond.
Now I know this sounds weird, but that’s what I found myself in when I was new – clicking “Reply to __” took me to "some sort of “a confusing page with so many things”. I was too shy to respond, and I didn’t know what to say. Should I just say “Thank you” or should I elaborate? I didn’t understand what the links in the welcome message were for – I was just “so confused”. What question should I ask? I had a million questions. How should I ask? What if the person thinks I’m “foolish”? What if the person gets offended or is rude and unkind? Now I know everyone around is so friendly and understanding, but when I was new, I didn’t. I was “so scared”. What gave me the courage to send my first reply was when I got some coaching when I was removing format tags without formatting articles. And I thought not responding to that would come off as disrespectful. New users can sometimes have a hard time figuring out things, and how do ask someone hot to reply to a message if you don’t know how to leave a message?
I know this is not the case with everybody, but I thought I’d just share my story
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I remember when I joined, I actually didn’t think Helpie was a real person. (I quickly found out I was wrong cuz I ummm… we’ll say asked a lot of questions.)
@Buterflie
your post is reminding me of when I first met you. =)
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Are any of us real though? How can we prove that everyone else aren’t figments of our imaginations? Perhaps we’re all NPCs in some kind of simulation or dream, and the only thing that truly exists is the dreamer… like the people of Koholint Island in Link’s Awakening.
Some people actually think our welcome messages are coming from just that - all bots. I keep telling them my real name when they think I’m just a bot, but i don’t think most are seeing these messages coming from a real person. So its more of an image thing. I know the welcome wagon user can back us up, but they often forge ahead and not ask them either. Yet most still would prefer to send additional messages to the Help Team.
Im not thinking about messages directly relating to those resolving a receipt of the message. Im thinking about further messages past that. Users will forget that we are real and that we cam still answer messages and that we are skilled at our trade here. In my viewpoint, i would think maybe an additional message box should display every so often during a period of time to make sure the user still understands their edits to the site and relays them back to either of us. I dont believe many come back to checking in on them after a one-off before they try the Help Team, but i believe they are scouting to see if they can get other answers elsewhere onsite, when some of them could get answers before another message is posted to the whole community.
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Perhaps a note can be added to the bottom of the message saying that the message was sent automatically, but that the person listed as the sender is real? I’m not sure what the message would say exactly, but something to that effect might eliminate any confusion.
I know that I used to say that, “The message above was sent by a bot, but it used my name so that you would be able to contact a real person”.
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