Chatbots are widespread, but users who need help mostly avoid them. Why? Because chatbots’ shortcomings have earned them a bad reputation. And now ChatGPT’s strengths have damaged regular chatbots’ reputation even more. The main cause of these shortcomings is that companies deploying chatbots don’t realize that creating a successful one is largely about user experience (UX), not just technology implementation. This foundation report in Forrester’s series on conversational experience design examines this mismatch between companies’ chatbot optimism and the reality of low adoption, then explains the problem, how you can overcome it, and where to turn next.