Blog Post  Have a Question? Meet the Ask MA Chatbot!

What is it?

Ask MA is an AI-powered chatbot designed to help Mass.gov visitors navigate the website. It makes it easy to find answers to questions about Massachusetts services on Mass.gov—all you need to do is ask.

How to Use It?

When you select the question mark in the lower right corner of the screen, it will expand into a message window.

Visitors can opt to select one of the buttons below or manually type their query into the message box at the bottom of the chatbot window. 

In this example, we chose the DOR/Tax button. In response, the chatbot provides the user with some options to choose from. You can choose an option that resonates with you, or you can type in your query in the message box.

We chose the Track Refund option, and the chatbot suggests pages based on popular demand. 

Along with keeping track of Mass.gov pages, the chatbot has several features that improve the user experience.

Features

Multilingual Feature

The Ask MA chatbot uses advanced algorithms to automatically detect the language of your message and then respond in the same target language. Currently, the chatbot offers 20 languages for text-based inquiries.

To select your preferred language, select the “🌐Eng” menu in the bottom left corner of the Ask MA conversation window.

Speech-to-text

Speech-to-text improves accessibility and usability by enabling you to interact with the Ask MA chatbot using your voice instead of typing. Currently, the chatbot offers 11 languages for speech-to-text inquiries.

To start speaking to the Ask MA chatbot, select the microphone icon in the “Start typing…” box of the conversation window. 

Auto-suggestions

The Ask MA chatbot also provides auto-suggestions that present relevant options as soon as you start typing based on the Mass.gov page you are on and the words you are typing in.

To use this feature, start typing in the conversation window. The Ask MA chatbot will auto-analyze the input and generate a list of suggestions from which you can select.

Feedback

The Ask MA Feedback feature collects feedback at the end of an interaction using the thumbs-up and thumbs-down icons. This lets you express your satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the chatbot's responses, performance, or functionality. We encourage you to provide feedback based on your usage of the chatbot.