Table 3.

Best practices.

Best practice	Quotation
It is best practice to design and develop chatbots with input from the target audience [16,20,29,30]	“The user experience is sacrosanct. All decisions need to be made with users at the center. This begins with understanding user needs and realities, including whether or not a chatbot is a channel with which they can engage” [20]
Chatbot use for contraceptive information is a new behavior; it is best practice for users to be given information on chatbots, how to use them, and why to use them before their first use [24,29]	“Using a chatbot to get information and support about health-related content (and specifically, sexual & reproductive health) is a completely new behavior. It isn’t enough to tell consumers WHERE to find your chatbot, you also need to educate them on WHAT a chatbot is and WHY they should use it – the value it offers them as a platform” [29]
Using a chatbot should be intuitive and easy (frictionless) with no superfluous steps to maintain user engagement and avoid drop-offs [20,29]	“Our reading behavior online is to dip in and out of content in an ‘on-demand’ fashion. Long and complex menus can be overwhelming and turn people off. If you have directed people to your chatbot with a very specific call-to-action, don’t make them work too hard to find the information they are interested in” [29]
Chatbots should be hosted on devices and platforms commonly used by the target audience, so that chatbot use is seamless with their routine digital behavior [20,26]	“27% of all users could not see Quick Reply buttons due to the application version or handset that they were using…These issues appeared to be most common amongst users with the Facebook Lite application, those using third-party applications, and those using older handsets. In response, we created an alternative to Quick Replies using numeric menus” [20]
Linking a chatbot with a reputable and well-known organization can build user trust [17,29]	“As I have said many times now, I saw that it [the chatbot] was related to Jacaranda Maternity. Of course, there are the reviews [of Jacaranda] and the reviews were so good. And I felt that by interacting with this chatbot, I was getting very relevant information from a very qualified source. So, I felt nothing fishy at all and I considered it a lot...” [FGD participant] [17]
The persona of a chatbot should resonate with the intended audience and reflect the intended relationship to the audience, for example, peer, health care worker, or neutral robot [16,20,22,25,30]	“A young woman of color was then hired as a copywriter to provide Layla with a ‘personality’ – rewriting responses using language that would resonate with the target audience” [16]
User privacy should be ensured and visible; this will increase user trust in the chatbot [20,24]	“I’m a bit worried especially due to data protection so I wouldn’t do it. If I didn’t have the certainty that my data protection absolutely complete itself so yes I don’t feel comfortable talking about my sexual health online” [Interview participant] [24]
Some access to human support is important for those in need of urgent help, especially where the intended audience is young people [20,27]	“Humans are still important!... During the test phase, we had 243 triggers, with 61 being interactions that we would classify as a safeguarding alert. These interactions would be addressed via human intervention to connect girls with suitable support services” [20]