1. A method for virtually integrating a bot with an online search service, the method comprising the steps of: surfacing bot content for indexing by a search engine associated with the search service, the surfaced bot content being includable in a link contained in a results page returned by the search engine to a user of the online search service responsively to a query; responsively to the link being activated by the user, launching the bot to engage in a conversation with the user, enabling the user to converse with the bot using a natural language interface; and receiving at least a portion of the query from the search engine to enable the bot to begin the conversation with the user using bot content that has relevance to the query by identifying the user with a unique identifier that is shared with the bot so that the bot may utilize the unique identifier to pull a last known query input by the user.
1. A method for virtually integrating a bot with an online search service, the method comprising the steps of: surfacing bot content for indexing by a search engine associated with the search service, the surfaced bot content being includable in a link contained in a results page returned by the search engine to a user of the online search service responsively to a query; responsively to the link being activated by the user, launching the bot to engage in a conversation with the user, enabling the user to converse with the bot using a natural language interface; and receiving at least a portion of the query from the search engine to enable the bot to begin the conversation with the user using bot content that has relevance to the query by identifying the user with a unique identifier that is shared with the bot so that the bot may utilize the unique identifier to pull a last known query input by the user. 7. The method of claim 1 in which the surfacing comprises exposing one or more sources of the bot content through an API on a hosted platform on which the bot runs.