Let’s take a look at the most important elements of the customer experience: Customers want fast response times. They also want the option to reach customer service representatives, regardless of the time of day or their location. I’ll explain how live chat will improve your customers’ service experience and ultimately help you make more money. But is that really what your customers are looking for? Provide fast response times Think about the last time you contacted a business that didn’t have a live chat feature. They also don’t know your products and services as well as you do, so they may not even know how to ask the question properly at first. Connect customers with knowledgeable support agents When a customer has a question or problem, it’s important it gets answered not only fast but also efficiently. It’s important to connect your customers with support agents who are able to help them with their problems. The database will also help you improve your products and services. Ask the right questions in response the customer inquiries.
It’s no secret that businesses need to prioritize the customer experience. Ultimately, keeping your customers happy will help your business grow and prosper.
In fact, 80% of consumers say they’re willing to spend more money to have a better customer service experience.
As a business owner, you need to recognize this and adjust your approach accordingly.
Ask yourself if your current customer service strategy is more convenient for you or more convenient for your customers. Here’s what I mean.
If the only way to contact a customer service representative at your company is via telephone during business hours on weekdays, that’s more convenient for you.
But if a customer has the ability to reach you on weekends or after hours, this will provide them with an enhanced customer service experience.
Improving your customer service may cost you more money. I understand this can be discouraging for some of you.
But as discussed, customers are willing to spend more money for this experience. So you can increase your prices accordingly.
Let’s take a look at the most important elements of the customer experience:
Customers want fast response times. This is especially important if they have an issue, need, or complaint. But you also need to provide fast response times for general inquiries.
Your customers want to speak with knowledgeable staff.
They also want the option to reach customer service representatives, regardless of the time of day or their location. The contact method needs to be fast and easy to use.
Implementing live chat addresses all these factors.
For those of you who aren’t currently using live chat to connect with your customers, that needs to change.
I’ll explain how live chat will improve your customers’ service experience and ultimately help you make more money. Here’s what you need to know.
Customers prefer live chat
Now that we’ve had a chance to look at the elements of good customer experience, it’s time to take those results one step further.
By reviewing those responses, it’s logical to assume that live chat would meet the needs and requests of the consumer. But is that really what your customers are looking for?
Absolutely.
Research shows that live chat has a 92% consumer satisfaction rating. This is the highest rating compared to phone support, social media, and email.
Furthermore, when asked directly, consumers cited live chat as their most preferred method of customer service communication:
That said, we’re seeing an increase in its availability and popularity in customer service. According to experts, in the next 12 to 18 months, live chat for customer support is to grow by 87%.
It’s in your best interest to implement this now, before your competitors beat you to it.
With the popularity of live chat increasing, consumers will be more likely to favor brands offering this most preferred method of communication.
Failure to jump on board with this trend now could result in you falling behind the competition and losing some customers.
Make your live chat option easily accessible
Let’s say a customer decides they have a question, need help, or have an issue that needs to be addressed. Now what?
They shouldn’t have to spend much time searching and scrolling through your website to find a representative. This is a navigation mistake that you need to avoid.
The live chat feature needs to be readily available, or it won’t be as effective.
The best way to do this is to provide a live chat pop-up in the corner of your page. Check out this example from Warby Parker:
Your live chat option should be easy to find, even when a website visitor isn’t initially looking to speak with a representative.
Just knowing that this option is available will improve their experience. If they don’t want to use this feature right now, they can simply minimize the chat window and continue browsing.
I really like this live chat feature from Warby Parker: it’s big, but not too intrusive.
Website visitors can continue to navigate and use the site, even while the chat box is open.
This makes it easy for customers to tell your live chat representatives exactly what they need if they have an inquiry that’s specific to something on your web pages.
Provide fast response times
Think about the last time you contacted a business that didn’t have a live chat feature. How did you reach out to them?
Chances are you used one of the following methods:
- phone
- social media
Several times, I’ve spent over an hour on the phone waiting to speak to a representative. We’ve all been in this situation before.
You pace around the room listening to terrible hold music or some other automated loop of a voice saying “your call is important to us.”
It’s frustrating, to say the least.
Email communication isn’t much better. This could take days or potentially even longer. I sent an email to an airline a few months ago, and it took them three weeks to respond.
But live chat gives you the opportunity to respond to customer inquiries as fast as possible.
Here’s a look at the top reasons why customers say that live chat is their preferred method of contact:
As you can see, getting their questions answered immediately…
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