Quality customer support plays an integral role in the growth of a business. Some companies choose to handle it themselves, while some outsource it. Irrespective of the method, it is safe to say assuring your customer is kept happy is assuring you have continued business.
Customer support follows a common workflow. An issue is raised by the customer, picked, diagnosed and fixed by the customer support team and then validated by the customer. It is vital that a company completes this entire workflow within the least amount of time, and with optimum quality.
Considering time is of the essence, what could be faster than a live chat window? Having a live chat window on your website’s customer support page could drastically minimise the time taken to ‘pick’ and ‘validate’ the customer’s problem.
Why Opt For A Live Chat Window?
1. It Saves Time
A live chat window’s top USP is that it saves valuable time, both for the customer and the business’ support team. Without a live chat window, the customer has to go through a tedious process of creating a ‘ticket’ that raises a flag with the support team. When the ticket is picked solely depends on the team’s availability and when the customer is available to elaborate/validate depends on the customer’s availability. Imagine there being a time difference of 12 hours between the two. What a disaster that can turn out to be.
This can easily be remedied with a chat window and a dedicated 24×7 support team. A customer satisfied with the support they receive is going to be a customer that returns to do business.
2. It Is Economical
Outsourcing customer support is an expensive deal because services are charged by time and head count. The longer the 3rd party support company has to spend fixing your customer’s problem, the more you pay. This includes the wait time to pick and later validate the problem. With a live chat window, this entire ‘wait time’ cost can be cut down.
In addition, the number of support heads needed comes down, considering one support engineer can cater to more than one chat window at a time, as compared to being able to support only one call at a time. Live chat window’s make customer support economical!
3. It Increases Revenue
Consider a visitor on an E-commerce site, like Amazon, having a simple query of ‘do you have this shirt in blue?’ The chances of that visitor raising a ticket for customer support, waiting for a response, then returning to buy the item is extremely low. It’s easier to just walk in to a store and pick it up
A company in such a scenario can benefit immensely with a live chat window on their website. A customer will definitely be willing to spend a few minutes asking questions if a swift response is guaranteed. Sort out the query and you can make a sale, collecting revenue. If it cannot be resolved instantly, add a sweet talking support member on the other end and the visitor could be convinced to return the next day and buy the item. This is what salespeople in a store do anyway, right?
4. It Bridges Language Gaps
Customer support personnel are sometimes located halfway across the globe from the distressed customer, in a different country speaking a foreign language. Talking over the phone to someone who does not speak the same language can be extremely frustrating for both, the customer and the support team.
A Live chat window solves this dilemma. Support members can simply use google translate or use built in plugins to translate text to and fro, making the discussion easy.
5. Fares Better Than Social Media
We’re talking in terms of live chats. You can leverage social media to connect with your customer. When a customer has a query or a problem, they find your company on Facebook or Twitter and connect instantly via a post, chat or tweet. But all things considered, this still has a lot of unnecessary steps like logging in to the social media site, finding the company page or profile and then initiating a chat.
A live chat window sits conveniently at the bottom of the company’s website, accessible by a simple click.
6. It Adds a Personal Touch
Many websites that employ a live chat window have an automated welcome message that pops up on the visitor’s browser, often sent from the profile of a support team member who is online. This not only reassures the customer that help is right around the corner, but also adds a human touch to an otherwise electronic experience.
The Verdict?
Customer service is the back bone of every product or service based company. Ensuring it works smoothly and at top efficiency means ensuring healthy business relationships. A company has to leverage every tip and trick in the market to fine tune its support strategy, and a live chat window can turn out to be the game changer.
