Across all industries and businesses, one of the core challenges of digital marketing is figuring out how to best communicate with customers. If customers do not feel that they are able to reach out and have their questions, queries, and concerns adequately and easily addressed, they will stay clear. This is where live chat comes in.
According to digital marketing experts, 73% of customers believe that an online live chat function is the best way to communicate with a company. Users prefer live chat because it is simple, non-committal, fast, and ideal for quick, urgent queries. If you operate a customer-facing business of any kind, you could be benefitting from live chat. Here’s how.
1. Save Some Serious Cash
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One of the most compelling benefits of switching to a live chat customer service format is financial. By offering a live chat function alongside other services, you can save up to 30% on customer service costs.
Running a phone line is expensive, while a lack of live chat functionality means that your service agents often waste large amounts of time answering simple queries and keeping customers on hold.
A live chat function will reduce the size of your customer services queues and save you a lot of overhead. This is exactly why America’s largest financial advisor platform, Betterment, recently decided to make its customer support 100% via live chat, to save money and time.
2. Retain Your Customers
One of the core objectives of any marketing initiative is to improve customer retention, rather than simply trying to attract new customers. For this, live chat functions can be a lifesaver. Studies have shown that live chat substantially increases customer satisfaction, helping to improve loyalty and reduce churn.
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One fascinating case study in this regard comes from the CRM service provider, Pipeliner, which implemented a “proactive” live chat function that actively asks customers if they need help with the page they are on, encouraging them to ask questions.
The live chatbots on the site are given individual names such as “Monty”, in order to create a warmer customer experience and emphasize that the company cares about the needs of users.
3. Enhance Your Product Offering
Live chat is not all about answering customer questions and problems. By implementing a live chat, you can also improve your digital products. If you run a digital platform of any kind, live chat options can improve the user experience while they are using your product or service.
One standout example here can be found in the entertainment industry, specifically with online casinos. The leading online casino platform Betway offers in-session live chat to anyone playing live blackjack on its site. Users can use this function to communicate with the blackjack dealer on the screen, in order to create a smoother experience and add to the immersive nature of the product. This is how live chat can enhance a product.
4. Resolve Problems More Quickly
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There’s no denying that good customer service is all about the need for speed. Your ability to answer customer questions quickly will play a significant role in your lead conversion and retention rates, whether on your website or via your business social media channels. This is one of the core benefits of live chat.
Live chat allows you to answer common customer queries instantly, without forcing the customer to sit on hold for hours or join a queue. Live chat extras such as one-click screen sharing and document uploads mean that even the more complicated customer problems can be solved in just a couple of minutes.
This is why customer service leaders such as Apple offer screen sharing to all users as a standard part of the customer support journey.
5. Expand Your Market Reach
Finally, it is difficult to overstate just how helpful live chat can be for helping you to expand your market reach. By offering live chat, you are giving potential customers from any part of the world the opportunity to instantly ask questions or make purchases. This is invaluable for companies wishing to build a brand that is genuinely cross-border.
Without live chat, a customer in a far-flung country would have to deal with expensive international calls to your customer service desk, unless you are a massive company with a global network of call centers. A simple live chat function helps bring an entire planet’s worth of potential customers to your doorstep, without the need for any expensive overseas investments.
These are the live chat business benefits that you can’t afford to ignore. If you want to stay ahead of the curve, live chat really is an option worth exploring.
