11 Productive live chat customer support tips

Offering live chat support is inevitable for organizations that provide support as inbound call centers. Memorable customer support in the form of chat is always pleasing but if not timed perfectly, the whole process can be a disaster due to high average handling times and other parameters. Professional companies are very keen about availing impeccable support in the form of chat assistance; they have exclusive teams for that. This not only brings in more business but also increases your loyal consumer base. Being valued by a business is appreciated by every consumer thus making them to purchase more from you and promote your brand through word of the mouth marketing.

1. Surveys are a good source

   Performing a survey is one of the best tools to judge how your agent can effectively support a customer. This survey will help to collect information relating to their issue. The agents will have a brief idea of what occurred and the basic system settings during that time. It also avoids unnecessary wait times and stress periods for consumers.

2. Proactive chat targeted

   This helps agents to focus on clients before they plan to approach. It is an added feature of positive customer service which adds to the client satisfaction and an increase in conversation rate. Consumers who are prepared to attend a session will be more than happy to agree to proactive communication.

3. Automatic chat acceptance

   The last thing that a client wants is rejection of his attempt to connect to a support technician. Putting on hold is as annoying as rejecting a session. An automatically attending support system will not only allow customers to connect to one of the manual support schemes, but it also adds to the end user’s satisfaction parameter. Live chat apps are the best solutions for automatic acceptance.

4. Enforce chat window customization

   You can customize the chat window during the live chat conversation. This would have a positive impact on customers who would appreciate your company’s professionalism. During chatting, live chat box’s visually appealing features help prospects make first positive impression about your brand. Your representatives must interact professionally and the chat window should carry brand logo and agent avatar consistent with your company’s vision.

5. Be an expert of your product

   Knowing comprehensively about your company’s product can help you extend actionable live chat support tips and enjoy competitive advantage. This is possible:

   • By remaining updated about the latest features and new releases of your company
   • Training each chat representative about recent updates
   • Discussing the latest changes in meetings and team sessions
   • Communicating company policy updates, new reward schemes, discounts etc. to chat reps
   • Developing expertise in maximum chat agents by offering them proper incentives

6. Align the interdepartmental functionalities to a common goal

   Professionalism must reflect from every interaction of your chat agent with customers. This is possible only if customer experience is enhanced with topical information. To achieve this, intra-organizational departments must communicate constantly in alignment with your stated goals.

   Among proven professional chatting tips, an important one is to teach your chat agents how to escalate a problem to right department for seedy problem resolution. Suppose, a website problem is preventing consumers from placing online orders. Your chat reps receive this complain over live chat window. His/her response should not be to direct customers to place orders over phone and forget. S/he must inform the manager who can convey the problem to site maintenance team or order processing department. This approach ensures that problems are speedily resolved and win-win situation is created for consumers and company alike

7. Promotion and goodie throwaways

   Even if you have failed to resolve a product related issue, you can keep that customer stick to your parent company by providing illustrative discounts and or zero day deals. These deals allow customers to renew their service or extend them. Some of these life saving tips can become very important in the course of customer support. And also read here on tips for providing better online chat support.

8. Refreshing interaction

   You have to train your agents on the importance of maintaining a pleasant language presentation because chat technique demands fluidic interaction between customer and agent. Most of the real time customer support service providers persuade their agents to behave pleasantly and to express their empathy. This is an important tip because they require agents to be online and understand their concerns related to the product or service.

9. Listen patiently and empathize

   Before thinking about how to speak more professionally over live chat, you must first cultivate the quality of listening patiently to customers to convince them that their problems matter to your company. Empathize with them before proceeding to suggest a viable solution

   An important live chat etiquette is to remain loyal to your company and never speak against it just to please the customer. This is unprofessional and create a negative impression about the company among customers, who may further spread the word. To engage your customers professionally, you need to empathize with them to a limited extent and focus more on tactically addressing the situation.

10. Fulfill your commitments

    One among live chat best practices is not to commit anything to customers that cannot be fulfilled. If anything has been promised, you must keep your word. Suppose, the customer is annoyed by frequent promotional calls from your company and is requesting you over live chat to put his number on ‘Do Not Call’ list. If you assure him about the same, then you need to follow suit.

    The best way to show that you care for customer’s sensibilities is to complete his request during live chat session itself. However, if this is not possible due to an overwhelming number of incoming live chats, you must schedule it in to-do list and complete the same before the end of the professional day.

    If you feel that you are not qualified enough to complete the customer’s request conclusively, refrain from promising. Instead, consult someone who is in an authoritative position to deal with the issue. After that, you need to communicate to the customer if his request his feasible for fulfillment. Commitments fulfilled within a reasonable time leads to deepening of trust among customers about your company’s ethos.

11. Conclude on a friendly note

    When you engage in live chat for gaining best results, you should never end the conversation abruptly or curtly. To win the goodwill of the customer, express your gratitude heartily before closing the chat.
    Never close your chat interface when you can see the customer typing something. Convince yourself properly that the customer is no longer interested in taking the chat any further before ending the live chat. Allow the customer to end the chat first.

    Enquire from customer about any additional way you can help him/ her out after resolving the primary concern. Once you receive the response, move forward to terminate the chat. Convey a positive impression about your company’s customer support services before signing out of live chat.

    A live chat solution as robust as the ones provided by professional live chat customer support companies will ensure a smooth flow of business into any organization that provides external support. Clients and agents will appreciate the simplicity and productive approach of these tools.