Are Chatbots (and Live Chat) Good for Business?

Every business should invest heavily in customer services aimed at providing more value to target customers. Improving Customer loyalty among existing customers to improve repeat business and referrals is be enhanced with chatbots.

In fact, front of office technology has significantly helped in the management of customer queries. Chatbots and live chats are now prevalent on most websites that have an eCommerce platform. Customers can now get to know the products and services being sold by a certain firm online and ask questions during the purchasing process in much the same way, a walk-in customer would seek out a salesperson on the floor to assist them.

As website users become more confident with self-service and preferring online transactions over physical stores, they too will have confidence in a chatbot or LiveChat. Chatbots are not real people, so users get a response every time and the more advanced software in use means there’s less need for real people interaction, and they are only required when the query is escalated, e.g. a billing enquiry.

From a user viewpoint, there is nothing more frustrating than attempting to use LiveChat, and the automated response says the team will get back to you, that’s what you get with LiveChat when it’s out of hours of service, and you’ve not outsourced the service. One way around it is companies will invest more on their chatbot software, so it’s using AI and machine learning to improve customer responses. These chatbots can learn to satisfy most queries so the websites using this technology will enjoy loyalty and higher sales volume.

Online buyers want their questions answered immediately emulating the same experience as they would get from a salesperson in a physical store.

LiveChat and chatbots are similar insofar as they improve the customer experience and engagement. If a website has to choose one software, LiveChat is preferred at least for now, as it relies on real people using it and therefore it’s more familiar and trusted by customers.

However, unless the service is outsourced for 24/7 coverage, users are likely to stop a purchase when their query is not answered immediately.

In this scenario, when the business is out of usual office hours, the user is presented with a templated response saying a customer representative will respond to the query when they are next online. While the out of office response is also emailed to the customer, and the same reply is visible in the ‘conversation’ on the LiveChat window when you next go the website, the lack of immediacy cools buyer interest in making a purchase.

eCommerce sites with high volume traffic are more likely to outsource the LiveChat service, so their customers get a real person every time without delay.

There is plenty of upside to using customer engagement software, including cost; as there are plenty of software providers and outsourcing services.

Customer satisfaction

Definitely, customers will be served with comprehensive feedback on what a particular firm is all about. They will learn about the products and services offered by the company. This feedback will bring great satisfaction to customers.

Feedback to an unlimited number of customers

Chatbots and live chat enable customer relations to reach out to many customers at once. This capability will save a lot of time that might be wasted by using traditional mechanisms.

Flexible

If the chatbot cannot answer a complex question, then the customer support team can switch to live chat. This flexibility is what makes live chat and chatbots very effective for companies. Your customers will always be kept updated with a lot of ease.

Cost effective

A chatbot does not need to be operated by anyone. It automatically responds to questions being asked by customers. This capability will prevent you from hiring customer relation personnel to respond to customer questions. You will save a considerable amount of cash. The money saved can be invested somewhere else to promote your company.

Customer loyalty

Make it easy for customers to use your website and make online purchases and they will return every time they have a need. Expect to also see your business referred to the networks of happy customers, therefore, focusing on keeping customers loyal is time and resources well spent.

Conclusion

Customers are up to speed with self-service online shopping however they do want the same level of attention as they’d get walking into a store, so get this right and your business will excel online.