Why is live chat support system important for online stores?

[Ashnit]

Online stores monitor their profits directly by counting on number of products they are able to sell online. Although many businesses have enjoyed good traffic but have faced challenges in actually getting their shopping carts filled and checked out. One of the reasons that have been revealed through analytics data is customer spends little time on page containing product information because he is not able to get more information instantly. He has to either contact on phone or mail the store manager to know more information.
Getting personalized service such as asking questions to a live assistant and getting guidance about a particular product can increase the chance of making a sale and statistics have actually proven this.
Live chat support for online businesses especially e-commerce websites can be therefore seen as a potentially viable feature that is worth trying.

 

[lynxus]

Yeah wonderful. While I'm clearly interested in this subject.. What is the point of this thread?

 

[Ashnit]

This thread is to give a small reminder probably about the simple things many webmasters/ online store owners actually overlook.. While most of the people are worried about online promotion, traffic etc., I feel analysing a visitor behaviour is very important and can lead to great conversions. And live chat support is one of the ways to give good welcome service to a online visitor.

 

[Bill1954]

Wouldn't have anything to do with getting a backlink then ???

 

[Ashnit]

Yeah, it is nothing to do with backlink. It is at a different level, I am talking about visitor interaction with the site. A happy visitor will be a returning visitor and finally a customer who would end up buying your product or referring it to someone. Google Analytics statistics have actually shown this. Hope this answers your question, if not please let me know.

 

[lynxus]

This thread is to give a small reminder probably about the simple things many webmasters/ online store owners actually overlook.. While most of the people are worried about online promotion, traffic etc., I feel analysing a visitor behaviour is very important and can lead to great conversions. And live chat support is one of the ways to give good welcome service to a online visitor.

Hmm. Ok,
While I agree. Everyone should use live chat. Thats what I do.. I do agree with Bill, This seems a bit of a strange subject to just blurt out for your 1st / 2nd post?

Yay backlinks,
However, This is mah hoose!

 

[Bill1954]

OK just seems strange that an ad has appeared in Marketplace for live chat software and the poster is viewing this thread as we speak.

 

[lynxus]

OK just seems strange that an ad has appeared in Marketplace for live chat software and the poster is viewing this thread as we speak.

U talking about My ad?
http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/t...at-software-for-your-business-website.319461/

?

I post in there regularly.
Just trying to find out who's encroaching lol

 

[Ashnit]

I want to know if live chat support is really helping websites. I mean, there are many live chat softwares in market, installing them on the website is all fine. Have there been any change in the way the website is performing.

Hmm. Ok,
While I agree. Everyone should use live chat. Thats what I do.. I do agree with Bill, This seems a bit of a strange subject to just blurt out for your 1st / 2nd post?

Yay backlinks,
However, This is mah hoose!

 

[fisicx]

I want to know if live chat support is really helping websites.

A good ecommerce website doesn't need live chat. It will have the right content and navigation, customer information, calls to action and other necessary details to enable the potential custiomer to select and buy the products.

If you ecommerce site ends up with a whole bunch of chat messages then that should indicate there is something wrong with the site. Even worse is a chat service operated by staff who cannot answer the technical questions a customer may pose.

 

[Ashnit]

A good ecommerce website doesn't need live chat. It will have the right content and navigation, customer information, calls to action and other necessary details to enable the potential custiomer to select and buy the products.

If you ecommerce site ends up with a whole bunch of chat messages then that should indicate there is something wrong with the site. Even worse is a chat service operated by staff who cannot answer the technical questions a customer may pose.

Yes, I do agree with your point. However, at some point of browsing you might need some help to move forward. There are e-commerce sites selling multiple products, which are huge and complex.
A quick answer to your question helps. Also, I agree that it is very important that the staff should be highly trained to answer questions otherwise it can be a disaster.

 

[japancool]

Phonenumber > Live chat

 

[fisicx]

However, at some point of browsing you might need some help to move forward. There are e-commerce sites selling multiple products, which are huge and complex.

Can you point to an example of a store like this?

99% of all ecommerce stores do not need live chat. What they do need is to be built properly (which most aren't).

 

[deniser]

The trouble with live chat is that you click on it and then it usually says there is no-one available to deal with your request. If it's only going to be manned during the same hours that the phone is then it's totally pointless as people do like to pick up the phone and have their query dealt with quickly.

 

[japancool]

Invariably, if there IS someone available, the fact that they're trying to provide customer service via live chat seems to drop their IQ down to the level of a badly shaved monkey.

 

[lynxus]

Invariably, if there IS someone available, the fact that they're trying to provide customer service via live chat seems to drop their IQ down to the level of a badly shaved monkey.

How does the shaven-ness of said monkey relate to its IQ?

 

[japancool]

Well, if it can't even shave itself properly...

 

[lynxus]

Well, if it can't even shave itself properly...

Hmm..
Id question:
1) Why is the monkey shaving itself
2) If its even managed to shave itself to a "poor" level, This is one clever monkey.

 

[Alex - A2 Hosting]

The trouble with live chat is that you click on it and then it usually says there is no-one available to deal with your request. If it's only going to be manned during the same hours that the phone is then it's totally pointless as people do like to pick up the phone and have their query dealt with quickly.

There should be a few options in all modern live chat software for just that, I know at Baseactive.com we have these: Hiding the chat widget when offline and enabling "Leave an offline message" if the chat widget is enabled, when offline.

It is also a good idea to compliment phone support by offering chat, it enables operators to chat to multiple visitors at once whereas on the phone you're limited to one person plus is a great addition for those who are not comfortable with phoning in or just prefer not to. Not to mention the price benefits.

 

[FrontierMan]

If a live chat pop-up appears within a few seconds of landing on a page, then I leave the site
I find it very irritating, much better if you have a question, click a "Need Help" button to activate live chat

 

[Excel Expert]

Live Chat actually slows down and bogs down customer service, making it slower and more expensive.

I worked for a large insurance company any we experimented with live chat and we simply discovered live chat conversations took 3 times as long as telephone conversations. That means 3 times the staff is needed. People simply dont type as quick as they talk.

In the situation I was in this was compounded because it was a fairly technical product (car insurance) when compared to other online stores. However anything that ties up your staff for three times longer than it should, is something that needs careful consideration.

Efforts should be made to minimise the amount of contact the customer needs to make. Better designed sites leads to less contact from the customers and increased sales. Relying on live chat means more staff, price increases and less sales.

 

[beasty]

Use live chat sometimes on golf driver website.

Very handy as when logged in I can see people on multiple websites from a single screen

I do know though like above, you say anything to the person early and they leave.. I leave too.

But i do get varied questions as the golf clubs are not one of the big brands but have massive success in a specialised area of golf.

As it is me that answers when it is on (Which to be honest is not often), I know more than the visitors often a lot more and and it works.

I always aim to get a phone number from and call them straight away as I can then see what they are looking at as we discuss options..

I think if you are making 5 quid on a product its obviously not worth it, but if you make a couple of hundred and you use it correctly it is useful....

 

[Excel Expert]

I think it also depends on the type of product you are selling. It certainly didnt work with car insurance because it is a complex product with lots of information being exchanged. Especially when you are talking about extremely high numbers of policy holders.

For a local shop it is of course a lot more viable, especially if you have people sat at keyboards anyway.

 

[Alex - A2 Hosting]

Live Chat actually slows down and bogs down customer service, making it slower and more expensive.

I worked for a large insurance company any we experimented with live chat and we simply discovered live chat conversations took 3 times as long as telephone conversations. That means 3 times the staff is needed. People simply dont type as quick as they talk.

But then you have to take into account that staff can take 1 phone call at a time per staff member or average at 4 - 6 live chats at any given time, per staff member.

 

[Excel Expert]

Tried and tested that idea Alex and it was a complete disaster.

People end up reading the wrong file notes or adding notes to the wrong file. Accuracy ratings went from the 95% area to around 30-40%. Not a good thing when dealing with financial products.

It would be like bank staff trying to serve 4 or 5 people at a time. It is not a case of will a mistake be made, it is a question of how many mistakes will be made in a day/hour.

When selling golf clubs as mentioned above mistakes are easy to correct, when dealing with insurance there are huge DPA issues, policies and claims being made void etc.

 

[cjd]

We introduced it 3 years ago despite my reservations - I thought it would be a waste of effort as customers wouldn't use it. I was wrong, it now accounts for about a third of customer contacts.

Quite a number of customers seem to like the real time, but distanced contact - a cross between email and a phonecall.

We find it very useful as most first contact customers are asking simple questions - "how much does a call cost?" etc. These sort of things can be quickly answered and the operator can deal with 2 or three at a time if necessary.

It's pretty useless when you need to help a customer set up a phone or a router though, or answer a question like 'what is VoIP?', for that you have to call them.

 

[SuffolkDesigns]

We introduced it 3 years ago despite my reservations - I thought it would be a waste of effort as customers wouldn't use it. I was wrong, it now accounts for about a third of customer contacts.

Quite a number of customers seem to like the real time, but distanced contact - a cross between email and a phonecall.

We find it very useful as most first contact customers are asking simple questions - "how much does a call cost?" etc. These sort of things can be quickly answered and the operator can deal with 2 or three at a time if necessary.

It's pretty useless when you need to help a customer set up a phone or a router though, or answer a question like 'what is VoIP?', for that you have to call them.

I have a live chat system that I provide to my clients, and the stats are quite interesting.
Overall about 1.8% of visitors will use live chat as a form of contact, this increases to 3.9% for the sites that are selling a service or product.

If site visitors would rather use live chat than email or phone, and you are in a position to be available for live chat 12 hours/day then why not offer it as a means of contact.
Personally, I would rather use email than chat, but there are plenty that would rather use chat.

In website reviews there are plenty of comments about building sites for your visitors, so if they want live chat then give it to them (after a period of split testing of course )

 

[Alex - A2 Hosting]

..... Accuracy ratings went from the 95% area to around 30-40%. Not a good thing when dealing with financial products.

Which software was you using?

If you are seeing mistakes on an hourly / daily basis then either the software was poorly designed or new staff is needed or you need to look at what back end system your using when inputing the notes etc (Many things can be accomplished automatically through integrations).

 

[GB Showplates]

I think live chat can be a valuable asset in certain verticals, where the products are specialized and customer queries are commonplace. (Eg a shop selling computer components) the problem is that a lot of companies use them as "beg bots" and throw a hard sell at customers as soon as they land.

They are great if they are used to answer customer queries, but should only supplement and never replace other contact methods. I don't think they are needed in the majority of industries.

 

[PalmerCreative]

Some are handy, if they're there just incase you need. But when they pop up and pester you or just say "Offline" it's pretty off putting, when I see Offline I leave the site automatically.

 

[JonClifford]

I'm new here but I thought that I could weigh in on this debate as we do use Live Chat for our business. We offer a support role to e-commerce rather than selling directly and I have found that the Live Chat (Comm 100 in our case) is very useful.

It allows people to ask us any follow up questions that may not be covered on the site and presents a more human side to the business.

It's possible not the most used contact option on the page but I'm glad that we have it.

And we make sure that any call is answered within a couple of 'rings'

 

[Alex - A2 Hosting]

Some are handy, if they're there just incase you need. But when they pop up and pester you or just say "Offline" it's pretty off putting, when I see Offline I leave the site automatically.

The offline form can serve as an offline contact us form making it easy to get in touch or raise a sales / support ticket or in most systems can also be completely hidden.

 

[whoisvisiting.com]

olark.co.uk has our vote for best live chat software

 

[lynxus]

olark.co.uk has our vote for best live chat software

Hi,
Can I ask why?
What does Olark have over other providers?

I'm not trying a flame war here, But trying to understand "why" from a business POV..?

 

[whoisvisiting.com]

Yes not a problem at all. Having used a bunch of these system I instinctively felt that olark.co.uk was most intuitive, convenient across a number of customer service reps and also enabled third party chat integration (I believe using Gtalk, Pidgen and a few others) so the system could run seamlessly in the background with no need for browser open.

In addition the price points and breaks for scaling up fitted well with the way that we scaled. I believe some of the systems operate a c. £40 per agent model and others such as zopim are more cost effective and inline with olark pricing however lacked the intuitive feel (being on a live chat all day really means you need to click with the interface!)

Hope this is of help. Appreciate this is just opinion but important to pick the correct one you feel most comfortable with.