Best PracticesHere are some best practices to help you incorporate live chat into your existing online customer service strategy.
1. Implement live chat as a complement to existing self-serve tools
Many companies have already implemented many of the following self-serve channels: FAQs, order tracking, product and service pages on websites, easy website navigation, email support, and 1-800 number phone support. These are all valuable self-serve tools companies should still leverage to provide good online customer service. Live chat should be used as a complementary tool, to nudge the online customer service from “good” over to “excellent”. 2. Integrate live chat with your company's centralized database, to leverage data collected on the customer from multiple channels You have collected large amounts of data on your customers using multiple channels. You should know a lot about your customers already, based on those data. Integrate live chat with your company’s centralized database, so that you can allow the live chat agents to leverage the customer insights already gained, personalize the interaction with the customers, and dramatically improve the customer experience. As Disney’s execs put it, you should “know the guest well enough to always know the next step, which sometimes might even be to do nothing at all.” 3. Test to determine the best strategic places to offer live chat on your website Live chat offering does not need to be on all pages of the website. Strategic placement ensures that live chat is offered only where it makes sense, to manage costs wisely. Tod Famous, product manager of the Applications Technology Group at Cisco Systems, points out, “some clients only offer live help at a certain point in the process, say, when you have an item in the shopping basket or when you have tried self-help. Fidelity, for instance, offers a call-back button only to higher-value clients,” he notes. 4. Customize the chat window with your company logo The chat window should have your company’s logo. The consistency would make customers feel more comfortable interacting with you using live chat. Backcountry.com initially made its live chat request boxes look like fancy marketing messages. Not happy with the results they received, Backcountry.com changed the request box to look like a standard chat invitation with Backcountry’s logo. “The change instantly doubled our acceptance rates,” noted Sam Bruni, Director of Customer Experience at Backcountry.com. 5. Provide ability for live chat agents to select canned responses for message consistency When live chat agents are able to pick from a list of canned response templates, it increases the response efficiency, keeps the messaging consistent, and retains the quality of the responses being replied back to the customers. 6. Write templates in a tone that is consistent with the style of your company If you use a serious tone for the template wording, while your website uses a fun and relaxed voice to promote your outdoor adventure company, there will be a disconnect between the experience the shopper receives using live chat versus navigating through the website. The template wording should be consistent with the style of your company. 7. Anticipate as many scenarios as possible when creating the templates, and create a comprehensive template library Start with the internal knowledge base, anticipate as many scenarios as possible, and craft a response for each of the scenarios. The more thorough effort spent at the start of the implementation means live chat agents won’t have to come up with custom response themselves if they cannot find a suitable answer. 8. Refine canned responses to ensure message is short, to the point, and factually correct At this day and age, where time is luxury, shoppers are less inclined to read long responses and decipher complex information. When crafting canned responses for live chat agents, ensure you continuously refine the wording so that the message is short, to the point, and factually correct. Nothing irritates the customer more if he receives erroneous information. 9. Allow chat agents to provide custom responses if he cannot find suitable answers from the template library Invariably, there will be scenarios that were not covered during the initial template library creation. Live chat agents should have the ability to venture outside of the template library, and provide a custom response based on the shopper’s question. 10. Review chat logs to help craft additional live chat templates Any custom responses crafted by live chat agents should be reviewed. Changes can be made to any that require revisions, and the answer can be added to the library to continuously expand the content. 11. Train the agents well before he starts the job The live chat agents should be well trained, have knowledge of the possible answers in the library, know where to look for additional answers, and well versed in the company tone in case he needs to craft his own answers. 12. Ensure agents always review the session log, or prior conversation if session was passed from another agent, before responding If a chat session is passed from one agent to another, the receiving agent should always review the session log before responding. There maybe information already presented or questions already asked by the previous agents. Using the information already gathered can ensure the shopper receives the best customer experience possible. 13. Establish firm guidelines on customer response time, reporting and trend analysis, and monitor the agents to ensure operating within the guidelines Establishing a firm guideline ensures all live chat agents operate on the same page, and provide consistent service no matter which agent the customer is connected with. Monitoring the agents ensures that data are collected for trend analysis and used for possible future process improvements. 14. Ensure agents do not make customers repeat themselves Customers can get irritated when asked to repeat themselves multiple times. If an agent receives a session transfer from another agent, the standard procedure should be to read through prior conversation before responding. This way, if a piece of information has already been provided by the customer, the agent can avoid asking for that same information again. 15. Anoint the agents as "loyalty warriors". They should always serve first, sell second Live chat agents are your front line loyalty warriors. They go into battle everyday to ensure they help you win your customers’ loyalty. The idea of “serve first, sell second” should be indoctrinated within your agents so that they provide the best service possible first and gain the customers’ trust. Trust is then followed by loyalty. 16. Collect metrics to gauge effectiveness and customer satisfaction Collecting metrics is the best way to find out the current state of affairs. Knowing the type of requests requiring live chat agents’ attention, amount of time for the agent to answer the questions or resolve the issues, number of concurrent sessions agents are able to handle on average, and customer satisfaction levels can all enlighten the company executives on what further improvements can be achieved. 17. Develop trust by getting back to customer if there are any follow-ups If there are any follow-ups to be carried out after the live chat session ends, agents should follow through with the follow-ups to further develop trust. People buy from people they trust. 18. Use feedback from live chat sessions to continuously improve other online channels - revise website navigation, add missing information, etc. When Houston Zoo came out from under the city’s budgetary control and became its own non-profit entity in July 2002, zoo officials completely revamped the website and also added a live chat feature on the site. “This was an immediate way to show the public that we’re here,” said Meg Alexander, Director of Interactive Marketing. Lots of people used the live chat to ask about zoo hours, prompting the team to realize the hours of operation was not prominent enough. Meg’s team immediately made a slight change to the website, so that the hours information is easy to find. 19. Use real-time information carefully, without appearing to be intrusive Approaching web shoppers, according to Martha Rogers, founding partner of Peppers and Rogers, is a dangerous game. Companies should be sensitive to online shoppers’ freedom to browse, same as browsing in a brick and mortar retail store, and provide assistance only where needed. Using real-time information to offer assistance is a reasonable support method. However, if a customer shows resistance in communicating with an agent as a result of a proactive live chat request, the agent should back off immediately. |  CONNECT WITH YOUR CUSTOMERS!
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