Nowadays, companies interested in selling any thing or service are more open to communicating with people by effectively using every channel where the people who make up their target audience are, and to try every way to remove the natural communication boundaries with the customer and turn their products into turnover.
Providing live support on online channels is a communication method that most companies are currently lagging behind. Building brand trust, improving and strengthening concepts such as brand loyalty and brand experience, which are among the things I constantly talk about in this blog, live support is no longer an activity for brands, it is not a convenience granted to customers, it is not an option at all.
Providing live support is a necessity that you must include in your brand's customer relations operations and budget for, and a priority that must be included in your marketing plans.
Almost every form of commerce has started to revolve around the internet, especially after the global pandemic we experienced in 2019. Most people no longer travel long distances to buy a product. You order it, it is shipped, if you like it, you continue on your way, if you don't like it or it doesn't turn out the way you want, you either send it back to the cargo and exchange it or return it completely.
You even do your home grocery shopping online, and when you go to the door, you find the bags hanging on the door. Therefore, people expect practicality in communication, real action and clarity about products, and they get their work done where they can find it. This is the definition of the mechanism in short.
So no matter what you offer people, if you're an online business - and there's no alternative to that these days - I think we can all agree that you need to be where your customers are.
From a consumer's perspective, what consumers expect from the brand
Just like you, I read books and articles, watch videos and movies, so I am a consumer no different than you. But I am aware of something that you may not have seen yet; I see that brands are struggling to go beyond their traditional channels in their marketing communication and customer relationship experiences.
Whether it is an online store or a mobile application, the ability of a customer browsing a platform to communicate and interact with the brand as quickly and rapidly as possible is as much about customer satisfaction as it is about the brand's perception of reliability.
I am a consumer just like you and spend most of my day searching for information that is publicly available on the internet, sorting it and making it meaningful for reuse. When I need a product, service or support, I go to the internet and a simple query brings up hundreds, even thousands of results on the relevant topic.
My time is just as valuable as yours and the first thing that comes to my mind about what I am looking for is to contact the brand directly, start solving the problem at hand as soon as possible and do this by reaching out to a real person instead of bots that waste my time and robotically give the same useless answers to everything I write in an endless loop.
As a method that is becoming more widespread for websites and shopping, live support channels which have expanded to mobile applications and even platforms other than these, are the most effective, easy and simple way to provide the support that customers need during the purchase process compared to other methods.
Live communication and support mechanisms carried out in the field of marketing communication are increasingly entrusted to artificial intelligence, which is currently trained with automated messages in the kitchen of this business. However, it is very important to include equipped and competent individuals in the team to provide this service, especially in countries where e-commerce operations are still largely carried out with manual processes.
It is true that artificial intelligence will be in a much different place in the near future than it is today. In these days, no matter where they are in the world, people want to deal with “real” people who can offer a real solution, not distract them when solving a problem they encounter while buying something. This can be a section integrated directly into the website or application, it can work with a Whatsapp, Telegram or Signal application, or it can be done by simply calling on the phone.
The right question to ask yourself is "what platforms are your customers on?"
When you spend time on your most frequently used shopping applications, you will see a link somewhere in the menus or interface such as “support”, “contact”, “contact us” and when you click / tap there, you will see a list of the possibilities provided by the store for you to contact the store. This can be a simple or comprehensive form, or it can only include a phone number and an email address. But today, even the most remote stores now have at least a Whatsapp connection button.
The first step you should take regarding integrating live support into your own platform should be to know which platform your target audience is on.
The most important reason why users are on more than one platform is related to the security, privacy, localization and even data transfer offered by the applications. For example, contrary to popular belief, the applications widely used in Far Eastern countries such as China and Korea are KakaoTalk and WeChat.
Once you have decided which applications you will use, you can establish the necessary collaborations with the application developer and start building the necessary infrastructure.
The most practical reason for including these methods, which are defined as “third parties” since they are not a party to the consumer relationship established between the customer and the store, is that although the applications appear to be simply programs that can be installed on mobile phones and tablets, they offer more than this basic function.
Live support and its effect on brand perception
Listening to what your customers say about your brand is one of the most valuable investments a brand can make in itself. Providing live support can be as effective as constantly monitoring social media, and can be considered a more controlled method of reputation management in the face of a negative situation.
Within the scope of customer relationship management, having a live support operation that is instant, personalized, solution-oriented, offers real solutions to customers with real people and is equipped with authority is a timely step to ensure that the customer perceives your brand better and thus strengthens your relationship with your customer. Keeping the customer satisfied will increase their loyalty to your brand.
Your main goal is to understand, know, have a vision, invest and make money in return. It is in your interest to make people choose you for a product or service they want to buy. Guiding your customers by providing live support and ensuring that they shop using your platform is a very small but important part of this business.
The decision is yours, you decide where to stop.
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For some further reading you can visit the links below.
- Ecommerce live chat: Why you need it + 12 top tools
- 25 reasons live chat can help you grow your business
