How Does Live Web Chat Work? 4 Small Business Use Cases

Customer engagement is king when it comes to business success. Introduction of digital engagement channels such as live web chat makes it possible for small businesses to compete on a level playing field with much larger counterparts when it comes to delivering delightful experiences to customers. The amount of time customers is willing to wait for a response from businesses is often measured in seconds. 

Customers Want Engagement Responses in Seconds 

Response cycles for traditional engagement channels such as email are measured in terms of hours—upwards of 12 hours! The same is true for social media—an average of 10 hours. Wait cycles for phone engagement typically take minutes. And even once a customer gets a live sales or support agent on the phone after passing through numerous robotic, automated response gates, it may take one or two transfers between agents before a correct one is reached, an agent who can answer their question or help solve their problem. 

Live web chat is now recognized—both human agents and artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled chatbots—as one of the most effective ways to deliver sales and customer support to customers. Customers can get answers to their questions and help in solving their problems in minutes or even seconds. And small businesses do not need to build a sales and customer support center and hire a team of agents. Rather, in some cases small businesses can manage live chat themselves. In other cases, they can outsource live chat—and other customer engagement channels such as phone and text—to external providers like Davinci Virtual.

Four Live Web Chat Uses Cases for Small Businesses

Before selecting and deploying a live web chat solution, small businesses need to understand their use cases. Following are some of the more prevalent ones to consider:

1. Optimizing Support Operations.

Small businesses have limited staff—and time—for handling customer support issues. Support agents can handle only one call at a time. But with live web chat, they can engage with up to six customers at the same time.

2. Enhancing Customer Experience.

Customers expect businesses to provide them with multiple engagement channels. Over 30% expect to find live chat on a business’ website. Plus, more than half of customers prefer to engage with a business for sales and support inquiries over live web chat instead of talking to someone via phone.  

3. Building Customer Loyalty/Advocacy.

Customers are happier with live web chat experiences over other engagement channels. For example, 73% of customers say they are satisfied with live web chat, compared to 61% for email, 48% for social media, and 44% for phone. 

4. Increasing Digital Conversion Rates.

Online purchases are often tied at the hip with live web chat. For example, one study found that 77% of website visitors indicate they will not make a purchase if live web chat isn’t available. Another study revealed that 63% of customers are more likely to return to a website if live web chat was available. But corroboration of the benefits does not end there. For customers who engage via live web chat, their average order value is 10% higher than customers who purchased but did not engage through live web chat. The same study also discovered that live web chat increases revenue per chat hour by 48% and a 40% increase in conversion rates. 

Getting Started with Live Web Chat

Live web chat can be quickly installed and launched on a website; it is simply a matter of copying a line of code onto your website, and you’re off and running. In addition, most live web chat solutions are extremely easy to manage—from the standpoint of both chatting with customers and administration—generating reports, measuring results, and other activities. 

In instances where a small business simply doesn’t have enough staff to manage live web chat in-house, extremely affordable outsource options such as Davinci Live Web Chat Services are available—where third-party agents serve as on-demand, virtual representatives of the company’s brand and sales and support operations. 

About Patrick Spencer

Patrick Spencer (Ph.D.) is the President and Founder of TIRO Communications that helps companies develop, build, and manage content, customer, advocacy, and demand-gen programs. Included in its offerings is TIRO Cognition Insights, a data analytics tool that enables B2C and B2B businesses to pinpoint what their customers and competitors’ customers are saying and to identify corresponding actionable product, services, competitive, sales, and marketing intelligence.

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Website: www.tirocommunications.com