Why small businesses need a website with live chat

Customer support is the backbone of any business. Live chat is an essential part of the customer support journey. It proactively works to make the customer experience better. This builds a better relationship with the customer and increases the rate of return customers.

Live chat lets the business directly connect with the customers in real-time, giving them a more personalized experience. This improves customer satisfaction and increases the chances of customers vouching for the company to bring in new customers.

As a small business, customer satisfaction is of utmost importance in gaining more traction in the community. In this blog, we’ll delve into the benefits of live chat, how we can get most out of live chat, and a few options to consider.

Benefits of Live Chat for SMBs

Live chat has numerous benefits for a business. Here are a few of them:

Provides 24x7 Support

Using live chat instead of emails or texts can help the business respond to queries or requests quickly. The live chat opens up a medium of communication that is direct with the customer. It helps in dealing with issues at that moment, making the customer experience better.

In case the request cannot be processed, live chat is a great way to collect all the information required to take it to the concerned authority. It gives the customer a sense of value that they’re being tended to. 

Alternatively, if the issue is small, the customer doesn’t need to wait for a more considerable authority to resolve it. Small issues can be fixed at that moment with the live chat.

With live chat agents deployed 24x7 or people from the business having access to the live chat 24x7, service can be provided at any time and any day. 

Increased Conversions and Sales  

A customer can come across an issue at any stage during their journey with the business. When they do come across an issue, they expect to be heard as soon as possible. Live chat is a great way to be there for the customer in their time of need. 

Live chat can be a medium through which customers can get the immediate attention they want. This improves their customer experience and increases the chances of conversion. 

This increased conversion rate, with the help of live chat, helps drive sales for the business. Thus, live chat can have a significant impact on the customer journey.

Eliminate Wait Times

Long queues and long wait times for a response from the business can be a huge deal breaker for customers. Small and medium businesses may sometimes not be able to afford the manpower to deal with the numerous requests or service emails.

This is where live chat comes in. Live chat provides the medium for the business to immediately respond to the customer. They provide an option for automated replies to first respond, and only if needed will a person get involved.

This reduces the wait time drastically and incentivizes customers to proceed with their journey. 

Connect from Anywhere

Live chat creates the opportunity for the business to connect with a customer from anywhere in the world. Of course, you will require an internet connection, but connecting with customers has no geographical boundaries.

All the live chat requires is a system with an internet connection, and the business can communicate with the customer. This allows your business to be geographically dynamic and can allow collaboration across various countries.

Live chat can make the business global and help it grow from anywhere.

Have Conversations

Live chat gives the business the opportunity to have conversations with their customers. As soon as the customer opens the webpage, a live chat can be triggered to initiate a conversation. This allows the business to engage with its customers at various stages in their journey.

The live chat can be used to give suggestions, understand more about their preference, and take feedback. Additionally, live chat can also be a problem-solving tool with the power of live conversations.

Save Time and Reduce Cost

Customer service executives or live chat agents can do a lot more in a lot less time using live chat. They can answer queries of multiple people at once, collaborate and coordinate service requests, and reduce the customer queue. Live chat allows business employees to respond to customers efficiently and in a time-sensitive manner.

A happy customer is going to need less effort to convert. Live chat reduces the effort. It performs the functions of a help desk and thus saves time and reduces costs.

Improve Customer Experience

All the points discussed above aid in improving the experience of the customer throughout their journey. The live chat increases engagement with the customer and reduces bounce rates.

How to get the most out of Live Chat

The right product can help a business. But there are things that the business can do to get the most out of it. We can draw a parallel to live chat as well. Here are a few things businesses can do to get the most out of live chat:

Reduce Back-and-forth

Implement the live chat software to work with the business’ online store and payment processor. This will provide the customer service executive or live chat agent with relevant information while tending to a customer. 

This relevant information about the customer can help reduce the time that might be spent on the customer's background information.

First Response Time

Be proactive while using the live chat. Engage with the customers, collect feedback and be quick to respond to customer or service requests.

Keep customers updated about common questions or widespread issues that have already been answered by automating responses to those questions.

Reduce response time by planning automation and collaborating with other live chat agents for efficient distribution of work.

Sync Team and Customer Conversations

Include shared inboxes and sync team conversations. This will help the team keep track of the customer's history and give them a quicker understanding of the issue they are tackling.

This also decreases the response time and gives the customer a personalized experience. It helps improve communication between a business and a customer, leading to higher levels of customer satisfaction.

Average Handle Time

Customers expect to receive service as soon as possible. Providing a personalized experience and solving an issue quickly can be completely different at times. Customer service executives or live chat agents must find a mix of providing a personalized experience and resolving the issue as soon as possible.

This will reduce the average handling time of a customer whilst keeping their experience pleasant. 

Choose a Live Chat Solution that works for your Business

There are many live chat solutions that the business can choose from. For the business to get the most out of the investment in the live chat, it must choose the one that caters to its needs. Choose a solution that streamlines the workflow, helps live chat agents provide more holistic and personalized responses, and helps reduce the response time.

Best Live Chat Software for Small Businesses

There is a plethora of options to choose from. Here are a few live chat solutions you should consider:

Falkon Chat

Falkon Chat caters to small and medium businesses along with enterprises. They have a competitive pricing structure and do not have any restrictions on the number of users for the live chats. The software is easy to set up and use and has great features.

Pricing: Starts at $9/month for a user

Live Chat

LiveChat has good overall functionality. The software is easy to set up and has a boatload of features and integrations.

Pricing: Starts at $24/month for a user

Tawk.to

Tawk.to has an innovative pricing structure. The software is free with basic functionality. Features are taken on a subscription basis.

Pricing: Free for unlimited users; paid add-ons available

Tidio

Tidio offers similar features to Falkon Chat. They have a plethora of packages to choose from with its own AI chatbot called Lyro. They offer a free 7-day trial to test all Tidio features.

Pricing: starts at $24.17/month for a user

LiveAgent

LiveAgent introduces agent gamification in the software. They have an affordable, full-service customer support suite. However, this software does have a lot of unlabelled icons, which could take a while to get used to.

Pricing: $9/user for a month

Conclusion

We see that there are numerous benefits to using a live chat software for your small or medium business. They help in decreasing response time of the business, improve collaboration on the team, provide accurate replies in a timely manner. In addition to this, they make customers feel valued. This improves customer satisfaction. 

However, choosing a live chat software is not the only thing a small or medium business must do. You should remember to understand your requirements and accordingly choose a software that will complement your needs. 

Once a software is chosen, get the most out of the software by making it work for you. It may take some time to get everything right, but there is a learning curve to this.

Grow your business with the right live chat software. Get chatting with your customers!

Don’t Miss Another Customer

Be there when your customers need you with instant, real-time support.

Start free trial