“Someone was visiting our site and asked me what we did better than our competitors.”
I asked in return “Were you able to chat with any of them online today?”
He said “No :)”, signed up, and paid that day.”
– Josh Ledgard, Founder of KickoffLabs
As a leader, you’re responsible for increasing revenue and achieving financial targets.
Live sales chat can significantly impact your ability to reach those goals. From increased customer satisfaction to more leads and faster sales cycles, it can become the most powerful tool in your sales and marketing arsenal.
But how? Here are 4 ways:
#1 – Delight Your Customers and Prospects
Steve Olenski, Forbes
Live chat has become both your prospect and your customers’ preferred way to communicate, finishing ahead of email, phone, and social messaging. Here are just a few reasons why live chat has become people’s favorite way to interact with businesses:
- Speed: Live chat eliminates lengthy telephone hold times that frustrate customers.
- Convenience: Chat sessions can take place at any time or place that offers internet access.
- Ease of Use: Live chat is easy to use and customers can engage from any device or location without complication.
- Flexibility: Customers can complete other tasks while communicating via live chat.
And when you’re giving your customers and prospects what they want, in the easiest possible way, instantly – you’re guaranteed to generate new leads, increase revenue and retain a higher percentage of existing clients.
It’s a win-win for everyone!
#2 – Shorten Your Sales Cycle Whilst Generating More Leads
– Jonathan Roomer, Co-Founder and CFO at yulife
Difficulty generating leads and long sales cycles are two of the most frustrating aspects of life as a sales person, yet the average representative will only follow up with a prospect for 9 days before throwing in the towel and completely giving up on the opportunity.
In many cases, online request forms are partially to blame. They are often the only way someone can communicate with you – especially if the customer’s need arises outside of regular business hours. Sales representatives are then often left to play detective in an effort to decipher incomplete phone numbers, missing contact information, and poor request summaries. Even if the details are correct, you could have just missed the opportunity to connect with the prospect in the now.
Live chat puts an end to these pain points, by enabling sales teams to capture leads accurately, in the moment. Additionally, sales representatives can easily qualify the chat leads they receive. Even if you’re offline, effective bot messaging and AI can be used to engage prospects before capturing the info you need.
It’s instant, it’s now, it’s another arrow to add to your lead generation bow and it enables prioritization of the most important opportunities.
#3 – Get an Edge On Your Competitors
Consumer demand for live chat increased 8.3% in 2017. However, there are still many companies that don’t offer it on their websites. Out of the 433 companies tested in this study by Drift, only 14% had live chat.
By offering this channel, you’ll immediately gain an edge over your competitors who have yet to discover it’s benefits. Here are some further ways live chat plugins will enable you to forge ahead of the competition:
- Helps customers stay on your website longer than the average 10 to 20 seconds, increasing the possibility for conversions
- Provides a means for customers to engage with you 24/7
- Humanizes the sales process through sustained interaction
- Encourages multi-lingual interactions with visitors from across the globe
- Enables international growth and the flexibility to respond to prospects in different time zones
Responding in real time to the needs of your customers and prospects, no matter the time zone or language, is enough to give you the edge over your competitors and ensure long-lasting customer relationships can be built and maintained.
#4 – Increase Your Revenue at a Lower Cost
Live chat is a cost-effective way to enjoy a healthier bottom line and grow your revenue.
For starters, it’s more cost-effective than other modes of communication such as outbound calling, email and social selling. In some cases by as much as 50%.
Then, when set up right, optimized and managed effectively, it can even generate $4.5 million in new opportunities leading to $1 million in closed deals at a 5.2X ROI.
How could this be achieved:
- Utilize a team of dedicated and highly trained sales chat reps.
- Optimize chat messaging to the exact page it’s deployed on. Ensure it’s benefit led or pain point driven.
- Make sure you’re quick to respond to all chats.
- Be friendly, personable and add value to every conversation.
- Listen to your visitors and demonstrate support before making any attempts to sell or capture their contact details.
- Reach your global market with 24 hour, multilingual coverage.
- If you’re offline, set clear, captivating bot messaging to fuel engagement, then capture contact details and leads
The Bottom Line
Live chat offers a host of benefits to businesses in virtually every industry. It’s no longer just a support channel and it’s certainly no longer just for B2C.
By enhancing customer satisfaction, growing your leads and shortening the sales cycle, all at a lower cost, live chat has the power to dramatically increase conversions, revenue and profits for your business.
If you’re not already using it, it’s time to take it on, and if you are, it’s time to ask: are you optimizing it to its full potential?
Head of Sales Chat at CloudTask
