People buy from your e-commerce website because they like the products, trust the brand, and get great customer service. Live chat options provide an opportunity for consumers to get more information and personalized attention without the need to hire phone representatives or in-office staff to constantly monitor activity. Despite this sounding like an excellent boost toward quality customer care, there are negative aspects of including a chatbot or live chat option on your website.
Why Live Chat on an E-commerce Website?
In the quest to make the online shopping experience mimic real-world shopping in only the best ways, retailers turn to live chat for advanced customer service. Flexible, accessible, and powerful, these site additions have many benefits for both consumer and company.
Live Chat Benefits
The major benefits of live chat on e-commerce websites include:
- Simple yet effective way to give shoppers basic information about shipping, availability, and terms
- Opportunity to upsell and cross-sell related products or introduce new product lines
- Younger demographics find immediate, short-form interactions more comfortable
- Improve conversion rates through training and analysis of customer responses
- Lower the company budget for on-call employees instead of receptionists and on-site workers
Most of the benefits of live chat for e-commerce come down to the immediate accessibility of help when a shopper gets stuck on product selection or the buying and checkout process. More people buy additional products if someone guides them to do so, and fewer shoppers abandon their carts if someone helps them understand how it works. When faced with a problem or confusion, an online shopper will not bother with phone calls or emails. A convenient chat box that opens up with a friendly, "How can I help you?" gives them what they need to continue with the transaction.
Live Chat Disadvantages
The main problem with putting live chat or chatbots on a website is the annoyance factor. Some visitors do not want anything popping up to distract them from the site pages. Forcing a response to make it go away can bring to mind pushy salespeople in brick-and-mortar shops. In some cases, the chat popup may slow load times or not display properly on smaller screen sizes.
Live chat adds a personalized touch to the e-commerce shopping experience that facilitates product understanding, boosts shopper retention in most cases, and improves customer service overall. As long as they can offer real, complete information, live chat programs can boost online retail success.
