When customers visit your business website, they are most likely to reach out to you in case of any queries. One way to do so is through email but most of the customers look for the quickest way of interaction. Here comes the role of live chats.
Live chats solution enable businesses to offer quick customer support to visitors and can solve all customer-related issues in a timely manner.
As compared to emails and phone support, live chat options are much more reliable as customers can easily interact with the agents while they are on the website.
Now, the question here is which type of live chat should your business users engage with the customers?
While the type of live chat strategy depends on the needs of your business, let’s start with knowing the basic difference between proactive and reactive live chat.
Here we go,
What is Proactive Live Chat Support?
You must have noticed a chat box that automatically pops up every time you visit a business website. The message in the chatbox usually begins with, “ Hi, how can I help you today?”. This is an example of proactive chat support.
Proactive live chat is initiated by the chat operators who ask the visitors if they need any assistance before the visitors ask for help.
Pros and Cons of proactive live chat support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Operators gain control | Customers might not be interested in interacting with the operators |
| High conversion rate | Operators can appear annoying to most of the visitors |
| Better customer understanding | – |
What is Reactive Live Chat Support?
Reactive live chat involves customer service agents reacting to a customer’s inquiry. Unlike proactive chat, reactive live chat requires customers to ask for help.
Now that you’ve learned the difference between proactive and reactive live chat, how would you decide the suitable option for your business?
Let’s start by stating facts,
If we talk about speed, reactive chat is faster and comes with a high engagement rate. On the other hand, despite having a low engagement rate, proactive chat works in filling the gap between the customers and the brand which totally works in favour of your business.
As stats reveal that customers who get involved in proactive chats are 6 times more likely to make a purchase.
But in some cases, proactive live chats may appear to be disturbing to most of the customers.
Pros and Cons of reactive live chat support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Customers ask for help only when they need it | Less customer interactions |
| Requires less planning than proactive support | Low conversion rate |
Which option should be considered then?
Also Read:- Combine Texting With Call Center Campaigns
Summing up
As you can see that proactive and reactive chat both have their own set of advantages and disadvantages, using both of them together can result in more satisfied customers which in turn will increase the purchase volume of your products.
If you need more advice on the matter, get in touch with us today!
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