In live chat communication, predefined or canned responses can help speed up the chatting process. However, agents should be careful when using this feature as if wrongly used may make the live chat session sound mechanical, resulting in a bad experience for your website visitor.
While designing your responses, you must ensure that it is unique and complements your business purpose. At this point, you may have a clear vision of the predefined responses you need to implement in your live chat application. However, for convenience, let us consider some scenarios that will prove helpful in creating canned responses.
The greeting message
Live chat apps, like Zifront, will automatically trigger a chat message with a customized response. It will save time and generate accurate answers for your team while delivering the visitor well-directed instructions on how to proceed. You can greet your visitors, thank them for contacting your support desk, and ask them how you could help.
Example:
For new visitors, you may use the following:
Hello! How can we help you today?
For repeat visitors, you may use the following:
Welcome back. What can we do for you today?
Start converting visitors into loyal customers!
Empathize with the visitor in a difficult situation
Empathy is an essential soft skill that every customer support professional should develop. Empathizing with the customer’s situation will increase the odds of having a good outcome. With an empathetic gesture, you can draw the customer’s attention to fixing the problem rather than making the complaint alone.
Example:
We understand how you feel; we are very sorry. We are going to take care of this for you right now.
Setting expressions and standard phrases
Adding some standard phrases or setting expressions to separate a group of canned responses can be helpful in the course of training your new live chat operators. Moreover, it will help them to choose the appropriate expression. Using the same expressions frequently will make the customer feel the conversation mechanical.
It would help if you considered your customer’s personality and set the tone of conversation accordingly. Consider a scenario where you have to say no to the customer if you cannot meet the request. A straight no will sound rude. The refusal has to be empathetic with a positive expression.
Example:
We apologize, but at this time, we are unable to meet that request.
Writing canned responses that work
Having read some of the canned messages for live chat, you must think of the occasions you got it wrong. Probably the response was not up to the mark. The perfect canned reply will not sound canned at all. Write the response to give your customers the best experience possible.
You can design a response to recommend a prompt solution if the customer wants a prompt solution.
Example:
I feel that the best way to solve your issue would be [your solution here]
Live chat agents are recommended to keep every customer session short and brief. Therefore, if you have to request additional information to solve an issue, there are many ways you can ask for clarification politely.
Example:
May I ask for some more information before we continue?
There could be a situation where you need to request the customer to share a screenshot to assist the customer in the best possible manner. It may sound a little awkward to ask for a screenshot.
However, if you have to view the visitor’s screen to solve his problems, you need to have patience with the customer and consider using this response template to get their confidence.
Example:
Based on the provided information, we are having a little trouble getting to the root of this issue. Will you kindly share a screenshot of your browser so we can diagnose further?
Start converting visitors into loyal customers!
Upbeat sales chat by providing value
Unless you select the right words, it will be wasteful to reach out to customers proactively. The bottom line is to hit a subtle balance between being respectful and helpful. Regardless of whether you are pointing customers in sales specific direction or providing general assistance, your supreme objective is bringing the optimum value of your offered service upfront.
Consider the lines in your canned message if you want to convert visitors to loyal customers.
For instance, if you have to review an option:
Excellent choice. We are confident that this option will certainly make you happy.
Ending a conversation
How you end a live chat session with a customer is quite important. Remember that all your good work will not reap the ideal outcome if the customer goes away with a negative impression. The politeness of the agent is an indispensable part of excellent customer service.
Therefore, you can create a canned response to finalize the conversation with this script:
Thank you for using our live chat service; we hope to hear from you again! Goodbye!
Conclusion
Canned responses complement chat engagement by striking a fine blend of efficiency and helpfulness, particularly when attending to plenty of customers in a limited period.
Fortunately, canned messages can be instrumental in improving the chat service. Well-designed canned replies improve your chat service’s bottom line and quality base, making people visit repeatedly.