Today, companies all around the world are looking for ways to deliver the best customer service experience possible. Many organizations have ultimately failed due to the fact that they didn’t truly understand customer expectations. Other businesses have missed out on a tremendous amount of revenue because they didn’t understand the importance of providing convenience to enhance the customer experience.
It’s no secret that customer service can be extremely frustrating at times. With more and more companies fighting to gain the attention of a fickle, volatile target, it comes as no surprise that businesses are all trying to find new ways to improve their customer experiences. If you consider that 90 percent of Americans will use customer service as a factor in deciding whether to do business with a company, you begin to realize that customer convenience should be much more than just an afterthought.
When it comes to providing convenience, there’s no better way than through text messaging. For customers, text messaging requires minimal effort to communicate and can be exchanged regardless of phone type or service carrier. Texting also enables customer support agents to be more efficient and resolve issues faster by serving multiple customers simultaneously instead of one at a time with phone calls and emails.
TrueDialog is a unique business SMS text messaging solution that allows customer service teams to remain personalized, even on a mass scale. The tool offers advantages such as CRM integrations to automated messages, mass text notifications/reminders as well as two-way team-based texting capabilities that allow multiple agents to chime into the same conversation thread to help answer questions quicker.
Why Text Messaging Works
Although text messaging has been around for almost two decades, the demand from consumers might surprise you. A study from Pew Research Center showed that 78% of consumers wished they could text a business, but most businesses don’t have this option available. According to Twilio, only 48% of business are equipped to handle messaging.
Additionally, text messages have a 98 percent open rate and cell phone users open 90 percent of their messages within three seconds. These statistics prove that the framework is already in place for a text messaging communication strategy to thrive. Therefore, your business can use text messaging to connect with customers by applying minimal effort and with very little barrier to entry.
The increasing need to remain connected with customers has led text messaging to occupy a central place as a means of customer communication. As businesses understand the need to engage their customers through multiple channels (a concept known as the “omnichannel experience”), text messaging has become an effective way to keep customers updated on promotions, engaged with customer service, or made aware of appointment times. We all know that customer service is crucial to long-term success, so why not utilize every tool at your disposal?
How Texting Changes the Customer Convenience Norm
Most businesses simply don’t understand how to engage meaningfully with consumers. It might be that they haven’t updated their website to make the mobile experience more seamless, or perhaps their design might be confusing to anyone who is genuinely interested in purchasing their products or services. Also, when they have to wait days to get a response back on a question about a recently purchased product, it’s easy to see how a consumer can get extremely frustrated.
Even if they do receive a response, your company might have had an issue regarding the training process. If your customer service representative isn’t friendly or knowledgeable, it doesn’t really help that they respond quickly. This is why it’s important to not jump into text messaging without a well planned strategy and established processes. By having proper procedures in place, your staff knows exactly what to do and can handle any situation in an efficient and consistent manner.
The existing customer convenience methods leveraged by businesses are not meeting the expectations of today’s consumers. For instance, businesses commonly offer a phone number where customers can call in to express their concerns. Alternatively, they might offer a support email address, but it might take days or weeks for customers to receive a response. In providing these ineffective methods of communication, businesses open up the door for their customers to seek quicker and more efficient alternatives. When customers have an issue, they want it to be resolved quickly and without much effort, and text messaging is the best way to meet those expectations and drive customer loyalty.
It’s easy to see how TrueDialog can provide a whole new level of convenience for the customer. Imagine a frustrated customer trying to get through to a customer service representative, only to stay on the phone for a half hour. Once they finally do reach a customer service representative, that agent might not fully understand the issue or even put them on hold even longer.
TrueDialog enables businesses to provide instant customer service through two-way texting. The ability for customer support agents to see text message conversation history allows any agent to chime in without much delay. The team-based texting feature also ensures a seamless customer experience and leaves no questions unanswered.
Customers today want immediate satisfaction, which is why businesses need to adapt to the preferences of today’s mobile-centric consumers and resolve issues through the fastest and simplest way possible. Texting enables customer service teams to provide a better experience to build trust and lifetime loyalty.
About TrueDialog
TrueDialog serves thousands of customers who send hundreds of millions of text messages each year. TrueDialog’s Five-Star Rated SMS Texting Solution is built for big business, yet made easy for small business. With direct carrier connections, an ISO 9001 cloud-database, and 99.9% uptime, it is the perfect business texting solution for businesses serious about personalized customer engagement at scale.
man standing outside using phone -DepositPhotos
