There are very few cities in the world that never sleep. New York City and Las Vegas are the two here in the United States that come to mind. And while I’m based out of Las Vegas, I do have a bedtime and don’t operate 24 hours. What about you and your business, do you operate 24 hours a day? Can your customers reach you and your business 24-7?
Trick question, right? Customers of yours always have access to your website, which is a good start. At lease they can see what you’re all about. But can those customers reach your business at all hours? In most cases, I’m going to guess the answer is no.
This is where a lot of businesses can take advantage of the opportunity to communicate with those customers that have questions after hours. With the average business being open only 9a-5p, that leaves 16 hours a day where potential customers could be craving information about your business. Do we just let them visit our website and hope there’s enough information on there to get them to come back during business hours? Or is there another way?
That’s where Live Chat comes into play. I’m not talking about a message option that is run by bots or automated responses. I’m talking about an actual chat option that is managed by LIVE Chat Agents that have information about your business. Real people talking to real people matters.
How does Live Chat work?
Live Chat gives you an opportunity to engage potential customers and get more leads through a chat box and a text-to-chat on your website. No matter what form of advertising you have in your media mix, driving traffic to your site is one of your ultimate goals. Why not have a way to talk to them when they get there?
On a smartphone, the visitor has the option to chat live on the website or chat by texting. If the mobile user selects the TEXT US option, the button will go to a text number provided by our Live Chat team that will match the area code of the business’ phone number. Then once the text conversion is complete the client will receive the transcript and will always receive the visitor’s phone number because that is automatically captured on a text chat.
The Live Chat function gets provided to you inside of a container tag (pixel) that sits on the back end of the website. It generates the live chat box, along with the text to chat for smart phones. As someone visits your site and scrolls, the Live Chat bounces and settles in the bottom right of the website (on a desktop/laptop). The Live Chat box is designed to match the colors of your website as well.
The chat agents that manage your website will have information on your business. This information is gathered prior to launching, and we have specific questions that we’ll ask you to make sure we have the proper information. While these Live Chat agents are conversing with your potential customers, their goal is to get the phone number or email of the visitor, so that you and your team can follow up with that lead. When providing the information about your business, you don’t have to provide a script. Our team will create one based on the information that is provided. You can provide special offers that the Live Chat agent can mention as well.
Another feature that our Live Chat tool has is what we call “Call Connect.” There’s no additional fee to add in this option. If you want this option, during business hours, once the agents gather the lead information, visitors will be asked if they want to be connected immediately to talk on the phone with your business. The Live Chat agent then rings your business and connects you and the customer.
Here’s a few recent enhancements to Live Chat:
- For the Call Connect option, you can have different locations’ lead transcripts sent to different email addresses. (up to 10 locations). This means that for those businesses with multiple locations, you can have the leads/transcripts emailed to the store that the customer wants to connect to via phone.
- Live Chat now integrates with Google Business Profile, formally Google My Business. The Chat Option can appear in Google Maps on mobile…AND in Google Search on mobile. So even if the potential customer doesn’t visit your website, they can still interact with your company.
You might be asking; well why do I want this to be on my Google My Business profile if I am trying to drive traffic to my site?
It turns out that 65% of Google searches do NOT result in a click to your website. The reason for this is because the user gets all of the information they need straight from the Google Business Listing. They call this a “Zero Click Search.” Having a chat option here enables you to interact with the user if they don’t come to your website.
Here are a few more questions you’re probably thinking about right now:
Q: Is it possible to tell if a lead came from the Google Business Profile vs the chat on my website?
A: Yes, we can pull that information for you.
Q: If we can’t place a Container Tag on our site, will the Google Business Profile integration still work?
A: Without a Container Tag, we can’t place the Live Chat function on your website, but it CAN appear in the Google Business Profile as long as you can access the account and accept our integration request.
Q: How many Google Business Profiles can I set up on 1 Live Chat account because we have multiple locations?
A: Up to 5 locations can be included at no additional setup fee. If you have more than 5 locations, we can discuss what that looks like for you.
Q: What languages can you have Live Chat set up in?
A: English and Spanish
Q: Why do I need Live Chat or Why does it work?
A: There are several answers to this question:
- 53% of consumers are more likely to do business with a company they can contact through a chat app (link to source in webinar)
- 73% of customers find live chatting to be the most satisfying way of communicating with a business.
- 89% of consumers would like to connect with businesses through mobile messaging.
- 42% of consumers say live chatting is their preferred way of giving contact info – higher than ANY other lead method.
- 42% of chat leads come outside of normal business hours
- 51% of consumers say a business needs to be available 24/7.
Remember, Live Chat is not Artificial Intelligence (AI) and it is NOT a message bot. It’s staffed by live humans who are trained chat agents, giving your potential customers the ability to interact with someone 24/7/365.
How are you communicating with the potential customers that visit your site? Are you letting them leave without getting a chance to interact with them?
Here’s your chance to change the way you communicate with them.
