The best team ever: Combine virtual and real agents
Chatbots are used to deliver preset messages for customer inquiries. They can provide account information, updates about shipping, the status of an order and similar information. However, to really connect with customers, chatbots should be used in a different way, according to an article on the business2community.com website.
During the initial interaction, they should gather customer details and information on the issue. The interaction should be handed over to an agent. That way, customer waiting time is reduced and the chance that the agent will be able to solve the issue is also high. The advantages are clear:
- Information is collected quickly, the customers have an immediate response.
- If the issue can be solved by the chatbot itself, it's done.
- When an agent needs to intervene, the chatbot forwards the query to the best-qualified one.
The evolution of customer service
It seems that customers are beginning to prefer messaging over phone calls when it comes to service issues. This is probably because when calling, one is often transferred multiple times to another agent and there is also considerable waiting time on hold.
Automation can be used, for example, when a customer is spending a lot of time on the customer service section of a website. Then a real agent from customer service should be notified automatically.
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