Why Chatbots are Better Than Live Chat
Over the advancement of technology, customer service has changed. A lot. You don’t have to ring a customer service line anymore, which is probably a huge relief to many of you. I know it’s a pretty hated communication method. Now, you can call, use Live Chat to speak to an employee or Chatbots to speak to a bot. But, which one is best? We think Chatbots.
If you aren’t familiar with these bots, give our blog ‘Should I use a Chatbot?’ to learn exactly what they are. They’re quickly becoming one of the most talked about things of the Digital world. Being extremely popular, they have a lot of pros.
No Humans needed
The main element of Chatbots that attracts so many people is the fact that they don’t need to be monitored by humans. They don’t need any human input into the conversations they have with customers. Basically, it can be programmed then left alone to chat and offer guidance to users.80% of customer’s queries have been resolved by Chatbots without human supervision, so clearly it works in most cases. But, there is still the 20% of customers whose questions aren’t answered by the bots, so we don’t need to boycott human customer service just yet.
This is super useful to businesses as it means your staff can get on with their work and new projects rather than having to sit and conduct customer service all day.
Live Chats solely depend on humans to work. It’s a feature which allows customers to ask the employees on the other side of the chat questions. So, you’ll need staff to man your Live Chat if you’re looking to invest in it.
Multi-tasking
As well as working independently, these bots can also multi-task. When I say that, I mean seriously multi-task. They respond to as many customers as possible, answering their questions and queries. As well as responding to multiple customers, they’re also scanning all their data to find every answer they need. That’s impressive, and way out of the capability of a human.
The staff working on a Live Chat platform can only respond to one customer at a time, as they’re only human after all. Multi-tasking on that scale for Live Chat is absolutely not possible.
Improving customer service
Chatbots have the ability to improve UX (User Experience). This is because they’re really fast. Being fast in customer service is key, questions asked by your customers are answered as soon as they’ve asked it. They’re Much quicker than any human, no matter how good at their job they are. The bots respond to questions immediately. When using Live Chat, there’s a pretty good chance you may have to wait in line or be put on hold for a little while. There are even cases where you’re waiting in line for over ten minutes, which is not what these customers want at all. The chat only goes as quickly as the Live Chat agent can go.
People don’t like waiting, being put in a line or on hold is very likely to result in that customer leaving the chat and going elsewhere. On the other hand, the Chatbots don’t leave customers waiting over a second.
24/7 Customer care
Another main factor that distinguishes Chatbots and Live Chats is the availability. Live Chat is only available to customers for as long as that business is open for the day, which is mostly 9-5. After that the Live Chat feature is disabled and no customers can get through to the team.
Chatbots stand above Live Chat a lot here, as they’re available 24/7. Literally anytime you want to speak to a Chatbot, you can. They’re available 7 days a week, 365 days a year. This is a great service for customers who need an answer to their question ASAP. Plus, it’s a huge benefit for companies who have customers on an international scale. Those customers who live in a country with a time difference will still be able to speak to the Chatbot. If they’re relying on the companies Live Chat, the time difference could mean they never get a chance to use it.
Saving you money and time
As well as everything else, Chatbots are the most cost-effective. To have a successfully running Live Chat feature on your site, you need the staff. Having staff means paying wages, as well as the necessary technology and materials they will need. This adds up to a pretty large sum of money to be spending on one feature. Plus, your staff will need full training on how to use the Live Chat software, which is really time-consuming. Installing a Chatbot for your site is much cheaper and saves you having to employ any more staff.
Like any technology, Chatbots have their flaws like not being able to recognise words spelled wrong and the questions having to be written simply. There are still 1 in 5 customers whose problems can’t be dealt with by a Chatbot, so they still need some work. Saying this, we still believe they’re better than Live Chat due to their speed, time-saving and 24/7 customer care.
