Imagine as a customer you want to know something and there’s not one to help you around. Or if there’s a number that you can connect – the message after 5 minutes will tell you that you call this number instead or visit their FAQ. Then if you e-mail the company and get an automated reply after 24 hours, will it still matter to you?

One competitive edge of any B2B company is responding fast to a lead or a potential customer. Just think about it: when you send a reply to a number of customers’ inquiries after 24 hours, it’s more likely that they aren’t even thinking of your product or service anymore. What’s worse is that they may have gone to your leading competitor with a faster response time. That sales lead/convert is put to naught. The overall quality of your product and service will be the biggest gauge for your company’s success. The accessibility and convenience of your customer service easily come in as the next major point to look at.

A 24×7 live chat is the best tool that a company can utilize on their website. It is what your business needs if you want to make the best impression to your potential, new and old customers. For the potential customers – this could be the reason they will convert and for the old customers, this easily prompts loyalty and retention. Obviously, live chat is one of the fastest tools of customer engagement and experience. The live chat feature makes customers happy and confident in your group at the same time. It will be where the customers will be looking for immediate answers to their inquiries or problems. It gives them easy and instant access to the sales people and/or support staff of your team who they can turn to anytime they need it. A live chat can provide the solutions when one is not there personally to respond. Get it?

Here are some of the reasons why you need 24×7 live chat now:

1) Fast response means more sales leads = better business

Did you know that if a customer waits more than 15 minutes, you could lose him? Statistics show that the companies, which responded slower than the others, had a significant decrease in the possibility of qualifying the same sales leads. If there are other businesses out there offering the same product or service as you are, then why would people wait for you to respond? Responding faster means a potential shoot up in sales leads. We all know that sales leads boost sales so that your company reaps the benefits in the long run. This all points to one thing: live chat is effective in generating leads and making sales. As live chat provides instant access to your team, specifically in support and sales and vice-versa — you would have the opportunities of converting these inquiries and/or visits to what matters most in the end: paying customers. Obviously, these converts can easily push up your company’s ROI.

2) Treating “Customer is King” is a competitive advantage

What are your customers’ “pain points”? Pain points simply mean the customers’ problems that are being felt or experienced; usually these have not been solved or addressed yet. As a business owner, defining what your customer pain points are will provide you the advantage to create the solutions that will resolve what their specific problems are. It even creates credibility for your company and the customers would trust you more. As they say, the “money is in the customers’ pains” so it’s a must to be able to identify their needs. With the e-mail and phone call as the traditional customer support systems – it is quite difficult to ascertain what the pain points that one person or team have heard or received. But a supervisor or team leader typically can access live chat so chat histories or reports can be filtered easily to distinguish the various customer pain points. The advantage is that the management team can quickly uncover the needs and problems of the customers, thus, would find ways to resolve them.

The most effective strategy to improve customer service and loyalty is undoubtedly having a 24×7 live chat. It allows you to provide ready answers to customers’ questions about your products and services and resolves quickly whatever problems or complaints they have. It gives guarantee that you are there whenever they need you. If a live chat facilitates customers to do business with you in a breeze, it would mostly lead them to respond favorably, such as with increased spending and in the long run, loyalty to your brand and product. A live chat indeed is a basic but nonetheless effective way to level up both customer service and loyalty.

From favorable live chat experiences – you may also get better reviews on your sites such as Amazon, Google reviews or your very own website. Good, positive reviews of course bring in more sales and converts. It also improves customer retention as a consumer study found out that more than 60% of customers are more likely to return to a website that provides a live chat.

Certainly, treating customer as king is the way to go. Customer experience plays a significant role in any business. It all boils down to customers who will in turn help you grow your business, i.e., an accelerated growth in your customer base. It goes without saying that as more customers are delighted with your product or service, higher returns for the company will follow.

3) Wider market reach is what you need to keep going.

If your business only has a website – it doesn’t guarantee that many would easily place orders on your products or avail your services. But if you have a live chat feature – the customers who are within a long distance can inquire, arrange orders and make purchases. These customers include those from other countries who may find it difficult to reach you via long distance calls at costly international toll rates. Technology causes doing things more convenient and fast. Ideally, a live chat function can help widen your market reach that you might have never thought at all in the first place. You can always welcome someone from the other end of your location or area, with you providing the same accommodation and consideration that you would offer to walk-in customers. Definitely, this is a win-win situation for your business.

4) Reports and analytics support your business goals.

Among all the support systems, it is the live chat that has access to information that you need for any marketing plan and strategy to draw more traffic to your site’s products or services. Data such as how many visitors checked your site, what times in the day they usually browse and which days are recurring, as well as the number of chat requests accepted and ignored are all handy and helpful facts. E-mail and phone support are not as convenient for you to utilize for reports and analytics. The live chat analytics also provides management with significant insights as to how the agents performed, the wait time statistics and chat histories. All these data are essential to monitoring and reviewing your agents’ performances. Data can also be used in analyzing your customer behaviors and trends. It does not only assure you of satisfied customers – but more so, loyal customers who can also be your product and service advocates in the future. Which business doesn’t want this?