Customer Support Designed for the Mobile Consumer

In an ideal world, you would have a happily-ever-after with your customers. But the reality is that you will, at some point, face complaints, requests, and constructive feedback. The customer support you provide in response is what will differentiate your brand from all the rest, help build long-lasting customer relationships, and keep shoppers coming back for more.

So what does that stellar customer support look like in today’s digital world, and how can you make sure yours is on point? Speed, convenience, and personalization are the key ingredients for the perfect customer service experience. You need to be where your customers are – at the right place, at the right time, with the right response. And where they are more than ever is mobile devices.

To attract more customers, drive them to purchase, and ensure they stick around, brands should leverage advanced customer support tools designed with mobile consumers in mind.

The power of real-time, conversational support

Customer service messaging, also known as conversational customer service, is a powerful and effective way to meet your customers’ expectations and take customer care to new heights. Being able to send a direct message through their favorite social media channels or via a casual SMS is how modern consumers prefer to communicate with each other and their favorite brands. Texting with a support agent is quick, convenient, and feels natural to the new generation of shoppers.

Some of the most used conversational support channels are SMS, live chat, chatbots, Facebook Messenger, Instagram and Twitter DMs, and Whatsapp. Customers love this direct one-on-one experience so much that 42% prefer communicating with customer service on messaging apps over any other channel. Statistics show that when implemented well, conversational messaging allows customers to reach your customer support team and get answers within 42 seconds.

Being present on multiple channels will not only help potential and existing customers reach you when they need you the most but will also allow your support team to leverage these channels to proactively reach out to customers with important updates and personalized discounts to keep them engaged and drive more sales to your store.

Five ways to tailor your customer support experience to the needs of today’s mobile consumers

1. Offer customer service on the channels they prefer

When targeting your audience with text-based communication, you need to reach out to customers on the channels they use the most. Keep in mind, though, that some age groups are more adept at one platform than the rest.

If you sell to millennials and Gen Z, conversational customer service should be at the center of your communication strategy. These two customer groups make up a whopping 42.3% of the US population and claim to value speed and convenience more than anything. Millennials prefer live chat over every other channel, with 60% of them choosing two-way text engagement because it’s easy to use, fast, and convenient. Furthermore, 71% of people between 16 and 24 agree that faster customer service would drastically improve their overall shopping experience.

When it comes to social media channels, as seen in Hootsuite’s Digital Report of 2022, the younger audience between the ages of 18-34 uses Instagram the most. One third of Americans regularly consume news on Facebook and, therefore, will be prone to seek communication with their favorite brands on the same platform.

2. Personalize each customer-brand interaction

One of the most common myths in conversational support is that using chatbots or SMS marketing automations will make the interactions feel… well, automated and robotic. However, when done right, you can make it feel like there is a human behind the screen.

There are various ways to “humanize” your live chat, text messages, and social media bots. Approaching customers with their first names, adding a personalized greeting at the beginning of each conversation, and mentioning details of their last order will make them feel as if they are talking to and getting support from a real person, not a robot.

Other effective ways to make communication more tailored include customizing your welcome message to their time zone, i.e., “good morning” or “good afternoon,” or acknowledging and celebrating milestones in their journey with your brand, i.e., “I see this is your 10th order with us.”

3. Replicate the native behavior of mobile consumers

Conversational customer service apps have become popular in the last few years for their convenience. You could be doing laundry and yet have the most hilarious conversation with your friend. Tapping into the chatting culture and encouraging consumers’ native behavior can put them at ease while communicating with your brand. They do not have to be on hold over a call and keep their phone engaged while listening to pre-recorded music over and over again. Their solution could be just one SMS away. Knowing this, they will subconsciously choose your brand over any other.

To replicate the look and feel of how modern consumers communicate, you can draft your automated customer service messages to be brief, fun, on point, and easy to understand. Here comes the golden rule – always aim to reduce the steps needed to find an answer. For instance, if you can usually provide a solution after three rounds of messages, find a way to do it in two. And most importantly – try to reduce the gap between messages received and messages sent. The faster, the better.

4. Choose the right customer service software

To make your customer service even more efficient, you need to engage with your consumers in real time and on multiple platforms.

With Gorgias, you can provide stronger, more effective, and multi-channel support. How? By connecting all your communication channels to a single dashboard, your customer care agents have a 360-degree view of the customer’s conversation history on any active platforms right in the helpdesk next to the ticket, allowing for a quick and effective resolution to every customer inquiry. As an additional bonus, they have full access to customers’ private data and information on previous purchases to make every message highly personalized.

5. Integrate your helpdesk with the leading mobile-first channel – SMS

SMS is a mobile-first, customer-first, and naturally conversational channel. It enables brands to have a direct line of communication with their audience on the most intimate device there is – their mobile phones.

With its 98% open rate and the fact that 90% of text messages are read within 3 minutes, SMS gives the feeling of immediacy that customers want when reaching out to brands for support. Plus, they don’t have to stay glued to your website and refresh all the time when they can get their questions answered on a device they already check countless times per day.

Connecting your helpdesk to an SMS marketing solution will enable internal support teams to streamline workflows to deliver expert support to mobile consumers, increase conversion rates, and strengthen loyalty over time.

Look for a support service like Gorgias that easily integrates with platforms like Yotpo SMS & Email so you can see everything on one dashboard, limiting the hassle of switching tabs. This all-in-one tactic enables your support agents to handle SMS tickets on the same window as the rest. They can access all information in one place and benefit from the same workflow automation.

In addition, SMS has a much higher response rate than any other communication channel, so offering support on the same channel that customers reached out on creates a seamless and frictionless support experience. With Gorgias, you can even exchange images with customers when needed – i.e., to see a picture of a damaged item to process a return or send product photos to encourage a sale.

Give your customers the support they expect

At Gorgias, we believe any industry can find value in conversational support, as it provides mobile customers with exceptional and personalized on-the-go experiences. And if you are still on the fence about expanding your customer care services, just remember this: stats show that more companies use live chat for sales than for customer support.

About Gorgias

Gorgias is on a mission to empower eCommerce businesses to deliver a top-notch customer experience. By understanding customers’ needs, we educate businesses on the best way to address them. That’s why we have built a multi-channel helpdesk software with the sole purpose of helping eCommerce businesses level up their customer support and deliver an exceptional customer experience to leverage inquiries into sales. www.gorgias.com