Businesses nowadays employ a variety of strategies to communicate with clients. Brands strive to develop an omnichannel experience that serves their customers, from a VoIP phone system to tailored emails.
As a result, messaging, whether through short message service (SMS) or instant message service (IM), has become a medium many customer support teams are beginning to use. Primarily because platforms such as Facebook and WhatsApp provide free messaging capabilities for businesses to engage with clients.
6 SMS Customer Support Tips and Best Practices
1. Clarify your objectives.
To get the most out of customer service messaging, you must first understand why you are providing the option to clients. Clarify your objectives to get the most of the service. Here are three crucial things to consider while developing communications objectives:
- Cost Cutting
- Productivity of Employees
- Customer Contentment
It’s worth delving more into which of these three is most essential to you. This allows you to prioritize the components of your communications that are most relevant to that objective.
2. Select the right SMS support channel.
Some businesses only want to communicate with customers through their website, while others might want to reach out to them via Facebook. And then there’ll be some that want to go a step further by using a more advanced tool, like live chat.
The choice of the channel depends on three things:
- The type of business you are
- The number of customers you have
- The nature of your customers’ needs
One crucial element to consider is that the interaction channel should complement the customer’s journey. For example, if you’re a travel company, your users will most likely want to communicate with you via their mobile devices.
So, messaging via SMS, WhatsApp, or Facebook Messenger could be a more effective way to communicate with them.
3. Be responsive.
Using SMS support as part of a customer service strategy aims to create a more personal, human experience. So, make sure you respond to customer queries as quickly as possible.
Receiving a prompt reply reassures your customers that you’re listening to them. And it creates trust between them and your business.
4. Use CTAs.
SMS conversations are short and to the point. So, what better way to drive action than through a call to action (CTA) in each message. A well-placed CTA will lead your customers to a landing page that informs them of the action they need to take.
Opt-out CTAs work well here. It’s also a good idea to remind customers of your CTA in the following SMS message they receive. That way, they’re less likely to forget to act.
5. Be polite and professional.
Even though there’s no visual element to the conversation, it’s still important to be polite and professional when using messaging for customer service. One mistake many companies make is sounding too corporate. Being too formal can make customers feel like they are talking to a machine. This can lead to them being less engaged with your business.
6. Be empathetic.
Customers demand an authentic, personalized experience when using your messaging tools. So, make sure you really understand the reason for their query. Then, try to be empathetic to the problem they’re facing.
This means asking questions that are relevant and responsive to their concerns. Being aware of the conversation’s context will help you do this.
Conclusion
SMS and other messaging for customer service is a powerful tool. It can help support your business in several ways, from improving customer satisfaction to reducing the time that your customer service team spends dealing with queries.
Are you looking for the best text messaging service for your business? Main Street Contact is the platform for you! Main Street Contact allows you to easily schedule text and voice messages to help your business promote events and build relationships with your customers. Contact us today to learn more about our SMS marketing solutions.