How Canned Responses are Failing to Meet Your Customers Expectations

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Imagine this: You’re all worked up as the new product launch is round the corner. But even during the ongoing pressure, you make sure that customers get to make an advance booking for the upcoming product. As you open the window for pre-bookings, you see too many emails getting piled up.

You even open up the option to chat live through a small window on the bottom right corner of your website. Keeping their common concerns in mind, you create canned responses for customer support operators so that all frequently asked questions are answered in a go. But suddenly you see a rise in complaints, leaving you in a spot to receive angry emails.

This is where you may ask, “what went wrong?”.

Is it wrong to use live chat for canned responses when having a conversation with the customers?

Well, the answer is – No.

With the best-canned responses, you can:

  • Avoid answering the same question several times
  • Avoid typos and grammatical errors
  • Reduce customer response time
  • Keep a conversation consistent till the end
  • Manage more chats at the same time
  • Boost support operator’s confidence during a conversation with a customer

Except, it is not necessary that every customer may react to your canned responses in the same way. Your support operators must be trained before such product launches on “how to use canned responses?” with customers. Plus, you need to ask another question, “Are the best-canned responses being used in the correct scenario?”.

Now, the situation portrayed above is quite rare. However, when companies are integrating technologies with a focus on meeting customer expectations, it becomes all the more important to add responsive technologies to build seamless journeys with their brand. And as you read this, there are 7.7 billion people (and still counting) on this planet throwing a great challenge to the companies in terms of:

  • Innumerable possibilities of various problems a customer may face
  • Unique questions related to the use of a product or service

You could also throw in geographies, culture, climate, and standards of living, and the companies have an enormous challenge before them. Given the diversity and magnitude of the customers worldwide, the question that looms is how do we make them feel inclusive? How do you ensure customer satisfaction, brand loyalty, and referral business?

So What Are We Driving At with Canned Responses?

Customers want their questions to be answered immediately. They are looking forward to fruitful live chat conversations that give them a good experience and leave them satisfied. How do companies ensure that this interactive experience is useful? Is it possible through some pre-fed responses?

The answer is yes. Live chats and messengers, through the use of canned responses, can take you closer to enhanced customer satisfaction. Some intelligently devised canned responses can push the graph of customer satisfaction higher for your company.

What are canned responses? According to Wikipedia, Canned responses are predetermined responses to common questions. In fields such as technical support, canned responses often help in answering frequently asked questions quickly and conveniently for both the customer and the technical adviser. It increases the responsiveness in a live chat as it rules out the need to type the same responses for commonly asked questions.

How Canned Responses are Failing to Meet Your Customer Expectations?

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Canned response for customer service is merit for companies. However, the situation explained at the beginning of the article is a classic example of how canned responses have at times failed to meet customer expectations during a live chat conversation.

In this section, we’ll skim through the reasons why at times canned responses fail to meet customer expectations.

#1: Impersonal Responses

Canned responses are generic, and thus sometimes fail to provide a satisfying response for a specific query, leaving the customer unsatisfied.

#2: Repetitive Questions

Canned responses for customer service are triggered based on questions answered by the customer. But unstructured responses may ask Repetitive questions, thereby creating a higher response time.

#3: Lack of Automation

Not sending a confirmation that the query has been accepted is a sure shot way to customer dissatisfaction. While it may not be possible to have a person at the other end to send this confirmation, not having automated support is not acceptable.

#4: Data Security

Customers are more concerned about their data being compromised. Even the best-canned responses may fail to leave an impact if the customer is unwilling to share some information.

Make the Best of Your Canned Responses

Live Chat has huge potential in the coming years, especially considering the advantages of speed and accessibility. Already 41% of customers prefer reaching an organization’s support team using live chat software. Whereas those who prefer phone support are reduced to 32%. In short, the need to have live chat won’t be reducing any time soon. That’s why you need to make sure that canned responses are used when they are bound to make an impact on the customer.

Here’s how you can make the best-canned responses for your live chat and use them at the right time.

  • Brevity is the key – Keep your canned responses brief, but relevant. Customers don’t like to read lengthy answers.
  • Personalize, personalize, personalize – The need to personalize the responses cannot be stressed enough. Test the responses in the team and only then add them to the chats.
  • A mix of technology works – A lot of times, companies think that having one type of online interaction is sufficient to connect with customers. Here’s where we can go wrong. Since the customer’s age bracket cannot always be demarcated, being available on the phone or the email is also important. Meeting customer expectations from all quarters add an important dimension of trust towards the companies.
  • Know your customers – It is always about the customers because all companies want to sell. The input of canned responses that customers can relate to makes for a great solution towards speedier resolution of queries. Customers who feel understood are the ones that can potentially increase brand loyalty. Know the socio-geographic aspects of your customers and respond to them accordingly.

Always bear in mind when creating the best-canned responses for a live chat that human intervention is still preferred by the customers at all times. Customers, in the digital age, are still not ready to abandon human interaction completely. They still want a human being who is an expert and can answer detailed questions.

The need for friendliness in the chat and the accountability of the responses adds to the whole experience. Companies who understand that this is vital for their organization tends to ensure that their team comes out with the best-canned responses, which, in turn, lead to the resolution of the customer queries.

The digital age has opened doors for faster and better interactions and meeting customer expectations in a variety of ways. With the input of thoroughly researched best-canned responses for a live chat in place, live chats are a great boon for the companies in the present and the future. Just keep in mind what your customers want and go ahead and give them a great chat experience with your brand.

Author Bio:

How Canned Responses are Failing to Meet Your Customers Expectations

Jason Grills is a technical writer currently associated with ProProfs Chat. He enjoys writing about emerging customer support products, trends in the customer support industry and the financial impacts of using such tools. In his spare time, Jason likes traveling extensively to learn about new cultures and traditions.

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