Should you really be handling multiple cats?

Should you really be handling multiple cats?

It’s hard to imagine a modern business running without live support software on its website. Chat software has the advantage of providing instant gratification to customers, as it facilitates a real-time dialogue between the company and themselves to reach a solution quickly.

But, it is a kind of synchronous communication channel; which means it only works when both the customer and the chat agent are available together. This poses a limitation because if the visitor has a question but no agent is available to answer, there is friction between expectations and reality.

Your agents may be faced with common situations where multiple customers request support at the same time. This often results in clients waiting a long time before someone responds or getting no response at all.

The end result is a damaged reputation for your brand and lost potential sales opportunities.

Managing multiple chats simultaneously is a necessary evil. It can do wonders for your business if handled correctly, but it can ruin your reputation if handled poorly.

Therefore, it is important to understand the mechanics of handling multiple chats simultaneously.

general multitasking

Most of the people often misunderstand the true meaning of multitasking. While multitasking, your brain focuses on only one task at a time. This is especially the case when the various tasks at hand require consciously thought out actions. For example, if you are walking while talking on your mobile phone, your brain is unconsciously working on the walking part as it processes what it hears and tells you to speak accordingly.

But, if you are listening to two conversations at the same time, it will be pure garbage and you will not be able to understand anything, unless you concentrate on a particular conversation.

The gist of it is that you need to quickly switch between the tasks at hand, focus on them, and take action. Handling multiple chats at once requires this ability to switch between multiple chat windows, understand each customer’s request, and provide the right solution.

Multitasking live chats can be dangerous

When a chat agent is handling more than two clients at a time, there are a lot of things that can go wrong if that person isn’t properly trained or experienced.

1. The agent may not be able to fully understand the customer’s requirements and give them a wrong solution.

2. The customer can get the correct solution, but the language may be wrong or full of errors due to the agent’s hasty typing, which hurts the brand’s reputation.

3. There may be long gaps between conversation pieces. Customers tend to get irritated when they feel they are not being given adequate attention and may be hesitant to buy from you.

4. The chat executive could mix up conversations with two customers by posting something to the wrong person.

It is necessary to handle several cats

While there are many things that can go wrong when handling multiple chats at once, no business can thrive without it. All companies aim to increase the number of visitors to their website, which means you will have to deal with more inquiries and provide more support.

Such a situation demands that you increase the number of chat agents as well, but common business sense would prevent you from hiring a large number of chat agents to serve one customer each. It’s just not economically viable.

Even if you go ahead with an army of chat agents, there may be situations where someone has to multitask.

Therefore, it is better to be prepared for such situations. Most live support software has built-in features that allow chat executives to seamlessly chat with multiple customers simultaneously, but training is also important. Other than that, there are a few more things that you can absorb into your team so that they can face such daunting situations with a smiling face.

Efficiently handle multiple chats

1. Use canned responses

Predefined messages are the savior when dealing with many clients at once. Be sure to provide your chat agents with messages like “Hello! How can I help you today?”, “Is there anything else I can help you with?”, etc. in your chat software.

Furthermore, the correct use of such phrases is essential and proper training should be provided to ensure this.

Whenever chat agents need some time to keep the chat active on hold and serve other customers, they should use messages like “thanks for the info, let me check it out and I’ll get back to you in a bit.” This way, executives can buy some time and won’t keep the current user waiting anxiously for a response.

2. Use a text expansion tool

These tools can help agents type faster by automatically showing them frequently used words and phrases. There are many such tools available and your chat software may have them built in as well.

3. View chat summary

As soon as your team members return to a chat board, they should review the summary of the chat session with that user to update the conversation so far and gain context. This exercise ensures customer satisfaction and prompt closure of the query.

4. Prioritize Dashboards

Always keep track of how long a customer has been waiting for a response. Many live chat software packages display the wait time on the panel or color code to show the priority of that chat. Make sure none of the customers are waiting for a long time.

5. Practice, practice, practice

Well, there is no better alternative than the good experience above. As chat agents become more experienced, they know more about the product and their confidence increases as well. In addition, they can anticipate the chat flow of users and be mentally prepared to serve them satisfactorily and efficiently.

6. Prefer younger chat agents

Employees of the younger generation under the age of 30 cope better with multitasking situations in general. They have already faced these types of situations in their lives and can also apply their knowledge while chatting with customers.

In general, handling multiple chats is mandatory for every serious business to remain profitable. But it should always be handled with care, so that it doesn’t compromise the customer experience and the quality of your service.

Balance is vital, as it is always healthier to serve a few customers successfully than to disappoint many customers. As the saying goes, never bite off more than you can chew!

Proper agent training and selection of the right chat software would definitely make the task of serving multiple customers simultaneously easier.

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