Consumers demand a seamless overall experience from brands. They want to be able to fluidly go from browsing in your physical store to researching your brand online.

If they purchased a product from one of your branches, they want to be able to call a customer service representative when they have a problem with the item. This way, they won’t have to return to the store.

This level of seamless customer experience requires you to have a reliable, efficient process in multiple platforms. Customers have different preferences when it comes to approaching businesses. Some would instead go to a physical store so that they can approach a real human instead of a chatbot. But others prefer sending a message to the brand’s social media account.

Establishing a multichannel customer service system ensures that you can accommodate various needs and preferences. This strategy makes sure that you don’t lose any sales opportunities and lets you build stronger relationships with your existing customer base.

Below are some omnichannel customer service best practices that will help you improve your customer retention and increase sales.

Traditional customer service still works

Calls and emails are still effective customer service channels. Many consumers still subscribe to this method, so you want to make sure they can reach you through either of these platforms.

Luckily, there are easy ways to provide customer support through phone calls or emails. Many agencies offer outsourced customer support services, which lets you ease the workload of your internal staff.

Plus, outsourced customer service personnel can be on-call 24/7, making you appear approachable and accessible to your target market.

On the other hand, you can elevate your email customer support through automation. Email automation saves your in-house team time by preparing templates for frequently asked questions.

You can also schedule emails to send later, gather feedback through polls and surveys, and automatically personalize outgoing messages, among other functions.

Social media response time matters

Social media can be a useful customer service tool, increasing your satisfaction and retention rates. However, there’s a gap between when customers expect a response and when the business reply.

Eighty percent of users expect companies to respond within 24 hours. And 50 percent of customers say that they stop talking to brands that take too long to reply.

Improve your response time if you want to improve your customer retention and satisfaction rates. Facebook offers an automated reply function on Messenger for businesses. That lets you respond immediately to commonly asked questions by preparing a template answer.

Live chat can improve your sales

Leverage your live chat feature to elevate your customer support. Many users prefer to live chat for its immediacy and convenience. This feature also allows you to speak to multiple customers at once, with conversations lasting only several minutes.

Plus, live chat helps the customer with their decision-making. Shoppers who use the live chat feature are often in the process of making a purchase or contemplating buying an item.

Communicating with shoppers who are at this stage in the buyer’s journey can help push them to a sale instead of a bounce. In short, live chat can increase your revenues.

Finally, don’t forget to test your multichannel customer support system. That will tell you which channels are performing well and which areas need improvement.

Study your customer base, their shopping behaviors, and their digital habits to help you design a multichannel customer service process that meets their needs and expectations.