What effects has the COVID-19 pandemic had on your company?
Are you interested to understand that this circumstance, which appears to be challenging, might be transformed into a money-making opportunity from anywhere in the world?
Read on.
Whether or not your company conducts business online, the conventional method of selling has altered. The ways we communicate have changed, which has affected how we can interact with prospects.
How can you use traditional sales techniques—typically used for in-person or telephone communications—to a prospect on the other side of the planet behind a computer (or, let’s face it, doesn’t pick up the phone)?
The way customers communicate has changed
Start by examining your prospect’s communication style and habits.
According to research released by the telecom network O2, people spend almost twice as much time (21 minutes) on their mobile phones sending and receiving messages and emails as they do making phone calls (12 minutes).
Calls are becoming less common, particularly in the office, since large corporations like JP Morgan and Coca-Cola have decided to do away with their voice mail systems. According to their CEOs, most employees, especially those under 40, have long relied on social media, email, text messaging, and instant messaging to interact. Millennials are driving this change in how we communicate at work, so it’s a trend that will undoubtedly continue to grow.
The way businesses communicate with customers needs to change
Sales professionals have a choice between chasing the decreasing amount of time prospects spend on these channels or engaging with them more effectively through their chosen channels.
One of the most significant ways to accomplish this as an online business is by including a live chat on your website. This places you on the shop floor of your online business and provides a communication channel with which your prospects are comfortable. Everyone is familiar with the idea of using email as a sales tool. Still, by giving it a specific function when combined with your live chat platform, you can begin to develop and improve a more efficient sales process.
It would help if you used live chat as early as feasible within your sales process. Utilize every chance you can to interact with visitors that land on your website and choose to do so. Live chat should be utilized as a sales tool primarily for listening.
When first engaging a customer in live chat, try to ask brief, open-ended inquiries. Questions like “what drew you to our website?” or “for what purpose did you hope to employ our software?”
Key pointers for using live chat to communicate effectively
- Aim for your chat messages to be no more than 1 to 2 sentences long. This format is better suited to live chat and how your prospect will be used to communicating with similar tools.
- Keep the tone relatively informal (as much as suits your company/brand. ) People expect and hope to talk with a natural person.
- Remember to keep the length of your pitch minimal and condensed via live chat. Think more in terms of an elevator pitch.
- Keep in mind that if you send multiple messages without a response, the conversation and dialogue will start to seem unnatural.
It’s also one of the best opportunities to qualify a prospect to find out if they are looking to make a decision right now. If they are ready, go ahead and work through the sales process with them, taking the opportunity to convert them while they are in the context of your platform.
However, if they aren’t looking to decide, don’t feel pressured to quote a price or go into too much pitching while using live chat. If there is a request for more information, take that as an opportunity to establish a dialogue via email.
Instant, personal, and easy
In addition to email, using live chat restores the one-on-one, quick engagement that has been lost due to the decline in face-to-face and phone communication. If used properly, live chat may provide you with a thorough picture of your consumer, which you can use to inform your email correspondence and convert more prospects.
