Momentum is building for self-service technologies in the real world. Consumers are adopting these self-service interactions
and interacting less with in-store customer services. Online it's a different story as online
shoppers want someone to talk to.
In
Future Now's 2007 Retail Customer Experience Survey, they recommend implementing
a "visible phone number for questions and problems" to improve
customer service.
Similarly, e-Consultancy
wrote in a recent article that “a visible phone number is absolutely essential
for answering any queries, as well as being a mark of trust for any e-commerce
site.“
Not being able to contact customer services is regularly cited as the top non-cost
related reason for customers abandoning a purchase. Yet despite customers want for an immediate
communication channel many retailers fail to provide either a phone number or a
chat applet, and take it for granted that there is customer confidence in an
established retailer.
If
customers have a product question that they cannot answer online then they will
either look for a contact number or shop elsewhere. The following are all too common user
comments:-
“There must be a number for me to call
and a person to speak with who can answer my question.”
"I have had issues so looked for a
telephone number... those with them got my order where as the majority that
only would talk to me by email lost my business to one of their competitors”
“I personally won’t buy from a store
that does not have visible contact information.”
The jury may be out on whether established mainstream retailers need to pimp credibility
indicators to same extent as their lesser established competitors to improve
shoppers confidence in their web site.
"The phone number? I've never
tried looking for it. But lets face it, you would automatically have consumer
confidence in an established site such as Amazon wouldn't you?"
Whatever
the verdict retailers should do whatever they can to bolster confidence and
create a sense of trust and credibility for consumers.
A
survey by PayPal revealed that “16 percent of consumers didn’t pay for items
because they could not contact customer support to answer questions.”
Why
phone numbers? Customers want direct and
immediate communication channels and slow email responses create customer
dissatisfaction. Email response times
are improving but there is still some way to go to restore customer confidence
to using other communication channels in favour of the phone.
Customers
have questions that need answering. This
could be around product specifications or delivery/ returns. No matter how much a retailer tries to answer
everything in their help pages or frequently answered questions, customers will
always have some questions they can’t find an answer to. If you make them work to contact you then
you’ll lose them.
Yet
despite what the industry knows about the impact of contact details on
abandonment rates many retailers make it hard for customers to contact customer
services. Some retailers think customers have nothing better to do than hunt
around for a contact number....wrong.
Abandonment rate is the Holy Grail that retailers seek to plug but many
shoppers are going AWOL because retailers fail to provide easy access to
contact data.
Providing
an easily accessible phone number also tells your customers that you are
willing to help. Tucking it away, 5
pages deep tells a very different story. An alternative or complementary services tool is a chat applet
which also offers an immediate communication channel - many retailers are reaping the results of technologies such as Live Person to realise significant improvements to their conversion rate.
The irony is that many customers don't want to phone customer services but just
want to know that there is a real person live to speak to should they need to.
“Personally, I always look for a phone
number on a website before purchasing, though would rarely actually call it. I
would agree it's a trust thing and that really there's no excuse these days not
to have one.”
Online
consumers that abandon are potential customers who are willing to buy – don’t
give them a reason to abandon.
In someone to talk to – pt II I will present a summary of the findings from a study of how the top 50 UK
Retailers rank on providing sufficient contact information. You’ll find out which retailers are getting
it right and which retailers don’t mind their customers shopping elsewhere.
Listening
to: Loveless
by My Bloody Valentine