Communication

November 16, 2022

Leah

The 9 Customer Channels – Strengths and Weaknesses

Live chat and phone and email, oh my! Choosing the best customer channels to offer is not an easy journey, but ultimately rewarding.

It used to be a no-brainer: first add phone and then maybe email. But now people have devices that can do so much more. Companies are figuring out how to offer the best customer experience without investing in too many unnecessary channels.

If you have limited resources, this gets even more difficult. That’s why we outlined the most prominent customer channels available to help you consider which ones may suit your support needs best.

Nine most important customer channels

1. Communication channels at a glance
2. Phone
3. Email
4. In-person
5. Live chat
6. Messaging
7. Video calls
8. Social media
9. Knowledge base
10. Online communities

*see Live chat

Things don't change overnight; telephone support remains an important customer service communication channel. Many customers even expect a company to offer phone support, even though there are now more convenient channels. This is because it meets basic human needs: having a direct, personal line of communication where you can express yourself in your own words.

• Conversation scale: 1:1
• Communication: Synchronous
• Use effort for customers: High

Older generations in particular rely less on digital communication channels. It's because phone has an important advantage: as long as you call within service hours, you’re pretty much guaranteed to reach someone.

But if your company is marketed toward a younger demographic, phone support can cost you time and patience. Being forwarded and having to repeat yourself is a pain. Some companies, like Squarespace, don’t even offer it.

Since it’s voice communication, conversations aren’t documented and searchable. This makes following up on inquiries and quality assurance a lot more difficult than it needs to be in support. Once a customer has their issue solved, chances are they don’t want to stay on the line to rate your service quality.

Agents can also still only take one call at a time, which inevitably leaves your customers in waiting queues. If your support demand is high, then your employee costs will be high. This is a tough battlefield for companies that are trying to keep their service costs down, which explains the switch to more flexible, asynchronous solutions.

Tools we recommend:

• Placetel: Placetel offers a flexible telephone system with over 150 functions. It doesn’t require any extra hardware, is suitable for home office setups and is quick to set up. They even offer a team collaboration suite that lets you and your team stay connected via instant messaging, desktop and file sharing and HD video conferences.
• Grasshopper: This integrative VoIP solution lets you make phone calls anywhere you have an internet connection without the need for a traditional phone line or cellular network. You have all the same voicemail and forwarding benefits as a regular phone line, but because it’s mobile, calls will rarely go missed.

Customer support requires effort for all parties involved, but email alleviates some of that pressure. It’s an ideal contact channel for customers who can’t commit to a live conversation but responses are much slower. Customers and agents can end up waiting days to receive a response and resolve an issue.

• Conversation scale: 1:1
• Communication: Asynchronous
• Use effort for customers: Medium

Email delegation and status tracking and drafting, even if you’re using canned responses, can also get messy. Even if many of your customers like the moderate effort it takes to email, they still expect a speedy response. According to a benchmark study by SuperOffice , the average email response time is 12 hours and 10 minutes.

Also, only 20% of companies were able to answer the customer’s questions in the first full reply. It lacks the rapid exchanges you get from phone and chat, which limits your conversion rate and how much you can guide customers across your website.

Tools we recommend:

• Freshdesk: for easier ticketing, reporting, automating, multilingual support and app integrations.
• Zimbra: Desktop software that allows online and offline access to email accounts. Zimbra’s email software offers team chat, mailbox integrations, smartphone compatibility and more.

Meeting your customers face-to-face isn’t just limited to businesses with physical stores. Customer meetings and visits are also helpful in online business.

• Conversation scale: 1:1
• Communication: Synchronous
• Use effort for customers: High

When possible, meeting your customers in person lets you make a human connection and put a face to a name. You can read your customer’s body language to see how they respond to you and your business, give interactive product demonstrations and help guide them during the shopping and selection process.

In-person service can also be more demanding of agents, especially when customers are angry or irate. Long waiting lines, peak service times, product unavailability and misunderstandings can lead to quick escalations. This isn’t completely avoidable, but important to remember if you’re considering opening your own brick and mortar.

Tools we recommend:

• In lieu of a tool, we recommend the following keynote to help learn the different types of universal body language and how to communicate in response:
• For help with choosing the right employees, we recommend our post “The 8 customer service skills and traits you should look for.”

More companies are switching to live chat to serve their customers. It’s a direct channel that allows for fast, personalized support directly on your website. Whether you work from home or at an office, live chat is undisruptive, familiar and less demanding than other channels.

• Conversation scale: 1:3+ - more than three chats at a time can get overwhelming
• Communication: Synchronous (and asynchronous*)
• Use effort for customers: Low

*With advanced website chat tools like Userlike, you chat with your customers not only synchronously, but also asynchronously: those interested can return to your website at any time and either start a new conversation or continue a previous one.

Live chat is also one of the most cost-effective channels on this list, which accommodates businesses of all sizes. It lives on your website, so it doesn't need extra equipment. Agents can also assist multiple customers at one time, which means smaller teams.

Businesses also experience an increase in conversion rates after switching to live chat. This is because it’s the only channel that lets you effectively guide a visitor throughout their experience on your website.

For customers, it’s a relatively easy channel to use. There’s no need to download anything, and chatting is straightforward. It’s instant communication that is internationally accessible at no cost, and translation software embeds, like DeepL , make live multilingual support possible.

Tools we recommend:

• Userlike: Our own live chat solution is suitable for any team size and budget. Chat messages are received in a central inbox. There are plenty of sales and service features available for handling requests, such as instant translations, message templates, and intelligent routing. Because we take data protection seriously, you get a GDPR-compliant messaging platform hosted in Germany that is also suitable for international support.
• Tawk.to: Free solution that has a built-in ticketing system, customizable widgets and chat agents for hire.

Messaging apps like WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger allow for private, quiet and direct communication, but on a much more flexible scale. It’s both synchronous and asynchronous. Customers can continue a conversation whenever it’s most convenient for them.

• Conversation scale: 1:3+ - more than three chats at a time can get overwhelming
• Communication: Asynchronous and Synchronous
• Use effort for customers: Low

Becoming a part of your customer’s messaging contact list makes it more likely for them to reach out to you in the future. It’s easily accessible and requires low effort to use.

Messaging is even helping break the relationship barriers that tend to exist between businesses and customers. Because this channel lives on their personal device, customers will see contacting your business as an effortless, satisfying task.

It's not just small companies that benefit from this modern communication channel. Companies like Toyota and Spardabank rely on messaging as a convenient contact option.

However, unlike with live chat, customers have to switch channels, which takes them off your website. This leads them away from your offers and creates a higher contact barrier.

That's why we recommend offering messaging channels to complement your website chat. With Userlike’s website messenger, your customers can choose to start a chat on your website or through a messaging app, such as WhatsApp, with one click.

Tools we recommend:

• Userlike’s Unified Messaging: Userlike is a unified messaging tool. Messages from your digital communication channels (including live chat, WhatsApp, Facebook, Telegram and SMS) arrive in the central message center and are processed by your service team. Chatbots support the work of your employees and help generate leads.
• Respond.io: A business messaging platform that lets your team collaborate on chats from shared inboxes, automate responses and surveys and integrate your business’ preferred apps.

Online business isn’t excluded from face-to-face interaction. Our devices make it easier to video chat with anyone in the world at any time. Why not extend this into customer service?

Companies, like N26, use video calling as an added security measure when processing new customer applications. Other companies, like SightCall, help insurance customers show their problem in real time to receive quicker reimbursements and reduce the need for onsite visits.

How to confirm your identity with N26

• Conversation scale: 1:1
• Communication: Synchronous
• Use effort for customers: High

It’s a modern way to have those in-store type connections and put a face to a name. An ideal combination is website chat and video calls. Imagine you're chatting with a warm lead and you just need one small final push to convince them of your product. With a unified communications solution like Userlike, you can switch from live chat to a video call in seconds and deepen the customer relationship - personal product demos and consultations can happen in the comfort and convenience of the customer’s living room, office, wherever.

In the end, you should decide if video calls are a good fit for your business and if you have enough personnel to maintain it. Especially in industries like automotive, and technology the investment can quickly pay off.

Tools we recommend:

• Userlike: Our customer messaging platform allows you to easily switch from live chat to a browser-based audio or video call. Only service representatives can initiate the call, ensuring they are free to talk face-to-face.
• Agora: A customizable and secure solution that specializes in digital voice and video calls. It works across platforms and channels and supports one-to-one video calls and group chats.
• Webex: The Webex Contact Center is an omnichannel, native cloud contact center solution ideal for small and midsize businesses.

Despite being a relatively new way to connect with friends and family online, customers of all ages have found their social media flavor of choice. Since the major platforms now offer business accounts, social media has become a viable contact channel.

However, managing customer relationships via Twitter or Facebook can end up chaotic and messy. Responses are public, which means your service interactions become publicity for your brand. This can be a good thing, but also very bad; many people use social media to complain about a brand, which can lead to discussion and resolutions but also damaging debates and arguments.

Example of how poor customer service can have long-term consequences

• Conversation scale: 1:∞
• Communication: Asynchronous
• Use effort for customers: Medium

You don’t need to currently have a large following on the social media channel your business prefers to start using social media management software. Though you should first consider if it’s even necessary for your business. Retail can take advantage of social media shopping features, such as Instagram’s “Swipe Up” profile shop. But for B2B software businesses there’s little value in social media engagement.

Tools we recommend:

• NapoleonCat: Lets your team interact with customers across platforms from a single inbox. You can schedule and publish posts on multiple platforms simultaneously and receive automated reports straight to your email.
• ContentStudio: This platform also offers a unified inbox for easier customer response management. You and your team can see who is responding to which inquiry, add notes and categorize conversations for automation and reporting.

Customers like to help themselves sometimes. It’s empowering and a learning opportunity.

Most websites have a FAQ page where customers can get answers to common questions, but this meets the bare minimum requirements of it being a viable channel. You can create satisfying customer experiences by building an interactive knowledge base organized with a large variety of troubleshooting articles.

• Conversation scale: 1:∞
• Communication: Asynchronous
• Use effort for customers: Low

A searchable knowledge base, like Tchibo’s and Dropbox’s help centers, with articles that address everything from billing troubles to product errors can take a load off your agents. Even if customers forego searching your knowledge base for themselves, agents can easily send and reference articles when assisting customers.

Source: Tchibo

This draws attention to your knowledge base for future inquiries and keeps agents from having to repeatedly explain the same solutions.

Tools we recommend:

• Userlike: Userlike’s digital customer communication platform offers smart automation tools like a self-learning FAQ page to complement the website chat and messenger channels. It uses auto-predictions to answer the customer quickly, even as they’re typing. In addition, we offer an interactive contact form that suggests possible solutions before their question is even submitted. Using AI, the software learns and improves with each customer request.
• Atlassian: This knowledge base software works both for internal and external customer use. Customers can use the search engine for quick answers, confluence lets teams collaborate on documents and find everything in one place, and it supports your theme, branding and workflow add-ons.

Looking for better customer relationships?

Test Userlike for free and chat with your customers on your website, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Telegram and SMS.

Read more

Online forums and communities exclusive to your products or services are another form of self-service, but a lot more collaborative.

Creating a space for customers to ask and share solutions to problems or concerns is a great community approach to support. Just look at Moz Community and the Wordpress Support Forum where customers submit and resolve issues on a regular basis.

• Conversation scale: 1:∞
• Communication: Asynchronous
• Use effort for customers: Low

Resolved issues, especially when easily searchable, assist similarly to help center articles. However, these resolutions can come from other customers, which means your agents may only need to monitor and respond when necessary.

Over time, your community page or forum will become an interactive guide where customers can reach out, learn, teach and share their thoughts and insights.

Tools we recommend:

• WordPress: The publishing site offers several plugins that let you seamlessly integrate a forum into your WordPress website.
• Vanilla: Enterprise-level software that lets you start discussions and allows users to post their own questions and polls.

Finding the right communication channel - questioning quality vs. quantity

Picking the right customer channels is a strategic decision. Chances are your company doesn’t have a need for more than two to three customer channels. Any more than this can lead to miscommunication, unaddressed messages, inconsistent service quality and stretching your team too thin.

For example, a fashion brand told me to call them after I’d sent them an email. Why? So they could “better assist” me. Why offer email if phone is preferred and encouraged? I could have saved a day of waiting for a response if their preferences were clearer on their website.

If your budget allows for it, try to offer a blend of personalized and self-service solutions for your customers. For example, phone, a knowledge base and live chat. Throwing email into this mix would be too redundant. Written communication is already taken care of.

Unified communications with Userlike

If you are interested in an all-in-one software specialized in digital communication channels, try out our unified messaging platform. Userlike is the leading provider of customer messaging and service automation in Germany and allows you to bundle all important communication channels into one inbox.

Offer your customers professional customer service with a powerful website messenger, including voice messages and video calls, or relieve your service team with automated help that’s available around the clock, such as AI-based chatbots, smart FAQ pages or a dynamic contact form. Userlike also lets you link your favorite tools, such as Slack, Salesforce, Mailchimp and more so you can benefit from efficient workflows.

Getting set up takes just five minutes. Test us out — with no obligation — with our 14-day free trial.