Live Chat vs. Chatbots: How to Start Effective Conversations (According to 26 Marketers)

How do you start a conversation?

This is likelynot您在整个日常互动中有意识地思考的事情。对话刚刚发生，对吗？

好吧，有点。人类是社会生物，我们每个人都拥有正确的话要说的直觉，我们应该对他们说的人以及我们应该如何说。（当然，精通的程度各不相同，有时对每个人都有很大的变化。）

但是当涉及到业务吗？哇，可以很容易地消除东西吗？糟糕

We overthink. We overpromise. We come on too strong. We ask the wrong questions. Too many questions. Notenough问题。（你明白了。）

These conversations, regardless of where they’re happening, matter.

Areport by Intercomfound website visitors are 82% more likely to convert into paying customers if they’ve chatted with the business beforehand, and their accounts are worth 13% more than shoppers who haven’t spoken with you, pre-sign up.

好消息？

There are tools that can make it easier to engage. And, website conversations don’t have to cost an arm and a leg when you’re using live chat or chatbot programs. (Even better when theaverage cost to acquire a new SaaS or technology customer是$ 395。）

因此，如果您准备向访问您网站的人们提供帮助，那么这是26个营销人员共享的最佳提示。

How can I start customer conversations?

Before we dive in, you need to get to grips withhowyou’ll start these customer conversations.

电子邮件？电话？还是完全不同的东西？

Google的一项研究发现61％的移动用户call a business when they’re in the purchase phase of the buying cycle.

But in today’s modern age, you don’t have to pick up the phone to start converting people into high-paying customers.

There are two other approaches you can use to start conversations with the people who’re engaging with your website, but haven’t yet hit the “contact” button:

• Live聊天: An online customer service platform that allow customers to speak with you (or someone on your team) in real-time.
• Chatbots: An automated system that replies to customers using artificial intelligence, without the need for human input.

So, is one more effective than the other?While there’s plenty of anecdotal evidence out there to suggest that people would rather speak to an actual human, 37% of the brands we spoke with see no difference in response rates between live chat and chatbots.

But these marketers have a preference–and share their best tip for optimizing their chat system to start conversations with customers.

Chatbots

“Within our chatbox[chatbots]，我们已经对我们的团队成员进行了可见的代表，这些成员准备回答在线访问者可能遇到的任何问题。”HouseCall Pro‘s Chris Eckstrum.

他说，他的聊天机器人“非常有效且受到访客的好评”，因为“看到一个身体上的人看起来更具吸引力，而且在必须划分不同类型的问题时也更有效”。

(A great way to encourage conversations; more on that later.)

据估计仅2％的客户服务部门are actively using chatbots–but that’s expected to soar in the next few years, with Gartner predicting25％的部门will integrate AI-based platforms by 2020.

Yet to take full advantage of chatbots, you need to start pushing potential customers towards starting a conversation through your AI platform.

这可以通过使聊天机器人出现在页面上的Kristel Staci上，可以做到这一点BloggingTips.com解释说：“我们喜欢设置在特定页面上弹出的聊天功能，并根据人们所打开的页面有不同的问题。例如，如果某人在托管页面上，我们将询问他们在选择托管计划时是否需要任何帮助。另一方面，如果他们在SEO或营销页面上，我们可以询问他们当前的营销工作如何为他们工作。”

Kristel adds: “This has worked nicely in both examples, especially in starting conversations and gaining new leads and customers.”

blogging.org‘s Zac Johnson, on the other hand, recommends having “a little popup window appear on the bottom right corner of the page. With this being more commonplace on sites these days, more people are open to the idea of responding to these forms and when they are ready to engage, it usually leads to higher conversions.”

Communicate the value of your chatbot throughout

太棒了!你安装的chatbot,但是你yet to see a steady stream of conversations trickle through.

What happens next?

The answer isn’t “wait for customers to press the chat button”. You’ll need to be the one starting the conversation, and lend an olive branch to your website visitors.

“We find the most effective way to get a user to engage with a chatbot is to communicate the expectations, and the value, from the opening line”, explains Hillary Black ofBlack Ops.

Putting this into practice, Black says: “This would be something like ‘want to see if we can help you sell your home faster and for more money?’ ‘Want to schedule a test drive?’ ‘Want to get a quote for life insurance?'”

Think about timing triggers

Since chatbots handle conversations automatically, there’s no need to manually analyze your website analytics to determine the best time to start a conversation with each individual visitor.

Chatbots offer the chance to personalize your approach and define a set of rules that only push customers who’re likely to convert towards your chatbot.

…One of which is timing.

Here’sGrow Hack Scale‘s David Oragui explaining how they use timing triggers on their chatbots:

“我们让用户触发我们的聊天机器人通过CTA buttons or after they’ve spent at least 15 seconds on our website, rather than popping them up immediately after a visitor hits our site. When our chatbot is triggered, we send them the following message: “Thanks for checking us out! What’re you looking for today?” and present them with three button response options so they’re routed to the right person.”

最好的部分？大卫说，这种方法帮助他们将“权力重新掌握在客户手中”。

Summarizing, he says: “Using them in this way ensures we’re able to start more conversations, re-route visitors to the right department/person and qualify them, so we’re only spending time and resources on people who’re genuinely interested in working with us.”

Use personalization

Timing triggers are a form of personalization–somethingIntuit‘s Casey Phillips says “is key when it comes to user engagement on the opening chatbot welcome message.”

Phillips says: “You need to make the user feel confident in the chatbot’s ability and making them feel as though the conversation is tailored to them is a great way to do so. If the user thinks they’re seeing the same welcome message as every other user they will assume they’re about to go down a one-size-fits-all conversational path that is unlikely to get them what they need.”

Duncan Fenn ofSix & Flowagrees, and recommends to take personalization a step further: “Greet your contacts by name and talk to them about the content you know they’ve looked at, the products you know they want to find out more about, the challenges you know they face”.

…As doesOptimizePrime‘s Harris Schachter, who summarizes by saying: “The best way to open a live chat or chatbot conversation is some type of personalization, whether it be based on the landing page and source, job title or level (if it’s b2b), visit count, cookie usage, name (if the visitor has filled out a previous form), etc. You can’t just use a generic conversation starter for everyone, and most chatbots have the features to do minimal personalization.”

The beauty of chatbots? They can personalize these fields automatically.

Myrna Arroyo ofPepper Inbound Marketingtakes advantage of this by “calling out” her visitors: “If the chatbot is triggered from a Facebook Ad, I use an opener “Hi! Are you here for the Free Guide I mentioned on Facebook?”. For my general home page bot, my current opener is “Are you looking for information to help you grow your business?”.

HealthJoy‘s Rick Ramos also uses the personalization trick for his chatbot that “helps people with their healthcare and employee benefits”.

He says: “I feel the more personalized a message, the better. If someone has stopped taking a monthly maintenance drug, like a cholesterol drug, for a few months, we might send them a message. We’ll ask them why they stopped and if there was anything we can do to help. If it’s the monthly cost, we might find them a manufacturer coupon or another way they can save money.”

在聊天机器人答案中包括视频

We’ve all seen the statistics that support the fact video can skyrocket sales:

• 79% of people say a brand’s video has convinced them to buy a piece of software or app (Wyzowl)
• 69% of businesses generated more leads with the help of video content, and 54% of users increased their sales (Renderforest)
• 包括登陆页面上的视频可以将转换率提高80％（Unbounce)

…Which is why Ivana Veljovic, who heads-up the marketing team atAurity, recommends including video in the conversations your chatbot has with potential customers.

Veljovic说：“最近，我们在聊天机器人中添加了个人视频，访问者的参与也有所增加。我们制作的视频很短，大约10秒，以便访问者可以快速互动。作为我们最有价值的资源是人们，我们想通过记录一个人对访客说个人信息来对我们的业务展示面孔。”

Live chat

If you’re not planning to board the chatbot train and prefer your (human) sales department handle all of the conversations you’re having, live chat is a fantastic option.

…Especially when42% of customersprefer live chat over other methods of communication, such as email or social media:

But what exactly does live chat offer that consumers are going crazy for?

“Our customers feel satisfied when their questions are answered in real time, by a real person”, explains Mackenzie Thompson ofNational Health Care Provider Solutions.

和The Advisor Coach詹姆斯·波拉德（James Pollard）说，现场聊天的转变对企业有好处：“我使用实时聊天来提高转化措施。如果有人没有购买产品，通常是因为该人有一两个问题。对我来说，实时聊天是一种旨在回答问题并处理异议的工具。”

量身定制问题的问题

According to the marketers we spoke with for this report, we found that product and service pages, homepages, and pricing pages tend to spark the most productive conversations,with almost 50% of respondents saying the most productive conversations happen on product/service pages.

但这不仅是更高的转化率，也可能是使用此信息的产物。

“使用实时聊天开始对话的最有效方法是在您网站的特定页面上自动主动聊天，其中包含与用户访问的页面相关的问题，”SurgeStream.

…Sense a personalization theme coming along here?

Natasa Christofidou ofYour Business Voicewill echo that advice and explains how you’re able to use the information you’ve already got on your website visitors to start conversations through live chat.

Christofidou says: “For example, we offer Live Chat and Telephone Answering service to our clients, so on the ‘Virtual Receptionist’ part of our website, our live chat would say “Hello there, Have you considered outsourcing your customer service enquiries to ensure that your business is covered for disaster recovery?””.

Live chat + chatbot = perfect harmony?

我们已经浏览了每个对话启动平台的功能，营销人员通常会选择一个或另一个。

但是，Janice Dombrowski说她的团队在Stream Creativeuse a combination to start conversations with customers and guide them towards a sale.

Dombrowski says: “The most important thing you need to remember is that most chatbots should be used for filtering, not for closing sales. Using quick links, drive users down logical pathways that answer their questions, drive them to your educational resources, and if qualified, pass them off to a live agent.

But why does this work so well?

Janice explains: “People like the quick response time and 24/7 access to chatbots, but at the end of the day, they want a human making the final sale.”

Closed-ended questions

Earlier, we mentioned how starting customer conversations is one of the trickiest things about speaking to your customers.

That means there’s huge pressure on the questions you’re asking.

But asGrowth Hackers‘ Jonathan Aufray says, the questions you ask need to relate to their pain points–and the solutions your product offers: “If you know well your audience and your product/service, it means you know the problems your audience is facing, the solution to their problem and the benefits of your product/solution.

He recommends to “ask a question about this problem”. For example: “Let’s say you’re developing a solution to prevent entrepreneurs from procrastinating. You could ask a question like ‘Do you want to be more productive?’ or, ‘Do you want to stop procrastinating’ or, ‘You’re in front of your screen but nothing gets done. Does it sound familiar?'”

These are close-ended questions. According to our report,51% of marketers say these are more effective at starting a conversations on your website.

Closed-ended questions have a simple answer; usually “yes” or “no.”

Alex Robinson ofTeam Building Hero他们也是他们的忠实粉丝。鲁滨逊说：“我们取得了成功，“嘿，我是一个真实的人。你在吗？”当我们第一次实施此措辞时，我们的响应率从〜3％跃升至接近30％。我们还将其缩短为“嘿，你在那里吗？”并看到了积极的结果。此消息之所以起作用，是因为它可以捷径过去的标准Internet消息传递，后者感觉是销售的，例如“我可以帮助您找到任何东西吗？”。

But, why do closed-ended questions work so well? Alex thinks it’s because “the people that come to our website don’t want to be sold to, they want to be consulted with and have real conversations with real people.”

Tim Absalikov of持久趋势sparks conversations using this closed-ended question: “Hi, I’m Mark. Let me know if I can help with anything, Okay?”. He says it works so well because it “is good at getting people to talk because for one, you’ve established yourself as an actual person waiting to help them whenever they need it and you also ask them if it’s okay.”

Guava Family泰勒·霍尔（Taylor Hall）简短而甜美的使用：“您好，我可以帮助您找到今天要寻找的东西吗？”。

Whereas Kenneth Burke, who heads upText Request‘s marketing department, says: “The most effective conversation starter we’ve used for live chat has been “What are you looking for?”. People have a question in mind when they make it to your website, and they’re looking for an answer. […] This worked a lot better than phrases like “How can I help?” or “Welcome to Text Request!””.

It seems closed-ended questions are a fantastic way to start conversations through chatbots or live chat, right?

Summarizing, here’s Connor Gross ofLola.comexplaining why: “The goal in starting a live chat is not to qualify a prospect but make it super simple for them to start a conversation. An example would be: “Do you have a pricing question?” and give the prospect a “yes” and a “no” option. From there you can set up your funnels accordingly but you need to make it specific and even a yes or no question to help engage them.”

Open-ended questions

我们知道大多数营销人员和销售团队都喜欢封闭的问题。

But, that sparks yet another important question: Is there still room to ask open-ended questions–and more importantly, will your website visitors respond to them?

Mackenzie Thompson ofNational Health Care Provider Solutionsthinks so: “Our customer service representatives have been trained to give the customer what they want, they do this by adapting to the customer, and using relatable answers that don’t sound canned, and get at the root of the question being asked.”

As doesCatalyst Marketing Agency‘s Ollie Roddy, who uses “Hi, is there anything I can help with or are you just browsing? :)” to start customer conversations through live chat because “writing in a personal manner like this makes people feel as though you are actually typing it out to them on the spot.”

“在测试了各种对话开始之后，我们得到最好的回应是‘嘿，欢迎来到第2广场营销！今天把你带到这里的是什么？''Square 2.

Clemens says this approach is “simple, easy to understand, and right to the point” and takes it a step further by customizing “some button responses based on the most frequent responses and then based on their responses have the chatbot or live chat take over from there.”

无论您问什么，都记得您在与真实的人说话

Whether you’re using chatbots or live chat to start conversations with your potential customers,WebMechanix‘s Chris Mechanic advises remembering you’re talking to a real person on the other side (even in B2B).

He says: “If you’re competing for attention in a noisy world, standard questions such as ‘How can I help you?’ just aren’t going to get much response. Add in a little bit of personality and maybe some punctuation to stand out and get a response. For instance, we’re currently testing a standard message such as ‘How can I help you?’ but in parenthesis afterward, we mention ‘We’re really friendly.'”

The result? Chris says: “This is coupled with real images of the chat operators and does well in terms of response, but more importantly, has lead to many conversations and meaningful dialogue.”

结果厨房大卫·杰格（David Jaeger）同意，并说他们的开场白是“嘿，是丹尼尔！我们可以为您提供下一次购买$ 10的折扣（适用一些排除）。让我们知道您是否想要要约或帮助……”有助于他们“影响20％的销售额”。