Live chat etiquettes are an inevitable part of the chat service provided by the websites these days. These are certain guidelines that if followed while providing an online chat support can help enhance the customer service . Let’s have a look at the most important guidelines that need not be missed out.

Understand your audience:

You need to have a good understanding of your target audience so as to determine their requirements and pain points. Using the words that your customers use helps them understand the things more easily and enhance the customer experience.

Avoid using ellipses:

Ellipses are the three dots used at the end of a sentence while chatting. You should direct your live chat agents to avoid using these as they can appear to be dominating in a text-based conversation. Also, tell your chat agents to be to-the-point and direct while chatting with a visitor.

Provide faster responses:

According to a research, over half of all customers become irritated if they don’t talk to a live person right away while 45% of customers will abandon a purchase if they don’t receive an answer from customer support instantly. So, you need to instruct your live chat agents to automatically accept live chat requests so as to provide a faster problem resolution.

Make use of correct grammar, spellings, and punctuation:

As a matter of fact, usage of bad grammar, wrong spellings, and incorrect punctuations has a negative impact on your website as it makes you look unprofessional. So, make sure that the chat agents use correct grammar, spelling, and punctuations while speaking to a website visitor, irrespective of the language.

Keep the visitors updated:

There is a possibility that a chat agent may be handling multiple tasks simultaneously and need some time answering the visitor’s questions, which might leave each customer waiting from time to time. Or some customer may ask a question that requires gathering much information that further demands longer time. So you have to train your live chat agents in such a way that they can handle such situations efficiently. Ask them to keep the visitors updated with their current status so that they can wait with patience.

Patience is the key:

Your site visitors may have queries related to product information or payment options. Either way, they use the live chat feature to ask for your help. It is your duty to tell your chat agents that no matter what kind of day you’re having, it’s their job to be patient, kind and helpful.

Follow the end-of-the-chat-protocols:

Whether a particular chat helps to convert or not, it should not end abruptly. Direct your chat agents to follow the end-of-the-chat protocols to conclude the chat. These protocols help leave the visitor feeling good about the whole conversation and enhance the customer experience.

Source: http://www.livechatagent.com/live-chat-etiquette-customer-experience/

Author's Bio: 

Owner of the Article.

Live chat etiquette is a defined set of guidelines that needs to be followed while helping out your site visitors through live chat.