An average time of answering a question related to customer service is 15 hours and 17 minutes. As digital channels and online availability of language schools develop, expectations of the customers with regards to mutual communication grow. How to increase the communication speed and contribute to a positive customer experience?
In this article you will learn:
- Why is it worthwhile to perform an analysis of customer service?
- What are the current expectations of customers?
- How to increase the speed of the communication with students?
Why is it worthwhile to perform an analysis of customer service?
To begin with, I will tell you a story.
Some time ago a friend of mine signed up for a free trial lesson over Skype in a language school. The lesson took place as promised, my friend was very glad and interested in continuing his education, now against a tuition fee. Unfortunately, from day to day his enthusiasm was waning… Why? Because after the lesson nobody contacted him.
And now for some (frightening) statistics for 2017:
- 41% of the companies do not reply to e-mails related to customer service;
- 90% of the companies do not confirm or inform customers on receiving their messages;
- 99% of the companies do not follow customer experience to check whether customers are satisfied with the reply;
- only 11% of the companies are able to provide a full answer to a question in their first message
- and last but not least…
- the average time of a reply to a question related to customer service is 15 hours and 17 minutes!!!
Do some soul-searching and answer the following question: What is it like in your language school?
What are the customers’ expectations?
In the independent LivePerson report, whose research covered almost six thousand consumers from six different states, a “perfect online customer experience” was built. Learn 7 requirements that will help you to improve the students’ satisfaction:
CUSTOMER SERVICE
- Fast problem resolution.
- Question answered in the first interaction.
- Nice customer service (a smile is never out of fashion).
A WEBSITE
Your website should be built in such a way that the user experience is the best possible (the website responds to the needs of Internet users, involves them to the extent they want to stay there).
- Visible information about the offered services or products.
- Easy navigation.
- Finding answers to questions.
- Obtaining assistance at the website.
Customer experience in the virtual world is today something directly affecting customers’ decisions in real life.
How to improve the speed of the communication with students?
Use of mobile devices, instant access to information, a million useful applications… All of that makes your customers expect things to be more, faster and simpler. And besides, they want to have the choice of the channel over which they can contact your school.
The Contact tab at the school’s website, where you provide your e-mail address and telephone number, does not suffice anymore. Online availability means your school can be contacted 24/7. Have no fear! This does not mean you have to sit in front of a laptop or stay on the phone non-stop. There are easier ways to build a positive customer experience.
1. Live Chat
LiveChat enables chatting with customers visiting your website in real time. A responsive tool allows for answering questions of potential students over a phone or tablet.
If you are unavailable, a customer has the option of leaving a message with you. You can change the appearance of your widget and the texts displayed on it.
2. Phone calls to the website
This is not about an ordinary text but about a dedicated window appearing when someone visits your website. Callpage encourages visitors to leave their phone number and at the same time promises feedback within 28 seconds. Within that time the call centre in your language school becomes connected with a potential customer.
3. Bots
Do you remember “Clippy – the clip at MS Office package? It can be called a forerunner of bots, or a software that takes the form of an automatic assistant that answers questions from customers. However, it does not do so live but with the use of answers prepared in advance.
Chatbots are present in such communicators as Facebook’s Messenger, Skype or Slack, which is used by companies. So far communication with bots is used in Poland by few, while abroad it is a popular tool for interactions with customers.
Owing to bots, you can automate the communication or even encourage users to take specific actions, e.g. make a purchase.
What is interesting, there is a spell-check bot. It is called “Nurtz” and is part of a Slack business communicator.
From the marketing viewpoint, bots can be used for the promotion of a brand/product/offer.
In Poland, this fact was noticed – among others – by a television station that attracts millions of viewers during “Millionaire” television game show. Well, TVN created a chatbot you can play with to win a virtual one million zlotys. To start the game, one should you use the Messenger’s search engine to enter Millionaires TVN and click on the Start button. What is interesting, every week the bot sends a reminder about the broadcast of the programme on television. This can provide an inspiration for you to promote your courses.
See an example of language school from Warsaw.
4. SMS communication
What do you do when a teacher cancels a class or replaces it with an online lesson? Do you call all students to inform them about it or do you write e-mails? You can use an easier method, i.e. SMSs. There are many tools for mass-scale sending of mobile messages. If you use the LangLion Platform, you can communicate with students by sending SMS messages directly from the system.
Remember that you can inform the students not only about crisis situations but also notify them about overdue payments (SMSs reach the recipients directly so this is an effective action) or send information about the newest offers of courses and promotions.
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In the era of the development of technologies, omnipresent knowledge, accessibility of the Internet, average users demand more. First of all, they count on reliable service, clarity of information and instant assistance. Therefore, to facilitate this process to them you should offer to the customers the possibility to choose the channel over which they will interact with your language school. Just make sure this is not the first and at the same time the last interaction
Ps. If you want to learn more about bots, please let us know in the comments.