Insight

6 Ways to Maximize Text Messaging for Customer Service

Text messaging is how consumers prefer to communicate with businesses for customer service. Here’s how to do it best.

Texting helps you solve customer service questions and problems fast, in a way that customers actually enjoy. In fact, 77% of people want to text for customer service, including:

Back-and-forth conversations about products, services, or accounts
Support-related questions
Product ordering and payments
Scheduling trainings or calls for additional help

A well-equipped business texting service like Text Request empowers your customer service team to streamline communications in one place, while enabling your customers to effortlessly reach out.

Below are six ways to apply text messaging in your day-to-day, so you can improve the customer experience, reduce costs, and grow revenue.

Why use text messaging for customer service?

Texting is how most people communicate. It’s much more efficient than phone calls, too, which creates better experiences for everyone. Customers spend less time waiting for help, and employees can service more customers with less stress.

Additionally, customers lean more towards personalized service. They don’t want to deal with an automated phone tree or chatbot. They just want to ask a real person their question and get a helpful, friendly answer. Text messaging enables that better than most options.

Two-way conversational texting can also help streamline your customer service processes, since the average rep can handle 10x more text conversations than phone calls.

6 Ways to Unlock the Full Potential of Text Messaging for Customer Service

1. Answer customer questions and solve problems in real-time.

Great customer service comes from being available and quick to respond. Texting is perfect for that. Once the customer has your number saved in their phone, they can reach out whenever they have questions, concerns, or want to buy something.

So how do you direct customers to text you for customer service?

Display a call-to-action (CTA) like, “Have any questions? Text us at [number]!” on places such as your website, social media, digital and physical ads, and in-store—wherever you would prompt customers to reach out.

Our SMS Chat feature is an easy way you can directly advertise that customers can text you. It’s a widget customers can use to message you directly from your website with any questions they have. The widget can even be formatted to display the CTA above, or something similar.

SMS Chat starts conversations between real people, which is way better than using chatbots that just leave people frustrated.

You can also set office hours with your autoresponses, so even if you're not available at the moment, the customer feels taken care of. Autoresponder acts as your out-of-office text message. If a customer texts you while you’re unavailable, the autoresponder sends an instant reply with whatever information you want people to have.

2. Give your customer service reps a shared line.

A dedicated line for your reps to share helps effectively manage incoming customer conversations. That way your customer service team can monitor text conversations all from the same place. If a member of your team is out or tied up with other customers, another person can jump in and pick up the same conversation without skipping a beat.

Once customer service reps have their designated space to handle texts, they can implement a streamlined process like:

As soon as a customer service conversation comes in, a rep is assigned to the customer with a Contact Tag
If the question is a common one, reps can use a pre-made text template to answer it
If the issue is more complicated, reps can ask a few clarifying questions
If it’s more detailed than that, reps can schedule a phone call via a texted link
From there, reps can document notes about the rest of the conversation, in case the customer needs future help

Business texting makes it easy for your customer service team to stay in sync from one shared platform. Customers will have their problems solved quicker and know they can rely on your team to respond instantly. That helps both your overall reputation and bottom line.

3. Schedule training, support calls, or in-person services with SMS.

Most customer service interactions are basic questions and check-ins about things like account updates and support, product ordering, appointments, and all the questions that come up along the customer journey. It's more efficient to handle these short conversations via text than phone call or email.

That said, there are times when you need a different channel to better flesh out a conversation, such as:

The customer says they feel stuck or doesn’t understand the instructions you messaged them
You have to break heavy news, like a mistake was made, or you can’t give the customer a solution that was previously promised
The customer accuses you of something that could potentially hurt your reputation
You need to hash out something complicated or nuanced

Hearing a human voice is key to showing the customer you understand the weight of the situation, and it prevents any further misunderstandings from occurring. Other situations where a conversation might need to be redirected to a different medium include:

Troubleshooting or activating equipment
Financial transactions, such as applying for a loan
Medical consultations
Luxury or high-end purchases
Further training on how to use your product

If you need to schedule a time to talk later, just text a calendar link so they can choose the best time for them.

4. Improve customer retention by following up via text.

Customers recognize when a business goes above and beyond for them. Texting to check in on customers is a powerful way to strengthen your business relationship.

There’s also a huge benefit for businesses operationally. If there’s any potential issue, you want to know about it ASAP, and this will help you turn the situation around. Customer loyalty and operational efficiency are two sides of the same coin here.

Examples of text reach-outs include:

Did we fix the problem?
How was your experience with [service/product]?
Was there anything about your experience that could have been better?

You can create pre-made text templates for each of these check-ins, as well as common questions customers ask. Text templates help reps handle common problems quickly and consistently, which is a core element to boosting your customer service.

5. Allow customers to pay by text.

Providing an effortless payment process is part of a quality customer service experience. That said, it can be difficult to get in contact with customers when they need payment reminders or when a credit card fails.

Text payments improve the customer experience by shortening the collection process and offering a contactless way to settle a bill, all at the speed of text. In fact, 69% of customers want to receive texts related to making payments, including:

Invoices
Secure links to pay
Payment reminders and requests
Updating expired credit card and billing information

Use our Payments feature to do all of this through text. You’ll be able to collect secure payments instantly through SMS all within the same platform.

So how can your business implement text payments into your customer service operations?

Make it clear that customers have the option to pay securely via text. Advertise this via your website, mobile app, social media, or email newsletters.
Teach customers how to send a text payment by giving clear instructions on what keywords or prompts they need to send.
Provide real-time payment confirmation texts with the relevant details such as the amount paid and invoice number.
Equip your reps with the knowledge to handle text payments.

Giving customers a quick, convenient way to settle bills boosts their satisfaction, leading to more repeat business and streamlined revenue flow.

6. Ask for reviews and feedback to improve your reputation.

Customer reviews are a direct reflection of your customer service and support, which is why it’s important to gather high quality, authentic feedback from your customers.

If someone has a great customer service experience, ask them for a Google review. That completes the customer cycle, and has benefits like ranking higher in search and bringing in more new customers.

If the customer has a negative experience, ask them for private feedback so you can handle the situation internally and improve your processes. A Review Management service like ours helps manage these review requests and feedback all in one place, so you can show off your stellar customer service.

Here are some tips for creating a successful review management strategy:

Google Reviews are the lifeblood for most companies, so it’s important to focus your primary efforts on that platform.
Consider the right timing to ask for a review, which is going to be after you’ve checked in on a customer or handled their questions.
Monitor and respond to reviews, and encourage customers to leave you private feedback if they didn’t have a positive experience.
Analyze and implement feedback by actively pinpointing patterns and making room for improvement as necessary.

Understanding your customers' needs, expectations, and pain points is fundamental to enhancing the customer experience. You’ll strengthen relationships with your customers, increase traffic to your business, and grow your reputation.

Improve Your Customer Service with Text Request

A business platform like Text Request keeps your customer service team available to quickly field incoming texts without affecting your voice services. When you prioritize speed and efficiency for your customer service, you’ll gain an edge over competitors and strengthen your customer relationships.

To learn more about how Text Request can streamline your customer service communications, contact us directly with questions, or schedule a demo.