Business 2.0

Build Rapport With Online Customers

2009-10-17T14:13:00.000-07:00

One of the hardest problems online business websites have is converting their visitors to buyers. This is experienced by mostly all business websites, probably even yours if you have one. To make a good conversion, there are a few steps that an owner should take, based on the observations of certain patterns created by common shoppers. By tracing these patterns, almost all of this can be avoided and those browsers will soon decrease and the buyers will be on an increase.

Probably one of the most important things to do first is to make sure that your website offers quality customer service. Remember, customers always want to feel important so give them utmost importance. You may consider outsourcing the customer service support aspect of your business to companies like http://live247support.com so as allow you to focus on the other aspect of the business. Next factor to consider is the checkout process which should be clear, concise, and confined. The top reason people leave their shopping carts is because it is taking too long to checkout. The Global Millennia Marketing Study also cites some other important reasons people leave the shopping area such as the following: requiring too much personal information, poor navigation, poor download times, confusing checkout process, and requiring registration to purchase.

Checkout is a key part of your online website, mostly because it is one of the biggest sorts of revenue for your site. This can be crucial to the upkeep cost of the site. When people decide they want to buy, they should be able to buy quickly. The more time they spend trying to buy, the more time they may spend second guessing themselves. There are some very good ways to keep the complexity of this problem down. One of them is by not requiring your guests to login before their purchase. Most buyers are not going to remember their login information, so they won’t want to waste time getting their information. Allow the buyers to skip this step and possibly track their order by the order number, or you could invite them to create their login information after the purchase.

By now, you need to make sure that you are keeping everything simple. Nothing is to be too complicating with this process. Make sure that you are only asking for the minimum amount of information that is needed to make the sale. Remember that the more screens a user sees or has to flip through, is money coming from your pocket. You need to make sure that you have a perfect balance between the numbers of pages in a checkout process to the length of the pages. A user doesn’t want to have to flip through a bunch of pages just to get to the end. Nor does the buyer want to see one long page that he or she has to fill out, since this may scare them and force them to abort the purchase. Find the balance between the number of screens and the amount of information asked for in each screen. By breaking up screens, buyers will see that the process seems to be shorter.

What’s a purchase without knowing how well the product seems to be with a marketing survey? The last step that you should make of your checkout is a survey on the marketing. These questions are to collect data on the type of buyers that are coming to your site. One important thing about these pages is that they need to load fast. Buyers don’t want to wait a long time for these pages to load. A good way to get rid of that problem is to decrease the graphics on the page to little or none. The page should load with in two seconds. Basically you should just make the survey pages look a lot like the checkout pages, so that the buyer is used to the same page layout.

After all these good tips, how can the effectiveness of the checkout actually are measured? The most common way of measuring this statistic is by calculating the ratio of the number of people that order and the number of people who began the checkout process. This is called “cart conversion.” Ideally you would want the cart conversion to be 100%, but that is not always the case. The high shipping costs at the end could force someone to leave their cart. These are normal barriers that will have to always be fought. A high cart conversion is ideal for everyone in this business, but not always possible. By analyzing the visitors and buyers on your website, you should be able to make some good fixes to the page layout and check out process to satisfy your buyers and increase your sales indefinitely.

Live Customer Support Software

2009-10-17T04:19:00.000-07:00

For many companies operating or actually doing business whether big, small or medium scale industry, there is always a new trend coming in the market. And one of these is what we call Live Customer Support Software which can be very beneficial and very helpful to every company particularly in the field of customer service area of the business. Live customer support software is less expensive and much cheaper and can easily be downloaded or purchased through different websites in the internet. It is designed for every company who want to improve their (ROI) return of investment or income as well as for those who want to improve their customer relationship by providing quicker response to their clients/customers inquiries or needs. Live customer support software cater the use of customer support online

via live chatting which are now being used everywhere in the internet. Like in the field where there are some discussions, forums, blogs or even in posting. It can be said that live customer support software is one of the best ways of improving your customer relations and even increasing your company return of investment (ROI). Therefore, I guess every company whether big or small, needs and should have their own live customer support software these days.

The Conversion Strategy

2009-10-16T08:18:00.000-07:00

You’ve built your website, sourced your suppliers, set your terms, and launched the perfect on-line business. Then you wait, and watch. Day after day, you check the stats, they’re looking, they’re visiting, but they are not buying. The frustration sets in and you ask yourself, what did I do wrong?

Cart conversion, or turning shoppers into buyers, is critical in your on-line business. Cart conversion affects your bottom line. The more cart conversions that go through successfully, the more money your site makes. One would hope that everyone who put something into his or her shopping cart would convert to a sale. Unfortunately, the national average of conversion is roughly 30%, according to various sources, including FireClick. So 70% of your customers will not actually purchase what they pick up. There are many cited reasons for shopping cart abandonment, including poor navigation, slow loading pages, asking for too much information, and registrations. Here we enter into a look at on-line business strategies that can turn your lookers into buyers.

Throughout this article, there is a key strategy that applies across the board. SIMPLIFY – I just cannot stress enough, the importance of simplifying. Don’t overcomplicate your site, and make it easy for me to do business with you.

Take a look at your checkout process. Even the most avid customer will stop mid-sale and leave your site if the process is too consuming. Are you collecting too much information? This can leave customers feeling uneasy. Is the process too long? According to a recent survey by Nielsen Online, a service of the Nielsen Company indicated 81 on-line shoppers out of the 1000 surveyed, shop online to save time, not money. Do not waste their time. What information do you need to conduct your transaction? Only collect that information from your buyers.

Do you have your customers register or log in to make purchases? This can be a major deterrent to most on-line buyers. When you go to the local grocery, do they ask you to register to buy food? No, it’s a waste of time. Think - get in, make the purchase, and get out. Requiring customers to register or log in, unless you have a really good reason for doing so, is pushing your customers away. Remember that they are shopping your store for convenience of time. How many sites have you registered on, and forgotten the login or password? Presenting the option however, of registering to gain the ability of reviewing previous order history, or tracking their order, feels like great customer service. Just offer it after you’ve gotten the sale, this allows them to choose whether or not to spend the time.

How do your checkout screens check out? Is it one, continuous, overwhelming screen? Is it many screens collecting piles of unnecessary information? Customers need to get in, make the purchase, and get out. However, the checkout process should build confidence, or they start second guessing their purchase, and start tossing items out of their cart. Or worse, they run completely. Make the process short and sweet. One continuous form they have to scroll down looks like a big process to time savvy customers, so break your checkout form into quick, and bite sized pieces. Keep the graphics on the checkout pages to a minimum; eliminate them with great product descriptions if you can. The ideal number of screens to check out is two to three. This eases the customer by building confidence that you aren’t collecting too much information, or wasting their time.

One final aspect to examine is your placement of your marketing survey. Marketing statistics is the key to tracking the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns, so eliminating the collection of this data isn’t an option. Entertain the idea however, of moving the collection of this data to follow the sale. Again, this is a time conscious shopper; don’t distract them from buying your products. The relief comes to the customer once they complete their purchase, and they most likely will oblige in providing the information you desire.

Now there are obviously, many other site issues that can impact cart conversion rates, such as security, shipping time or shipping rates. It’s always best to look at the whole picture from the customers’ point of view. Cleaning up, simplifying your checkout process and quality customer service are key steps to securing more sales for your on-line business. There are several customer service support providers around like http://live247support.com -- and analytics tools available on the web that can aid you in the fine tuning of your on-line business, such as Google Analytics. So take the time to make the process simple, and then track the effectiveness of your hard work.

Enhance Your Online Business

2009-10-15T20:29:00.000-07:00

Advanced technology enhances business and live chat software is one of such example. Constant touch with the customer is the latest buzz in the business arena of today. Live chat software exhibits this function at a very economical way as it boosts the sales right from company’s website. Live chat software provides live interaction of site visitor or customer individually and help resolving their individual queries. It helps them to final business deals while saving much of the time.

For any business type, live chat software is the ultimate choice. It also lifts the visitors or customer from their usual time taking queries to fast resolving option. This software provides all the details of the visitors on your web site at any point of time like what page they are searching, from which place they belong, at right time etc. It also shows whether the customer needs your help or just checking it out. Moreover this software helps you to give direction to your website visitor to the particular web page that you think could be more useful for the visitor.

In this way you can provide more information to your visitor through your website and help them to decide purchase. If the visitor expresses any doubt you can instantly invite them for chatting with you in order to resolve it. Live Chat Software is good for providing live help or support to your customer. This software makes your website live and more interactive as it is the need of the hour. Check out http://live247support .com for instance and find out why it is no doubt that this software offer best customer care services and resolve customers’ needs instantly.

The software enables you to help different customers at the same time on individual basis at low cost. This helps you to use the stored responses and push web pages and save time in a cost cutting method. Live chat software has several functions like the actual time visitor supervision, live text chat on individual basis, automated positive chat invitation, personalized online or offline status graphics, pushing of web pages, incorporate with auction web sites such as eBay etc.

Live chat software has different audio notifications, web based edge for visitor observing and chatting. There is no need to downloading or install the software. It has individual windows application for visitor observing and chatting is completely free. Apart form all these functions this software has several sections support, leaving message for specific section, providing hidden hits counter or hits log analyzer, personalized on-line or off-line images, pre-chat or leave message for personalization, personalized visitor chat window. You can use any language or extending support by using any language, geographical location tracking for visitors like city, region and country. This software canned the responses with pro-pop ups or auto pop-ups. It also has pay per click or publicity campaign tracking and sends live support status in e-mails.

Live chat software offer numerous options to help you enhances your business and the price you pay for this is very meager. This software is available at very reasonable rates.

Why Customer Support Software?

2009-10-14T23:40:00.000-07:00

At the core of every successful online business is an effective software that facilitates costumer traffic to the website. Because there is no physical space to accommodate clients, online businesses basically rely on support software to attend to the needs of the costumers.

There is no limit to the size of a business for it to need an online customer support system. Apart from still-life ads of a business’ product, the best way to transform mere visitors of a site into a customer who buys and patronizes its products is thru an effective online customer support system, regardless of a business’ size.

Internet customer support was not very affordable in the past. Now, in the age of computers and the internet, customer support becomes easily available thru computer software. The cost of utilizing this software was previously too high. However, there are several available support software now in the market that are cost-effective -- less expensive, built with the latest technology, and can be used in multiple costumer care solutions. Your company may have spent an amount for this support software but considering the competition among the providers today, one may definitely be able source out more affordable options. One company like http://live247support.com for example, is offering several packages depending on your business needs. Whichever is suitable to you, the returns are evident in the increase of your sales.

Features of the modern customer support software include automatic chat or live chat, live help, live support and automatic responder systems. These added attributes are incorporated into previous support systems because it has been seen that their goal is not just to quickly attend to the needs of the customers but ultimately to develop long-term trust from the customers and business partners.

Through customer support software, it will be a lot easier to receive, process, and take action to consumer purchases, requests, and complaints, thus cutting total business cost. Because it is a “software” and is, for the most part, automated, customer support software eliminates the need for more manpower to handle costumer needs. Moreover, it can make use of a database containing previous questions and answers which can be easily retrieved for use both by clients and personnel. It is also easy to maintain and it takes away the expenses for costly infrastructure.

Gaining the trust of customers and at the same time cutting operating costs are the major benefits of using customer support software. Plus with the technology currently incorporated in the Internet, traffic control becomes effective and volume of incoming requests can possibly be decreased.

Customer support software also provides a way to synchronize all contacts, dates, events, records, among others. Communication between personnel-to-costumer and personnel-to-personnel will now be simpler, faster, and cheaper. You can also monitor the behavior of you website’s visitors, which in turn will allow you to predict consumer trends and improve your marketing strategies.

Present day customer support software is also upgradeable to future and more effective versions. In case you’ll need additional features to suit your business need, be sure to choose a software that is flexible enough to readily be able to acquire these features. Be careful to pick a software that can cater your business’ present needs and can expand its abilities as your business grows.

Increase Customer Confidence

2009-10-14T02:17:00.000-07:00

Shopping online is an entirely different process than that which one might expect to experience as a consumer in a department or specialty store. It is the direct, one-on-one, face-to-face sales communication that makes the difference in closing a sale, and now, that important edge is available via a live chat program to answer questions from customers as soon as they arise. For online businesses, this is godsent for three important reasons:

1. Time and money (Count as one reason only, please.) Live chat software saves money and resources - two valued commodities in any online business. Compared to the cost of hiring phone operators, live online support is less expensive and better adapted to servicing the needs of customers. Consider the amount of time that could be saved if operators could send prepared responses to those most frequently asked questions.

2. Availability. Live chat software doesn’t go home, to the bathroom or close for weekends, holidays and vacations. It is always there to service the needs of customers quickly and easily. Help when it is needed and not when it is convenient is a very important selling point of Live chat software, which can honestly promise to be there “24/7” and deliver its claim every single time.

3. Increasing the browse-to-buying ratio. Online customers demand answers when they ask them and the process of having to wait could make a consumer reluctant to make a purchase. Quick answers and a customer’s confidence in the answer can only help to close a sale quickly.

The last thing I want to do is recommend things but http://live247support.com stands out to be the leading example in providing excellent online customer service.

So what are YOU waiting for?

Unveil Online Business Software

2009-10-13T21:47:00.000-07:00

Do you want to know the hidden mystery behind business websites and internet pages? It is on how quick your services are and the quality of communication between the company representatives and its clients and guests.

With the enhanced human technology of today’s time, a new program known as “live chat software” continues to increase the rates of sales and business output of business websites. Why is that? Simply because these live chat software offer an almost instantaneous response or responses to its clients and website visitors, unlike in the olden ways where people had to send emails to the company website and wait for a longer period of time to get an answer.

With these new-age live chat software, customer representatives are able to provide quality support and aid to their clients by holding a one on one chat or talk with them at the same time, in short, no more waiting, just communicating. Due to this, it makes it easier and faster for the website’s clients to think, evaluate, and decide whether or not to purchase the company’s products or not.

Almost all live chat software found online are user-friendly and very simple to use and manipulate. They are usually found in the website itself. You just type in your inquiries, comments, or suggestions and click on the send button and the online customer service representative will immediately receive and respond to it. And, one of the best things about them is that you do not have to install, download, or configure anything to and from your computer. They are hosted and managed entirely by the company’s web developers. Also, it helps the company know all necessary and valuable data such as the location of their visitors and clients and what services and products are they mostly interested in. These software also help the company track the number of its website visitors thus helping them evaluate and come up with better solutions on how to make their company, products, and customer services better.

Want to try out these live chat software? All you need is a working internet browser and good internet connection. Just visit the website you want ant then that’s it. All people regardless of background or location can use the software. Do not worry; they are so user-friendly you might even not stop using them once you get the hang of it.

There are a lot of inexpensive live chat software in the internet today. One example would be that of http://live247support.com which has been highly rated and is said to be one of the most reliable and fastest live chat software provider in the e-Commerce industry today.

Almost all large internet websites and web pages rely on this new technology to help boost sales and customer awareness of their products and services nowadays… E-bay, small and large law firms, business ads, online stores, shops, and malls, services such as web hosting and finance, real estate and insurance agencies, and so much more. Nevertheless, all sides of the pole be it sellers, buyers, or just plain visitors gain a total 100% benefit from these live chat software.

So why not try these live chat software today and see the wonders it will bring to both the company and the client.

Live Customer Service for Your Website

2009-10-12T00:48:00.000-07:00

It’s always nice if you are able to exchange a few words with the clients of your website. There was a time when the customers used to send emails to the authors of the website and wait for long time to get a reply. Sometimes this long wait ended up with the user getting frustrated. But the times have now changed with live chat software giving the ability to the website owners to provide answers to consumers right away.

Via live chat software the company representatives are able to have one on one dialogue with the visitors in real time. By providing real time help it is possible for the representatives to impart live support to the consumer thus enabling the consumers to make instantaneous decision to whether or not buy the product.

Though to provide real time support is the primary function of the live chat software, it also acts as a way to keep a track of the number of visitors to your site and thus helps in upbeat sales of your products. Different forms of live chat software are available in the market but my personal favorite is that of the http://live247support.com for two reasons; the first being that it can be effortlessly installed in your website making it user friendly and second it provides website owners of several options to choose from.

Using live chat software is pretty easy. The only thing that is needed is a web browser. No need for any software to be installed or accessing any servers. Every end user like the customers, administrators and operators can have an access to the software from any part of the world by just using a web browser and getting connected to Internet. Once the live chat software has been embedded in the website code all you need to do is to log through the website and then chat with your potential consumers.

At the moment, live chat software has become the customary communication medium that is being used to serve the customers. The domain is which is enormous ranging from web hosting sites to financial services to real estate services. Thus almost every industry has been known to gain from usage of live chat software as it improves the sales of the company immensely.

For using the chat software the only thing the consumer has to do is to just click on the live chat button provided on the website. This is because of the fact that live chat software is 100% hosted and doesn’t need any installation to be done. The company staff benefits from this software by having a statistic about the number of visitors and also about the trend in the pages that are mostly visited as compared to others. One more impressive functionality of the software is that it facilitates you with the ability to see from which countries the visitors are from and which product or service they are predominantly interested in. Assisting the consumer through their purchase in real time not only helps the consumer but also improve the relation of the provider and consumer.

Three Best Online Credibility Builders

2009-10-11T20:55:00.000-07:00

The hardest thing to do on the internet right now is to convince people that your site, your product, is both legitimate and credible, and that you’re not one of the army of ‘scammers’ that have recently become virulently active throughout the web. This being the case, few will convert from viewers to customers without believing, in effect knowing, that their money is well placed and not ill spent. The problem most sites face is how to give that air of respectability without spending a fortune – the three most active forms of this are company policy regarding returns, accessible contact details and online live customer support.

It may be the hope of every business that there will be no problems with your products when delivered, but there will always be those that no longer want the product or service after purchase, so having a concise, clear and well stated returns policy is paramount in order to successfully deal with these events. If your returns policy clearly outlines all steps necessary for your client to deal with this eventuality, you and your business will project the necessary air of responsibility needed in today’s business economy.

While it may seem redundant to do this, it is one of the many areas that too many companies fall down on, and do not comply with. Simply having your contact data, or accessibility available in each page of your site will lend that air of credibility you seek – just seeing contact info like this, even if the customer never uses it, will instill the correct feeling you want to put across, without belaboring the point.

An important area that’s becoming more and more useful currently is that of online live customer support, thru software. This is a way in which the client can interact directly with a member of your support staff, in real time thru the placement of a contact point, be it a specific area or from a button or tab, on your web pages to get more information, directions, explanations etc. thru the use of a window or pop-up that uses instant messenger technology. The uses for this product are many, and in its use it in turn lends more credibility to your site. One perfect site example of this is http://live247support.com . With the knowledge that someone is available to question or query online, without any other device needed, about these areas, your prospects will feel both more trusting of your product and much more inclined to make the step from prospect to client.

As with so many things, these steps may seem self evident, but again it’s surprising that so many people tend to see the Forest, not the individual tasks or Tree’s necessary to have that well run business or site by attending to the basic’s first. If only one of these area’s is implemented correctly, you will see a change in how your business ROI is, and if all three are implemented to the best of your companies ability, then your return will be three fold.

e-Commerce 2.0

2009-10-09T01:40:00.000-07:00

Successful website owners, including online business owners, know that every nook and cranny of your website matters.

The very first thing a person notices when your site has loaded (after the amount of time it takes for your website to load) is the visual appeal. This is a combination of your layout, images, graphics, and so on but the content is also very important.

You should never intimidate a visitor, because your competitors are only a few clicks away.
Instead, everything about you should be friendly and inviting… encouraging your valued visitor to read on, or to browse your catalog.

And, of course, you want to collect information from your traffic. This information can be used for email marketing and other methods of building lasting relationships… without spamming anybody. But this is where many website owners make their biggest mistake… costing at least 5 times the relationships you could be building.

To find out if you have been making this mistake… then all you need to do is answer the following question:

Is Your Shopping Cart Drop Rate Higher than Your Bounce Rate?

If you answered yes… then I have good news for you! You are well on your way, and a few more adjustments are all it takes to improve this slight error.

The problem is that the action of making a purchase should never take too long… and it should never feel like it is taking too long. Think of when you are standing in a store, in a very looooooong line… and all just to buy a candy bar. It takes a very short amount of time before you are analyzing whether that candy bar is worth it… and not much later you will be putting that candy bar back and leaving the store.

Shopping online is even worse. There are no long lines, but there are long processes. If you are required to make an account, provide all of your contact information, personal information, favorite colors…

Well, this is all it takes for a potential customer to “give up” and change their mind. You not only lost a sale, you also lost a relationship.

Your mistake?

Requiring an account to be built before a purchase is made will not only lose potential members, but also increase your shopping cart drop rate.

The smarter, more effective method is to give opportunity (and not a requirement) to open an account after the sale has been made and processed quickly. If you don’t already know the “secrets” of gaining permission to send newsletters and other benefits of being a member… then you should reflect on the most basic trick of attraction marketing there is…

Do You Offer Valid Benefits that are Not Self Serving?

If a visitor has already made a purchase, then they might be interested in making more down the road as well. This is good news for both of you, but there is no need to instantly push another sale.

Certain convenient capabilities, such as the ability to view prior orders and to save items in a shopping cart before purchasing at a later date… these are real reasons that a person would want to provide their information and become a member.

If you offer something useful, something worth signing up for, then you should have no problem lowering your shopping cart drop rate, increasing sign ups, and building lasting relationships with ongoing customers. And while you’re busy exerting effort in increasing your cart rate, you may consider outsourcing your customer support service to companies like http://live247support.com so as not to overlook this aspect of your business.

Remember, one should never compromise the power of quality customer service for this is the strongest weapon one can ever have in this tough competition.

Happy Shopping :-)!

Gabriel Taylor

Innovation in Communication

2009-10-09T00:51:00.000-07:00

Maintaining good, open communication with customers and clients is an important rule of both online and offline businesses. While offline businesses prove easier to maintain relations with its customers, its online counterpart made it impossible to maintain one-on-one communication with customers. The arrival of online chat software like Live Chat Support has bridged the gap, making it possible to interact with customers more efficiently.

Http://live247support.com is a perfect example of a website that provides you with your own online chat software. As indicated in their website, a company is up to eight time's more likely to get a sale when offering live chat. By installing this software in your website, it provides your company with instant communication to business associates without the hassles of email or normal phone lines. It also has the capability to send business files utilizing its software.

With the increase in mass junk and spam mail one receives, the majority of people dump their bulk mail folder when it fills up. However, even important emails sometimes find their way into that folder, which is why many companies and customers prefer using Live chat instant messaging. The software enables avatar operators to interact with customers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, insuring that necessary emails get to where they need to go.

The majority of businesses have their own websites, but those serve more as informative links instead of support links. Live chat support software makes it possible for customers to get instant answers to all their questions. This works on any web server, has no software to install, and can be used within minutes of embedding into your website. In addition to providing immediate communication between you and your company, it also helps you monitor your site traffic in real-time, as well as other services.

You may choose from the software: Live Chat and AutoChat. LiveChat is geared for sites needing live customer support via instant messaging. AutoChat is an automated chat guide that functions around the clock driven that answers queries of online shoppers. Using a friendly avatar character, it electronically draws its answers from an automated respond list. With AutoChat, you save money on web personnel while still providing consumers with the same instant customer support.

Gabriel Taylor