Live chat allows retailers to approach their prospects directly in real time and there is no doubt about its power of boosting online sales. But before you are tempted to try your upsell/cross-sell strategy in live chat, make sure to stay away from these 7 mistakes.
1. Don’t be creepy
I know you can easily watch customer’s activities from the live chat dashboard and learn a lot about their product preferences. But don’t make your recommendations sound somewhat creepy like, “Hey John, we know you’ve just checked out our new laptop model 2 minutes ago. I think you should buy a new printer to go with that.”
Your customer would think, “Is this guy stalking me? Gosh, they’re creepy as hell. I should get out of here.” So instead of scaring your prospects away, you can try making a warm recommendation like, “A good printer to complement your new laptop is a brilliant idea. Do you want to buy our laptop+printer package with better price?”
2. Don’t rush
Live chat is first and foremost a support tool. Don’t be tempted to being “salesly” before you fulfil your responsibility of help. Wait for your customers to be totally happy with your resolution to their problem or your product recommendation to their demand before you rush to give them those “Do you want this with that?” offers.
Even if they don’t have time for your upsell/cross-sell speech after that, you can always get back to them later. The tip is to use some simple text commands while chatting to store your visitor’s name and buying information into the system so that next time they come back, you can locate them instantly and show them your offers.
3. Don’t be pushy
Proactive chat can helps you actively deliver loads of upsell/cross-sell offers. But be careful with the way you deliver it. Being aggressive, forceful or intrusive never works. It only makes your customers feel more annoyed and may even leave their current shopping cart.
If the customer chooses to refuse your offer, respect their decision and don’t pester them further. You should give them the option to close or minimize the chat invitation. Or else, you’re only interrupting their browsing experience without making any sales result.
4. Don’t be shy
Not being pushy doesn’t mean you should be shy at giving recommendations. Customers love buying combo or package with better price. As long as your offer is perfect for their needs, you can be confident to go all out and upsell/cross-sell to your customers.
But be mindful of timing as well. Choosing when to throw out your offers is deadly crucial. Don’t upsell/cross-sell when customers just land on your site or when they are browsing your products. Let them have some time to make their buying decision. And when they have picked something, you can jump out with your offers during or after their checkout process.
5. Don’t overuse
Chat agents tend to use triggers to fire chat invitation along with upsell/cross-sell message to visitors. But don’t overuse it. Don’t send your offer to everyone since your limited support resources can’t handle too many chats. You should choose who to target wisely.
Target those who are more likely to afford your offer, for instance, repeat, loyal or top customers. For those who want your offer but can’t afford it, you can consider downselling to them. Try offering them a cheaper alternative and you can still increase your conversion rates.
6. Don’t be irrelevant
No one wants buy a washing machine together with a laptop. So try to be relevant with your upsell/cross-sell offers. It must be something that can go well with each other, like a PC and a keyboard, a mobile and an earphone, a laptop and an external hard drive, etc. It must be something that fits customer’s preferences and piques their interest as well.
To come up with a perfect offer, you can dig into the customer’s profile and browsing histories to get to know their buying behaviors better. These data can be monitored and collected from the live chat dashboard. This is where you have a real-time watch on your customer’ location, personal information, background, activities on site, buying histories and more.
7. Don’t get carried away
You may have many super-relevant upsell/cross-sell to offer, but don’t get too carried away with it. Even though they are all great offers, there is nothing worse than bombarding a customer with dozens of options and make them decide. When they can’t decide, there’s a high chance that they won’t choose anything at all.
Therefore, you should pick the offer that tends to your customer’s benefits the most. Since communicating through live chat is communicating in a text-based manner, make sure your message sounds as sincere as possible.
Don’t leave the bad impression that you’re just another greedy retailer who only wants to sell more. Show your customers that their interest is your top concern and your offer is nothing but based on their benefits.
Do you have other Don’ts to share? Let us know in the comment. If you’re unfamiliar with upselling/cross-selling in live chat, try Subiz live chat today to start boosting your eCommerce sales.
