Travel agencies: it’s time to get social!
The one thing none of us can dispute or ignore is that technology has morphed communication in unexpected ways. One swift glance around the tube during rush hour presents thousands of people, staring at a 5-inch screen in their hands. While some will argue mobile technological developments have made us less social, we spend more time engaging a higher number of people on these devices in a week than we would have in a year four decades ago. One holiday photo with the right hashtags can reach thousands of people instantly. When you think of the volume of people in that social network of each train cabin, it’s mind-boggling. And it doesn’t end at the numbers, as these people are engaging with others who are on the other side of the world, who share the same interests. The scope combined with the volume makes social media the technological advancement that changed society virtually overnight, and it shows no signs of slowing down.
Where business meets social
Marketers are like those friends who you don’t invite to the cool kids party because they are most likely to spoil the night by being themselves. They enjoy going where everyone congregates, where they can get the highest number of eyeballs, and then saturating it until it’s ruined. A great example of this is radio and television, where consumers developed the phenomenon of channel surfing just to avoid advertising. Some of us used the return or last button so much we erased the words. But social media had a different plan for marketers, they made it useful for both business and consumer. With the global rendezvous of social media, marketers were quick to jump on board, getting the most out of the presence for their companies. As they racked up a fan base, likes and impressions, the social platforms stumbled upon a method that would help marketers, but not ruin the experience for users: direct messaging.
Users were familiar with instant messaging through ICQ, AOL, and Windows Live (formerly known as MSN messenger), so the addition of a direct messaging option made sense as it keeps users on their platforms longer. But the hidden benefit for businesses became massive. Facebook became the go-to place for contacting a business or window shopping before a purchase, with customer reviews, peer feedback through timeline posts and photos all in one place. And then you had the convenience of sending an instant message to them, right there in the application. Users loved it but businesses could not keep up as work responsibilities kept staff busy and antiquated IT policies internally barred Facebook and other social media networks for many companies.
Click4Assistance recognised this and developed a solution so that you never miss a message from your customers via social media, like Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp. Rather than having your staff log into Facebook or WhatsApp several times a day to check for a pending message, the messages are delivered right to our customisable desktop dashboard, saving your travel agency time and increasing your productivity.
The desktop dashboard pulls all your messages, from live chat and social media into one place, so as soon as a customer contacts your company, your travel agents can respond swiftly and close more sales. This increase in productivity is also benefitted by a seamless integration with your CRM or customer relationship manager, so you can easily update your customer records without switching applications.
Have your customers skip the queue!
As a society, we have grown spoilt by our ever-increasing appetite for immediacy. We live in the ‘right now,’ with patience levels reducing drastically every year and expectations increasing with a parallel pace. When a text message is sent, a response is expected within minutes, sometimes seconds. Remember the golden days of physical mail, when you sent a letter to a friend and didn’t expect a response for weeks? We can officially say those days are long gone. This ever-increasing pace of communication ripples through every aspect of our lives, from work to life to play. We have these expectations of friends, family, work colleagues, and even strangers. When we contact a business, we expect a turnaround within hours, preferably in minutes, or better yet, immediately.
Customers are less likely to sit around in a queue waiting to speak with someone unless they are left with no alternative. This is where live chat can benefit your business, as it allows these customers to skip the queue and contact you directly, with a method they are more familiar with. You can go one step further, and introduce a virtual assistant like Artie, Click4Assistance’s artificial intelligence chatbot, who will engage your users 24 hours a day, ensuring every customer has the opportunity to convert.
If you’re interested in deploying Click4Assistance, the UK’s premier GDPR compliant live chat software solution, to make your travel agency more effective in 2020, give us a call on 08451235871 or send an email theteam@click4assistance.co.uk and one of our experts will be with you right away.
