When it comes to communication methods today, it’s safe to say that text messaging is king. Most people text at least once a day, making it a popular and powerful way for people to keep in touch with one another, and also with businesses.
Here at Answering Service Care, we recently introduced Care2Text, a new feature that allows our clients to advertise a phone number that their clients can use to correspond with them via text message. When their clients reach out via text message, our live agents can reply to answer questions, schedule appointments, and more.
Businesses of all sizes and types can benefit from an SMS text messaging service. Here’s how!
It’s always good to offer your customers options.
People like to have options, and in today’s digital age there are more ways than ever to communicate. Businesses can provide excellent customer service not only over the phone and in person, but also through email, social media, chatbots, and text message. Offering multiple ways to reach your business allows your customers to better reach you when they need you, using the method they are most comfortable with.
People prefer texting over calling and communicating through social media.
Text messages are convenient, non-intrusive, and familiar, with 81% of Americans using texts to communicate every day. People text their family members and friends often and prefer it to communicate with businesses as well. A study found that three-quarters of consumers would rather text with a customer support agent than correspond with them through social media. Making your business reachable in the way that your customers want you to be can result in more sales and better communication overall.
It frees up your phone lines for other callers.
How many times have you called a business to ask a general question, and you ended up wishing you could have just sent a text message? Our Care2Text feature allows your customers to send a text message for simple things like asking questions or scheduling an appointment. This frees up your phone lines so your virtual receptionist can speak to those who need assistance with something bigger.
It offers a better way to communicate with your customers.
With SMS open rates as high as 98%, text messaging is a great way to make sure that your message is received. Answered phone calls and email open rates are much lower, making text messaging an effective way to confirm appointments and respond to questions that customers send you.
Your customers may already be texting you and you don’t even know it.
Did you know that 150 million texts are sent to landline and toll-free numbers every day, even though many of those lines are not text-enabled? That’s a lot of missed connections that your business could be losing out on! Incorporating an SMS text messaging service ensures that no more communications between you and your customers get lost, or go unanswered.
