Having the right communication strategy is vital for businesses, whether you are a small startup or an industry giant. Mediums and channels of communication have evolved a lot over the years. Over a decade ago it was email that the consumers preferred. After that came the social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, which are still popular. And now it’s the era of messengers-based sales.
The arrival of online messengers or messenger bots has brought a revolutionary change in the world of marketing, business, and sales.
What makes messengers a better medium of communication for conversing with the customers over social media? Here we are listing some pros of using messengers.
1. Privacy
Social media, as we know, is an open platform. It’s all about sharing and connecting with people or, in a marketer’s words, his audience. But, messengers are direct communication channels that are more private and, of course, secure. Plus, there are no privacy leaks and data usage concerns as there are in social media.
2. Personalization- Building Confidence and Reputation
Nowadays, personalization is a key factor in understanding what your customer needs. 72% of customers say that they engage with personalized messaging only. The one to one conversation offered by messengers helps you to get valuable insights into your customer’s interests and preferences.
3. Speeds Up and Automates Your Customer Service
One of the most popular messengers has an average response time of 5 minutes, which is pretty faster. Additionally, messengers can also automate your customer service, thereby reducing time, effort, and money.
4. Popularity
A recent study shows that WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and WeChat, three of the most popular messaging apps has over 4 million active users per month when combined. And it is a pretty huge number when it comes to business.
5. All-Inclusive Channel
Messengers are an all-inclusive service channel, unlike social media platforms. For example, say you are an eCommerce company. One of the customers wants to replace a product. If you are communicating via messengers, you don’t have to use or redirect them to any other channel. You can chat, send multimedia, include details and transactions through the messenger. And above all, messengers support complete CRM system integration.
And when these powerful messengers are integrated with the mighty CRM systems, you will be able to converse better with the customers.
It’s all about keeping up with the modern customer!
What’s Wrong With Present CRM Without Messengers?
CRM systems help you to get a complete 360-degree view of your customers. For example, insights on their preferences, likes, past behaviors, etc. You can make use of this data to formulate highly personalized offers, thereby improving customer service.
CRM will help in:
- Tracks customer interactions
- Building a strong bond with the customer
- Offering what the customer wants
- Providing expert customer service and support
But can the existing CRMs offer the best marketing strategy? Especially in a customer-centered world, where the customer has the power to demand a whole new level of attention.
The answer is no.
The main issue with the present CRM systems is the slow response time while communicating with the customers. Do you know that the average response time taken by a company to manage a customer service request is 12 hours and 10 minutes?
This will affect customer support since quick response time is one of the key characteristics of a good customer experience. As a result, the customers will lose their confidence in your services, and there is a greater chance they might stop doing business with you. This may lead to a loss in leads and sales.
Top 5 Reasons Why You Should Integrate CRM With Messengers
Integrating CRM with messengers comes with a long list of advantages. Let’s see them in detail.
1. Faster Response Time
The integration will help in reducing the response time, thanks to the quick interactions by the messengers. The longer you make the customer wait to get a response from your side, the less likely that potential lead is to convert or become a customer in the future. A recent survey shows that responding within the first-minute will increase the lead conversion rate by 391%.
2. Better Lead Generation
Lead generation can be made by integrating CRM with messengers. After responding to their requests or queries, you can easily store all this info you get while chatting with the potential customer- both customer information and the chat transcript to the CRM system.
3. Personalized Customer Experience
Usually, providing a personalized experience to the customer can be tricky since you have to go through the customer’s entire past conversations. This is made easy by combining your CRM and messenger functions. You can immediately recognize the customer with the help of the chat messages, customer details, and past behavior data stored in the CRM system.
4. Reduced Cost
Integrating two of the most powerful tools used to avoid duplication of content can help you reduce the cost by eliminating the burden of doing extra work. Plus, you can also automate the interactions in cases you cannot attend or lack of staff, with the help of ‘smart’ messengers. Or you can also ticket them to the CRM.
5. Real-time Feedbacks
Messengers can help in providing immediate responses 24X7, in a more personalized manner. This will help in getting real-time feedback, which can be stored in the CRM. You can make use of these insights to improve the customer experience in the future.
6. Being on the Same Plane as Your Customers
In this digital era, customers spend most of their time online, especially over online messengers. Combining your present CRM with these messengers, such as WhatsApp, will help you stay connected to potential customers all the time, in a place they would love to see you.
Best Messenger Apps that can be integrated with CRM
Now we have seen the benefits of integrating messengers with CRM, it’s time to discuss some of the messenger apps that can be used for this purpose.
1. Facebook Messenger
Facebook Messenger has over 1.3 billion monthly users, making the second most popular messenger app available. Integrating CRM with this platform helps in automating the process of lead access and management in real-time with the help of Customer Relationship Management software. According to a study by Harvard Business Review, contacting a lead within the first hour is 7 times more likely to qualify the lead as compared to contacting within two hours.
2. WhatsApp
WhatsApp is relatively more inclined towards making direct interaction with the customers, and thus more accessible. By integration with CRM, you can send template-based or time-based text messages with required links to your customers. As per the latest official reports, WhatsApp is being used by 2 billion people worldwide, at the top of the list of popular messenger apps.
3. Skype
Skype is a relatively cost-effective messenger app that can be integrated with Customer Relationship Management software. It provides omnichannel support, with the multi-features offered by Skype-like video conference, chatting, voice calls, etc, which can be stored in the CRM system for future analysis.
4. WeChat
WeChat is best for conducting surveys with the help of voting functions. You can also use this to track customer behavior by monitoring their online activities in social media networks. All these data can be used for coming up with a personalized marketing strategy.
5. Telegram
Telegram is a heavily encrypted cloud-based instant messaging app, making it the most secure messenger app in this list. In this app, all the data on the one to one interaction is stored in one place, allowing us to carry on with the same conversation without any interruption. By integrating Telegram with CRM, the workloads can be assigned to the appropriate sales or marketing agents, and CRM can keep track of their real-time activity separately for each case.
6. Viber
Viber is an instant messaging app, popular among modern customers. It will help you in communicating with your customers directly via audio or video calls and video or voice messages, leading to customer success. Integrating CRM with this app can help in improving lead generation, thus attaining a high conversion rate.
Wrapping it Up
Integrating with messengers can help in boosting the efficiency of your CRM, thus sharpening your marketing tactics.
Which messenger do you think is the best to integrate with CRM systems? Do mention it in the comments section below.
A content writer/technical writer with a passion for creating content that can engage people, thereby boosting the online visibility of clients. Writing has always been her thing, and now it’s her profession too.
