This story is part of our Making Business Human series. For more on the series and our mission, check out this post!
Barbara is our longest-serving support agent, with over 30,000 chats to her name. Yes, 30,000!! Given that she only worked part time for most of those chats, that is one serious record.
We think Barbara’s experience is second to none when it comes to chatting. She provides hints and tips for Olarkers in our internal Customer Service newsletter, and we’ve decided her advice is just too good to keep to ourselves. We will be gifting you her wisdom once a week, and would love to hear from you with any chat-related questions you want answered :-)
What’s the best way to greet a visitor when they start a chat?
Folks who send you a message want to know, as quickly as possible, that it went somewhere and they're being heard. When you get a new chat, fire off a quick "hello!" so they know there's someone there. Or add a little more of your personality — "hi!", "howdy!", "hello there!", etc. all work well. Olark’s own Story Sherpa Kate suggests that you could even take a page from Alexander Graham Bell’s old book and toss out a big cheerful “Ahoy-hoy!”
Sending something you wouldn't have had time to type out will make you sound like a robot.
The only thing you'll want to keep in mind is that sending something you wouldn't have had time to type out will make you sound like a robot. So skip the shortcut that spits out "hi, my name is Barbara and I'm more than happy to help you with any Olark questions you've got!"
When you get a new chat, fire off a quick “Hello!” so your visitor knows there’s someone there.
Try it! After you've implemented Barbara’s Quick Hello, take a look at your reports page — there's a section for "MEDIAN INITIAL RESPONSE". Not to brag (but I'm gonna anyway) — mine for this year is 7 seconds, all because of the quick hello. Give it a go and see if you can reduce your response time, too!
Got a chat question you want answered? Ask away!
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