Customer Service Platform: Take Your Support Online

It has become increasingly vital to give customers cutting-edge support in today’s speedy environment. Most importantly, when you are a big-shot business, engaging with every one of your clients would be challenging. If you aim to interact with them across multiple channels independently, it literally would kill your precious time. In this case, all you need is a system from which you can manage all your customer service operations. If you already feel that way, you are actually in need of a customer service platform. You can think of it as a one-stop solution that brings all customer interactions into one place. Let’s dive deeper to get insights into this digital business handler.

Introducing the Customer Service Platform

When you come around to this terminology, it basically refers to a digital customer service platform. This is a digital system designed to manage and improve customer interactions across multiple channels, such as social media, chat, email, and even phone.

If you go through a little bit technical route, you will find two major terms- Platform as a Service (PaaS) or Software as a Service (SaaS).

In most cases, customer service platforms are SaaS. They are delivered through the cloud and are fully managed by the provider. And the provider is responsible for maintaining the underlying infrastructure, managing updates, and ensuring the availability and performance of the platform. 

On the other hand, PaaS customer service platforms come up with more control over the underlying infrastructure, such as hosting it on a private server.

Different Types of Customer Service Platforms

You can find several types of these platforms, each with its own unique features and capabilities. Let’s unwrap some of the most common types.

1. Help Desk Platform: Help desk platforms are designed to manage and resolve customer support tickets. They typically offer features such as ticket management, escalation, knowledge base management, and reporting.
2. Live Chat Platform: Live chat platforms provide real-time chat functionality to engage with customers. They typically offer features such as chat management, agent routing, chatbots, and reporting.
3. Video Chat Platform: This trendy platform is actually a digital tool that allows users to communicate in real-time using video and audio over the internet. It enables two or more people to see and hear each other simultaneously, regardless of their physical location.
4. Social Media Platform: Social media platforms enable businesses to manage customer interactions on social media channels. They typically offer features such as social media management, monitoring, engagement, and reporting.
5. Integrated Platform: Some customer service platforms are good enough to offer combined features from multiple types. For example, a platform like REVE Chat offers live chat, chatbot, video chat, and social media management features.

5 Benefits of Using Customer Service Platform

The customer service department is not a new concept; rather, it has long been an integral part of the operations of large companies. But what are the current benefits now of having the word “platform” attached to it? Let’s see.

1. Better Customer Experience: When you keep everything on one stage, customers no more get tired of finding you. The automation is leading to flexibility, allowing clients to personally hear from you. This will give them the feeling that their problem is being taken seriously.
2. Increased Efficiency: When getting support is on the stream, it is reducing a big chunk of time and the need for resources. For example, chatbots can take care of all the queries. Now customer service representatives have time to be more productive.
3. Cost Effectivity: Routine tasks are now automated and the self-service option is landed. Businesses can get rid of the need for too many heads, resulting in cost savings. Moreover, getting data upfront for forecasting will prevent a big amount of bad expenses.
4. Access to Data and Analytics: As valuable insights into customer psychology can be now measured, You can oversee the milestone of your products and plan accordingly. It poses a lot of help in product development and marketing campaigns, influencing your revenue figures.
5. Greater Scalability: Another superpower of these platforms is customizability. You can easily scale your operations as your customer base grows.

5 Key Features of a Best Customer Service Platform

As you know all the benefits, now it’s natural for you to raise the question of how to choose a customer service platform. Keep reading to get the answer.

1. Omnichannel Support: Firstly, you should consider an omnichannel customer service platform. This will ensure all your channels, including phone, email, live chat, social media, and self-service options, are in one place. Both you and your customers will have a seamless and consistent communication experience.
2. AI-Powered Automation: With the AI customer service platform, all sorts of routine and repetitive tasks will perfectly be taken care of. So no more taking extra time to answer common questions, and route inquiries to the appropriate team. This enables you to provide faster and more efficient support.
3. Self-Service Options: Customers should be able to access self-service options such as an FAQ section, a knowledge base, and community forums. This not only helps customers quickly find answers to their questions but also reduces the volume of inquiries that need human support, saving time and resources for businesses.
4. Customer Data and Analytics: The platform should provide businesses with customer behavior, purchase history, and interaction history. It helps users to personalize their customer service and make data-driven decisions to improve their service.
5. Collaboration and Integration: The platform should enable collaboration and integration between customer service teams, marketing, sales, and other departments. It ensures that customers receive consistent and accurate information, regardless of the channel they use to communicate with the business.

Over to You

Overall, investing in the right platform for customer support can lead you to a competitive edge in the marketplace. Seeing the clients happy and loyal, as well as increasing the sales curve is not an overnight scenario. But it is a big relief to have a sense of business moving towards progress. However, there are also challenges associated with implementing a customer service platform. Integration with existing systems, training staff on new processes, and ensuring data security and privacy can be huge obstacles. Despite these challenges, businesses that invest in such platforms are likely to see improved customer satisfaction. Because users are coping with their shortcomings, leading them to keep pace with advancement.