HIGH-TOUCH INDUSTRIES AT A DISADVANTAGE IN ECOMMERCE
High-touch industries such as B2B software, real estate, and telecommunications, that require the engagement of an virtual agent to sell and/ or service their products and services have been largely left behind by ecommerce technology, while low-touch industries such as books, apparel, electronics, and others thrive with continually evolving technologies.
Do-it-yourself website companies such as Shopify and Weebly are rife with shopping carts, inventory management, and similar solutions that assist users in building low-touch ecommerce sites quickly and efficiently. But when it comes to high-touch industries, these websites are largely relegated to informational portals that are constructed to lead customers to off-line communications such as email, calls, and store visits.
INCREASING DEMAND FROM CUSTOMERS FOR ONLINE ENGAGEMENT
Customers today are increasingly demanding that their commercial needs be met online as they look for faster and easier ways to shop for products and services. Global retail ecommerce grew at an astonishing rate of 24.6% in 2021 and took up 11.7% of the total retail market[i]. Every day we find more examples of companies such as Amazon and EBay displacing traditional or brick-and-mortar counterparts as these counterparts are forced to retrench or restructure.
Similarly, customers are demanding online engagement with conversational marketing from high-touch service industries, and these industries are responding with omnichannel solutions such as integrated virtual assistants, apps, live chat software, digital marketing tools and self-guided support. However, regardless of these advancements, these industries continue to rely on in-person visits and call centers to close deals and provide support.
INCREASING DEMAND FROM BUSINESSES FOR ONLINE ENGAGEMENT
Businesses also are looking into increasing their online presence and evolve their technologies in order to (i) meet the increasing demand of their customers for online engagement, and (ii) to save money and increase productivity through cloud technologies.
Moving processes to the cloud saves businesses time and money as information becomes more available and synchronized; as customers engage the company’s support representatives less as they rely more on self-help technologies; and as customers become better informed with more timely and in-depth information.
WEBTOQ’s PLATFORM ENABLES HIGH-TOUCH SALES AND SERVICE
WebToq is the solution that will enable businesses to move more of their customer-facing processes online, while improving productivity and meeting demand for online engagement at the same time. WebToq provides rich, on-demand, structured, and bidirectional communications between web user and agent that enable the sale and service of products and services online.
- Rich communications: With WebToq agents can engage a customer in a video call and share multimedia communications such as documents, images, videos, questionnaires, VOIP calls, whiteboarding, and more, in the pursuit of a sale or support.
- On-demand: Agents are able to engage their customers directly through their website, rather than having to off-load the visit to a phone call or web conference. Contact is seamless and begins through the natural progression of a customer’s visit, whether when requesting specific information, an agent, live chat software, or initiating a sale.
- Structured: Unlike a web-conference where an agent has to put together information on the fly, WebToq’s agent platform is structured to follow a script, with all pertinent information pre-loaded and the steps pre-arranged. This allows for consistent quality in agent communications as the right information is available at the right time, with minimal searching and waiting.
- Bidirectional: Unlike co-browsing where an agent is merely assisting a customer through the navigation of a website and providing information to him, WebToq’s communications are bidirectional as the agent can receive questionnaire answers, files, voice and text, choice selections, and much more, that enable the closing of a sale or support case.
ONLINE ENGAGEMENT WILL REPRESENT A PRODUCTIVITY BOOST FOR HIGH-TOUCH COMPANIES
High-touch companies will see their productivity increase as they engage their customers online.
- These companies will now be able to handle multiple customer sessions at a time, rather than one-at-a-time as demanded with a call
- Off-load customer education and training to manuals and videos
- Handle a transaction all at once, rather than having to go back-and-forth between visits, calls, faxes, and emails
- Hire remote, stationary virtual agents only requiring writing fluency, rather than having to have local or traveling agents, or agents with perfect pronunciation and accents.
And, since WebToq is structured and pre-loaded, customer training will be quicker and easier, and customer sessions will be more consistent and effective.
HOW WEBTOQ WORKS
| WEB INTEGRATION | THE PROBLEM: |
| Companies can build hooks to WebToq into their websites via linking to specific WebToq content such as forms, guides, or videos, or by using WebToq’s live chat software. | High-touch industries have missed out on many productivity and efficiency improvements available to low-touch industries via web and cloud technologies. Customers are demanding online transactions more and more, and high-touch industries need to comply to compete |
| AGENT PORTAL | THE SOLUTION: |
| Agents log in to the agent portal and await a customer session to begin. Agent sessions are connected on a first-come-first-served basis. Agents then retain control of the customer session and proceed through the script. | WebToq has developed a cloud platform that enables company representatives to communicate directly with customers through their websites using multimedia technologies and remote support tools. These rich, structured, on-demand, and bidirectional interactions allow high-touch companies to engage leads while they are still hot and inform customers better than self-guided navigation, and cheaper and with deeper information than through a phone call. |
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