Dive Brief:

• Shopgate has partnered with Intercom to offer its retail customers Intercom Live Chat, an in-app chat capability that allows users and store associates to start in-app conversations, according to a press release.

• The chat capability also includes an inbox for an entire customer support team that allows the retailer to see which team members are helping which customers. It also can be used to assign certain team members to certain customers based on categories like languages spoken and types of questions asked.

• The retailer’s customer support staff also can decide where to continue the conversation with a customer — either in-app or over email if the customer provides an email address.

Dive Insight:

It’s no secret that chat could become an increasingly common path of communication between customers and the retailers and brands they follow. Armies of chatbots on Facebook Messenger and elsewhere have helped get the ball rolling, but it has been acknowledged that early-generation chatbots have lacked intelligence and an abundance of options that would make them more useful to shoppers. Because of that, nearly 60% of marketers say the technology isn't a priority. 

A new generation of chat solutions, like Apple Business Chat, seems game to provide a new level of support and the type of personal, creative and flexible responses that only a human customer support team (or a really well-trained AI) can offer.

Shopgate argues that even online shoppers like knowing there’s a real human behind a retailer’s invitation to chat, and that the personalized, direct way of engaging with a customer in app makes the whole shopping process feel more like shopping on a website or in person.

The company has also played up a couple of intriguing stats: Live chat can help improve conversions by 20% by guiding app visitors through the payment process, reducing cart abandonment; and live chat boasts a 73% customer satisfaction rate, higher than email’s 61% satisfaction rate and phone support’s 44%. Marketers may still need some convincing, but an easy way of answering, initiating and managing chats in-app could help.