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Click-to-Call Is Just Another Tool For Your Website
Luca Filigheddu, the CEO of a click-to-call technology provider, has an interesting post about click-to-call technology for websites, and why any site should have click-to-call. While I agree with much of theory behind Luca’s reasoning, in practice, click-to-call is just not right for every website.
What Sites Need Click-To-Call?
Click-to-call technology can be used on any site, but there are certain sites that will truly benefit from the technology. These sites include large e-commerce or other large commercial sites that are in a position to staff the click-to-call “line” so that an associate is accessible outisde normal hours of operation. One of the most important benefits of click-to-call is the conveinence to the customer of having help be “just a click away”, but that benefit is only realized when someone is on the other end to answer. Otherwise, the click-to-call functionality of your website is useless.
Adding presence to click-to-call technology was an important step, but how does it reflect on your company, when during the middle of the day, during normal working hours, a user could visit your site, and see that help is “offline”. Do you really want a user to have that much visibility into your business operation? Nothing screams “go elsewhere” like help “offline” during normal business hours, especially since most of the time someone is there ready to take your call, they just forgot to log-in to the queue or otherwise.
What Sites Do Not Need Click-to-Call?
For starters, blogs. Just ask Andy Abramson. In addition, due to factors expressed above, small sites, be them e-commerce, commericial, or informational should be careful of adding click-to-call technology, especially if they do not have the manpower to staff the click-to-call line. There is a fine line between accessibility and annoyance, and with click-to-call it very easy to turn being accessible into being annoyed.
You see click-to-call really is about giving customers another conveinent way to contact your company. While I do not know this for a fact, I believe the origins of click-to-call grew out of the poor choice many early web pioneers made of making their contact details impossible to find and the fact that years ago, it was difficult to sell and support the buying decision from a one dimensional webpage.
The Web Has and Still Is Changing
In the traditional sense, the Internet is a road, a web-browser your car, a website a store or destination. The idea of “always-on” in the offline world is typically reserved for stores servicing essentials (goods typically not available online); gas stations, grocery stores, and super Wal-Marts. If I drive by a store and see that it is closed, sure I would drive to the next one, but chances are it will not be open either - most stores follow standard hours of operation. If I need something that is not sold at an “always-on” store, I must wait until the next day.
But with the Internet there is the impression that because you can get to and use a website at any and all hours of the day, it is “open for business”. The truth of the matter is though, that most companies with websites, excluding the larger ones, operate along the same hours of operation as their offline counterparts. It is not that companies do not want to be “on” 24 hours a day, it is that employees do not or a company can not pay to have 24/7 staffing.
So what does this have to do with click-to-call? It renders it’s true benefit, extending accessibility, at best useless for most, because until people and companies change the way they operate, it will be just another way for a user, customer, or partner to get your voicemail. At the very worse, the very presence of click-to-call capability on your site that is not staffed 24/7, will lead to a poor customer experience, or visibility (help “online” or “offline”) into your business that may not represent your company in a positive light (being “offline” during standard hours of operation).
So while click-to-call is a beneficial technology, best suited for those with large sites, focused on and with the ability to staff for always on business, it is not a “must-have”. It does add value for some, but not all. For most companies, who want to increase the accessibility and visibility of the ability to assist when a user/customer is stuck on a page or has a question, is best suited to boldly display their phone numer in the top left hand corner of every page on their site, with their hours of operation underneath. For some, it has become one of their differentiators.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
This certainly is an interesting discussion, and you could not be more right in one respect…click to call is not for everyone. However, there are a couple of other points that you raise, that I think need some clarification, because a true click to call solution for ecommerce does much more than just provide a proxy for connecting phone calls. In fact, it HAS become a must-have for significant multichannel organizations due to its ability to seamlessly bridge the gap between online and offline sales.
A few points I wanted to address…
1) You start off by saying that the only companies that benefit from click to call are those that can staff the “click-to-call line.†This assumes that contact initiated from click to call buttons is directed to a dedicated line when, in fact, click to call contact (at least from companies like eStara) can be routed any phone with in the contact center or business.
2) “One of the most important benefits of click-to-call is the convenience to the customer of having help be ‘just a click away.’†While it’s true that click to call offers an extra level of convenience to online shoppers, having the ability to just be a click away from assistance is just one of the benefits, and not the most important by far. The call connection is the easy part. The true benefit that click to call offers ecommerce sites is data. Click to call can tie the online session data of the consumer to the call center so that the customer does not have to “start all over again†when they connect with the business, and the call center is enabled with the context of the customer’s session which improves efficiency and service.
3) You are correct in stating that the problem with presence-based solutions is that they can reflect poorly on the business if the button shows they are offline during normal business hours. However, that’s why enterprises are tying click to call into business rules that allow them to deploy the right form of contact, at the right time, based on agent availability and customer need. For example, calls can be routed dynamically to multiple phone lines simultaneously to assure someone answers, or if all agents are on the phone then an alternative method of contact, such as email or chat, can appear on the site.
There is a fine line between accessibility and annoyance. Not every customer interaction merits a phone call, which is why large companies invest heavily in developing FAQs and knowledgebases. However, for high-value prospects that are likely to abandon a transaction, proactively engaging them with click to call based on rules-based triggers, such as the value of their shopping cart, time spent on a page, items looked at, etc. has been proven to dramatically increase results for major online retailers.
4) The origins of click to call are perhaps lost in the annals of history. But I suspect click to call risen in prominence not so much because of previous failures on the part of ecommerce businesses to offer assistance, but due to the growing complexity of online transactions. We’re not just buying books on Amazon anymore, we’re buying plasma screen TVs…sometimes it helps to talk to a real human being for this major purchases….and it helps if they know why you’re calling and can tie the data of your online session to their CRM and inventory systems, which is easy to do with click to call, but not as easy with a standard telephone number.
5) Displaying a phone number on your site is phone. But most phone numbers are black holes of information that can not deliver the granular detail afforded by click to call. The best click to call solutions are those that are tying the power of Web analytics to the convenience and efficiency of the phone.
Dan:
I see that you represent a click-to-call technology company as well…I would be happy to clarify my points made in order to further assert my point(s).
1) Click-to-call is pointed to a line somewhere - be it a specific line, a call ring group, or the main-line number. Regardless of where it is pointed, if no one is there to answer, what is the point? The solution has legs when there is staffing to support, but when that staffing in not there, it really is not a help to a customer/user right?
2) True, but in my experience, after I say “Welcome to Acme Technologies” when initiating a call, the customer responds with exactly what page they are on, etc. While on demand data is helpful, it is more helpful and beneficial to larger sites selling a ton of products. If I am only selling a handful of products or one, chances are that data has less importance to me as there is only a small number of things a customer could be calling about.
3) Presence and the way it ties into your business/life is always getting better, but the fact remains, if no one is there to answer the phone, email, or text message, AT ANY HOUR, the solution is no better than just having your contact information prominently displayed.
4) Yes, but you can also take a look at the accessibility and annoyance of the user/customer. One of the reasons consumers use the web is that they can “shop in peace” and not be hassled by overzealous associates and sales people who often ruin the traditional buying experience by being pushy, persistence, rude, obnoxious, or just annoying by presence.
The last thing many consumers want to is to be proactively solitcited with a “need help” button that follows them around the we page, because someone at a company figured out that if a person stayed on a page for 3 minutes, they must need help…what if they read slow or are showing the page to someone. These proactive presence based triggers are not granular enough to account for these instances, and are plain annoying because every customer and user is so different that making blanket rules just can’t apply.
4) I totally agree. We sell bleeding edge communications equipment to businesses. They transactions are about as complex as they get. We had previously dabbled with click-to-call and click-to-chat circa early 2005, and the results, in relation to the cost were marginal. Customers still preferred calling our 800 number, as evident by the lack of a huge percentage based increase in click-to-call/click-to-chat usage, or increase in sales.
5) I agree, but the same could be said about click-to-call. The black-hole is typically created by, and is the fault of, the business. More information is not always better than less information…it is what is done with the information once it is obtained that matters most. If the business behind the site can not execute on the additional information click-to-call provides, is click-to-call still that much more effective than a regular call or is it just another expensive data mine?
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