Support ticket deflection is the art of diverting customer inquiries away from traditional support channels, empowering customers to find or get answers on their own. The goal is to lighten the load on your support team, minimize response times, and empower customers to become self-sufficient troubleshooters. In this blog post, I will explore support ticket deflection principles across different channels such as email, chat, and phone support.
Email: Autoresponders and Self-Help Resources
To deflect tickets effectively through email, utilize autoresponders. Craft informative messages that acknowledge the customer's inquiry and provide links to self-help resources such as knowledge base articles and FAQs. Autoresponders can guide customers towards finding solutions independently, reducing the need for further support intervention. Deflekt.ai lets you use LLM technology to even further improve your auto replies with natural language answers.
Chat: Leveraging Chatbots for Quick Assistance
In chat support, chatbots play a vital role in deflecting tickets. These virtual assistants can engage with customers, address common queries, and provide instant responses. By equipping chatbots with pre-programmed responses or AI, customers can get answers directly, be directed to relevant resources and self-help options. Chatbots enable efficient and quick assistance, reducing the volume of support tickets.
Phone Support: Scripts for Guided Assistance
Phone support provides real-time conversations, and deflecting tickets can be achieved through well-crafted scripts. Develop scripts that gently guide customers towards self-help resources or alternative channels. Train your support team to provide guided assistance and navigate conversations effectively. Scripts ensure consistency and help deflect tickets by empowering customers to find solutions on their own.
Ticket Form Deflection
Your contact or ticket form is another perfect place for deflection. When your customer or user formulates their question, you can already offer an instant answer using AI (or good old search). Only when they confirm that suggestion didn’t answer their question, you can provide a submit button.
Channel Shift: Guiding Customers to Efficient Channels
Channel shifting involves guiding customers towards more efficient support channels. Prominently display links to knowledge bases, FAQs, email inbox with autoresponder and live chat options on your website or in email signatures. Encourage customers to explore self-help resources and engage in autoresponding email or livechat instead of submitting tickets. Channel shifting helps reduce the ticket load in time-consuming channels and directs customers to quicker resolutions.
Conclusion
Support ticket deflection involves empowering customers to find solutions independently while minimizing the load on your support team. By utilizing smart autoresponders in email, leveraging chatbots in chat support, scripting phone conversations, and guiding customers towards efficient channels, you can effectively deflect tickets. Implementing these deflection strategies improves response times, customer satisfaction, and overall support efficiency. Embrace support ticket deflection and witness the positive impact it has on your support operations.