These days we’re all on video chat, from FaceTime with family to work meetings on Zoom. It’s become a core and — key word, expected — form of communication. Integrating video chat as a touchpoint is essential to building a great customer experience.

Why focus on customer experience? Providing an excellent customer experience encourages people to choose your brand over the competition, remain loyal, and spread word of your business to new buyers.

In fact, research from PwC shows that more than two-thirds of companies compete primarily on the basis of customer experience, and 86% of buyers will pay more for a great customer experience.

5 Ways Video Chat Improves Customer Experience

Increase Sales — Major brands are using video chat and screen-share tools to drive sales, conversions, and customer satisfaction. Real time video gives sales representatives the opportunity to streamline the customer journey and build a sense of credibility. Screen-sharing empowers agents to cross-sell and up-sell related services and products the moment they become relevant to the customer.

Personalization — 80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase from a brand that provides personalized experiences. In the virtual world of websites and mobile apps, video chat is the best way to provide a one-on-one experience completely unique to each customer.

Higher Engagement — Video chat is a powerful way to humanize your brand experience and engage customers. When chatting ‘face to face’, customers are more likely to stay engaged with a brand and are less likely to abandon the experience altogether. In fact, the option of video call has been found to reduce the customer drop-off rate by up to 70%.

5x Average Engagement Rate

Real Appeal, UnitedHealthcare’s most successful preventative health program, uses one-on-one video chat features to provide a personalized experience and help people lose weight.

The design has resulted in employee engagement five times higher than that of traditional disease-geared programs and over 3 Million Pounds lost by Real Appeal members. View Case Study

Higher Customer Satisfaction — Customer service is where video chat truly shines. Live chat has the highest satisfaction levels for any customer service channel, with 73%, compared with 61% for email and 44% for phone. Customers seek human interaction to feel heard, and video chat helps resolve problems faster with less touch points.

Build Relationships — 93% of communication is non-verbal. Being able to see the person we’re speaking to helps us understand information faster, respond more appropriately, and probe for clarity. Video chat is an incredibly useful tool for building customer relationships and loyalty. Video-based interactions are more engaging, more memorable, and hold almost every advantage over audio and text alone.