Is Your Email Killing Sales? How Chatbots Win Customers

For a long time, email was the main way customers talked to online stores. Until recently, all web shops included a contact page with a contact form, essentially just initiating email communication. Usually, this meant full inboxes and slow replies, risking customer happiness.

Slow Replies = Lost Sales

In e-commerce, slow replies mean lost sales. Customers expect fast answers to their questions, or they’ll go elsewhere. Competition is just one click away.

Adding live chat is a step forward: customers get instant help during your open hours. Another step forward (and a real game changer) is implementing an AI Chatbot. It’s on 24/7, giving immediate replies even to midnight shoppers.

Note: When no live agents are available, clients using the chat are asked to wait for an e-mail reply. As a result, the chat becomes just another source of e-mail tickets! Adding a chatbot solves this problem, because the bot acts like 24/7 customer service.

E-mail vs. Chatbot – Face Off

Getting Customers to Chat

By promoting live chat as the primary contact option, you can shift the usual email-to-chat ratio to favor AI-automated chats. So, make live chat the obvious choice.

Note: When no live agents are available, clients using the chat are asked to wait for an e-mail reply. As a result, the chat becomes just another source of e-mail tickets! Adding a chatbot solves this problem, because the bot acts like 24/7 customer service.

Put a big “Chat Now” button on top of your contact page

Make sure it stands out as the first and preferred way of contact.

Image: CurvyKate.com suggests Live Chat as the first option on the “Contact Us” page.

💡 See tutorial: How to make an “open chat” link for Gorgias?

Add an “open chat” link in the footer of all your pages, above any contact details

Image: Example of a “Chat with us” link placed above contact details in a website footer.

Use chat pop-up messages (Gorgias “Campaigns”) to grab attention.

Campaigns open pop-up messages, that proactively appear next to the chat bubble and encourage the users to start a conversation.

In the case of customer service scenarios, we strongly recommend using them on the contact page and in the whole help center.

Image: Example of a campaign pop-up inviting to a chat conversation on spacircle.au

💡 See tutorial: How to set up a Gorgias Chat Campaign?

Add a “Chat Now” link in all your emails.

To reduce the number of email responses, add a link or button in your emails’ footer that opens a live chat with your store.

Image: PuraVida Bracelets e-mail footer contains a graphical invitation to start a live chat conversation.

To create a link to your store that makes the chat box open automatically on page load, simply add the ?gs_open_chat parameter to your URL. The resulting store URL is now www.my-store.com?gs_open_chat.

👉 Read more about Gorgias URL parameters.

Turn on the “Chat contact card” in your Gorgias Help Center

In your help center settings (Settings > Help Center > Contact), turn off the “Contact form card”, but turn on the “Chat contact card” instead.

This way, your team deals with less email, and customers enjoy faster, smarter service.