Best Practices Series: How to keep customer conversations going

You’ve set up your TextKit account, sent your first few messages using a message template to contacts in your campaign, and received a response from a customer. Great! Now what?

As you continue to use the platform, you will likely come across conversations such as the above example that are in progress but have no actionable result yet. These messages are found in two categories: “To Answer”, where a customer has sent a response and is waiting for you to reply back, or “Open”, where you sent the last message and are waiting for a response.

Let’s go through four tips on how to keep active conversations going to maximize the effectiveness of your outreach.

Stick to the channel you started with

In most cases, we saw no increase in conversion rate when a user switched mediums mid-conversation. Stick to the same medium you started the conversation in, unless it makes sense to switch. For example: a customer has a specific question with an answer that would be too complicated to explain over text. In this case, a call is the better channel to continue the conversation.

We have seen instances similar to above with a text-response-call pattern have an increase in the conversion rate because it made sense in context. Remember that if a switch is needed, you should notify the customer before doing so.

Keep in mind the customer’s preferred channels of communication as well when considering which medium to have the conversation. You can always access this in the right-hand sidebar of the TextKit window.

Respond to every message

When a customer responds, don’t leave them hanging! Reply back as soon as possible. Even just one response from the customer can increase the expected conversion rate dramatically by up to 3x over time. What’s more, conversations that lead to a back and forth have the best conversion rates.

Keep it going past the first response

The ideal pattern with the highest conversion rates is an initial text, response from a customer, followed by at least 2 back and forth responses through either texting, calling or a combination of both. 

The holy grail of ongoing conversation is rather simple. lf you can manage to bring most of your conversations to the ideal pattern, you'll be awarded with a very high conversion rate. 

Reach out to everyone you need to

A key coaching tip we recommend is to reach out to every customer in your campaign by sending the initial text with a message template. By completing 100% of your list, you’re increasing your chances of receiving a reply. That can potentially lead to a sale or at least make the customer aware of you for the next opportunity that comes up.

Even if you don’t receive a response, the conversation rate for our texting users is around 5%. As the quote goes, “you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take”.

Remember to record your actions at key moments (such as when you booked an appointment because of the outreach) and close the conversation when it’s finished.

For more tips on keeping your conversations going, check out our Quality Conversations Guide for recommended replies based on customer responses.