Almost half of all German companies operating in the internet economy do without modern communication technology. Not even 7% of all customer enquiries are dealt with via live-chat, virtual counselling or dynamic FAQ systems. Instead, more than 80% of companies cling to personnel-intensive and therefore cost-intensive means of communication with clients such as phone, fax or email. This was revealed by the “Multichannel-Management” study conducted jointly by the novomind software company and the TeleTalk specific journal.
Apart from the personal conversation in situ or via phone, in particular email or fax are applied as communication channels. Nine out of ten internet companies use email when communicating with their clients. Surprising is the fact that one quarter of all client enquiries are still dealt with by obsolete fax technology.
The about 200 experts and executives who were interviewed in the course of the above study expect that the percentage of internet tools used for customer communication in customer management will increase from currently 7% to 17%. This is important to save costs. Client enquiries via online systems, for instance, cost only 10 cent per enquiry while answering to such an enquiry per email entails costs amounting to 5 Euros on average. When using fax or phone costs even amount to 6 Euros.
In most cases sophisticated web solutions already amortise themselves after a few months. By using dialogue-oriented tools it is not only the costs of costumer service which can be reduced. At the same time customer satisfaction also increases if customers are attended to via modern web solutions instead of email. 