Role of Quality control and Training in a Live Chat Service – Part 1

Customer Service and Sales undergo comprehensive quality control and training measures. Similarly, for Live Chat, an extension of these two fields, it is just as important to undergo these measures especially if you are running a live chat service for your customers.

Mistakes and errors are all a part of the learning experience, but if you know what kind of errors are possible in Live Chat some preventive and counter measures can be put in place to minimize these kinds of mistakes.

Language Errors:

When it comes to language errors, spelling errors are the most prevalent. When we talk to somebody face to face, nobody is going to pay attention to how you said “Mississippi”, but in Live Chat it’s a completely different ball game. You are communicating with visitors through instant messages and since it is a professional communication medium spelling will be most definitely scrutinized.

With the advent of instant messaging through the years like MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger etc. Live Chat Operators tend to use short words or slang commonly used in the internet world which will give a bad impression on the visitor.

Another Language error that is very common is the wrong use of tenses, use of impolite or unprofessional words, and sometimes missing words altogether. The best prevention measure for these errors would be extensive language training and testing. Some other measures are summarized below:

- If the live chat software that you use does not have a spell check you can use softwares like “Tiny Spell” which would highlight spelling errors before it is sent over via instant message

- Create a list of words that are identified as unprofessional or impolite and in that list, add another list that has alternate words that is deemed proper.

- Strict Quality control measures should be put in place. Random chats that have taken place throughout the day can be scrutinized and feedback can be provided to individual operators.

2011-01-04T15:00:38