Use Social Proof in Live Chat and Customer Service Conversations to Boost Conversions

Customers trust other customers more than you, even if you're not using high-pressure sales tactics. At the end of the day, social proof is a critical factor in getting customers to buy.

You're probably already using product reviews, but if you're just showing them in the typical places on your product page, they can be easily overlooked.

Integrating social proof into more noticeable but natural feeling areas can massively boost conversion. Ezra Firestone has shared that adding product reviews in place of product titles increased average revenue per user by 13.7% - which drove an additional $30,000/month for their store at their size at that time.

Being creative works!

Another place where integrating social proof can drive a lot of value is in live chat and customer service conversations. Integrating social proof in a conversational way can increase the conversion rate of the chat and customer service channel.

At HelpFlow, we provide 24/7 live chat and customer service teams for over 100 stores. Over the years, we've tested a lot of different ways to drive more sales. While predicting cart abandonment and saving those sales through chat is a big driver, integrating social proof into conversations also has a big impact.

In this post, we'll dig into how we do it to spark ideas for you to do the same.

Mention Reviews in Conversations

Reviews show that other customers have been happy after making a purchase. This is great for someone considering buying, but burying reviews on the product page causes effective reviews to go unnoticed.

You can integrate mentions of customer review content in live chat conversations naturally to drive more social proof than a product review section on your product page. When someone asks a question about a specific product, answer the question but also consider mentioning and sharing a snippet of a review that is related to their question.

For example, if the visitor asks how well a product works with another product they have, sharing the answer and a review that shows how happy someone is using it the same way can perform really well.

(I'll mention a bit of tech you can use to make this easier at the end of the article).

Drive Scarcity with Stock Count or Recent Orders

If customers know other customers are buying, it can create a drive for them to purchase. Not only does this create a sense of social proof, it also introduces scarcity because they know the product is in demand.

How can you seamlessly do this within a chat or customer service conversation?

• If customers ask about delivery timing, answer their question but also mention subtly how many products are left in inventory. For example, "Shipping to San Diego should only take three business days. It looks like we have ten units left, so if you're ordering soon, we should be able to get it to you by Friday.". This subtly introduces the scarcity of 10 units and a feeling of ordering quickly without being pitchy.
• If customers ask a question about a specific product that isn't timing-related, you can preface your answer with something subtle like "Happy to help. Quite a popular product (we sold seven already today, which is a bit higher than normal)." This feels conversational, acknowledges their interest, and naturally leads to answering their question - all while integrating social proof and scarcity.

Again, I'll mention a few ideas for making this easier with tech below. But the core strategy is definitely a winner.

Mention Prior Similar Questions from Buyers

With the above tactics, you're basically mentioning past buyers from product reviews or recent orders as a way to drive social proof. You can also just mention recent questions you've answered on chat and customer service channels to show social proof.

This is similar to mentioning prior orders, but you're mentioning prior questions instead.

For example, suppose someone asks about a specific product. In that case, you can preface your answer with something like "I actually had a chat with someone in Arizona about the same thing earlier today." and then answer the question.

This is basic, but it helps the prospect recognize the legitimacy of your product and increases their likelihood to buy.

What's Next?

The key here is to integrate social proof into the customer service conversation. These are a few ways to do it, but there are more opportunities if you get creative that you'll identify once you see these work.

With that said, integrating specific and real social proof is key here to make this work - I'm talking about real relevant reviews, accurate inventory counts, real recent orders, and real recent conversations. Otherwise, it comes across as spammy.

To make this easier for your team, you can create custom search engines that search through your product reviews, order data, inventory system, or customer service conversations. That's a bit technical, a bit nerdy to break down in detail here. But if you have a team working on your store, it should be pretty simple for them to put together.

We Can Implement This For You

At HelpFlow, we run 24/7 live chat and customer service teams for over 100 stores. We've driven nearly $100M in revenue through customer service channels since 2015 and can help you provide a better customer service experience that is insanely profitable at the same time.

• Book a Strategy Call on our website, and we'll break down specific ways to save cart abandon and drive conversions based on your actual data. Even if you don't work with us, you'll get a ton of value from the process since we've worked with so many stores.
• Check out our blog if you want to see additional conversion strategies or customer service scaling methods. For example, we've got a post here about how to save cart abandons with live chat and another post here about how to forecast customer service staffing needs.
• Or if you just want to nerd out about what you learned about and ask questions, reach out! We're happy to help.

Chat soon!