Posted on: 03 December, 2001
Author: Mike Banks Valentine
Imagine yourself at the local Sears carrying a shopping ... the isles looking for the perfect gift for your ... you come to a great looking watch in the jewelry ... know she'l Imagine yourself at the local Sears carrying a shopping basketdown the isles looking for the perfect gift for your spousewhen you come to a great looking watch in the jewelry department.You know she'll love the design, but also know she has a curiousallergy to white gold and call over a salesperson to ask themwhat the bevel surround is made of. She reassures you that it'smade of platinum so you cheerfully purchase the watch, smilingas you wander over to have it gift-wrapped.Take the same scenario online and imagine you have the samesimple question to ask someone. Now what? You most likely justabandon the shopping cart and leave the store because you can'timagine spending that amount of money without knowing whetheryour sweetie will break out in hives because the white goldallergy affects her wrists so badly.Abandonment of shopping carts online is blamed on everythingfrom fear of using credit cards on the web to privacy concerns.My theory is as follows: If you have any questions about anyproduct or service you are purchasing online, ecommerce sitesexpect you to either look up the answer in their FAQ's(frequently asked questions page) or just search out their800 number from the site somewhere and call them yourself tofind out. This can be a ridiculous process on some sites asthey simply don't want to be bothered with expensive phonecalls and leave their number off of the shopping cart pages.They don't want to devote customer service reps to those fickleshoppers that abandon online shopping carts at rates as highas 90% at some ecommerce sites. I'd propose that most onlineshoppers abandon those carts because they need to know somethingthat could never be considered for those FAQ pages like the termof the product guarantees or how long the battery life is. Ifthere were a simple way to have your questions answered, I'dlike to suggest that those shopping carts would rarely everbe abandoned.I've found the solution and can't believe the brilliance ofthe idea behind the answer to this thorny question. Customerclicks a button labled "CallButton" and gets a pop-up screenasking for their name and phone number so a representativecan call them at their convenience to answer any questionsand/or concerns! They fill int their name and phone number and receive a politeresponse page custom designed to reassure them that they willbe contacted how and when they would like to be by a person thatcan actually answer their question! No nasty telephone trees orautomated callbacks, but a person from the jewelry departmentthat knows platinum from white gold.You now have the name and phone number of a prime valuablecustomer ready to buy who WANTS to hear from you.>From the customers viewpoint, this is simple, responsive andsatisfying. From the sellers position it is one of the mostpowerful ecommerce tools to be announced on the web this year!This idea and the powerful software behind that simple buttonwere announced at a press event titled "Showstoppers" duringthe Spring 2001 InternetWorld conference and show in the Cityof Angels (Los Angeles) March 15th. This tool receives my vote as a better ecommerce solution thanany seen at the huge eCRM (Customer Relationship Management) showheld concurrently with the I-World show at the LA conventioncenter this month. The powerful tracking and reporting functionsthat come as part of the package with this incredibly simplelittle button could turn around the fortunes of major e-tailerslike many of those we've seen sink in the economic downturn.Priced at a very low per-call rate starting at about $1.50per customer contact, you can have calls routed anywhere fromyour cell phone to your home office and be assured of makingthe sale to that customer that very likely would have walked(or clicked) right out of your e-store without that personalcontact from a caring customer representative. Most so-calledCRM solutions are simply automated-database-tracking-purchase-recording-preference-listing-sub-routine-predictive-expensive-file-them-here-contact-them-then-follow-up-with-them-nexttypes of robotic de-personalizers.CallButton offers the reporting and tracking tools availablein those complex CRM solutions with two major differences. Yourcustomer gets their questions answered and you make the sale!It's installed on your page with a short line of HTML code andyou don't invest the tens of thousands of dollars required ofmajor corporations for their robotic de-personalizer software.You make the sale, your customer is satisfied. Now comes thebonus. The upsell while the customer is on the phone with you.This prospect has requested your contact, has an interest in moreof what you sell and has qualified themselves for your services. If you don't upsell them now, you might consider doing something else with your time.I've signed up for the service and can't imagine how I got along without it. It's priced for the small business and handily solves adifficult issue for both business owners and their customers.http://callbutton.com/ Article Tags: Shopping Cart, Shopping Carts, Phone Number Source: Free Articles from ArticlesFactory.com