During the pandemic, two-thirds of US adults said they checked the weather on a daily basis. So, it’s no surprise that 39% of the text notifications consumers receive are weather updates, per a report [download page] from TCN.
Weather updates are the most popular text notification among US adults, followed by delivery or order pick-up notices (37%), banking updates (37%), medical or dental appointment reminders (33%) and breaking news (32%).
Previous reports found that 48% of businesses use text messaging for customer service. However, only 28% of consumers prefer this method of communicating with customer service (top 3 responses). Instead, 7 in 10 (69% selecting in top-3) prefer to talk to a live agent, and more than half (55%) say easily getting through to a live agent is important when contacting customer service. Email (54%) and online chat with a live agent (46%) are also preferred over text message communication.
The least preferred communication with customer service by consumers is chatbot. In fact, fewer than one-fifth (17%) say chatbots are important when contacting a company’s customer service department.
About half (52%) of consumers say they want customer service to be 24 hours and they want easy access to a business’ contact information on websites (49%). If they can’t talk to a live person on the phone, 41% say a website chat with a live person will do.
Consumers are also willing to wait to talk to live agents. While only 12% say they are willing to wait 10 or more minutes, according to the report, actual wait times average 17.4 minutes. Some 62% of consumers say they’ve waited more than 10 minutes to talk to someone, and 23% say they’ve waited longer than 30 minutes.
When it comes to overall customer experience, consumers are looking for agents to have a willingness to help (60%), the ability to solve their issue (60%) and knowledge about the company’s products and services (58%).
Find the full report here.
About the Data: Findings are based on an April 2021 survey of 1,000 US adults.
