2021 holiday season, especially the BFCM period, witnessed one of the busiest e-commerce seasons ever to be recorded.
The US holiday e-commerce sales hit $206.88 billion and accounted for a record 18.9% of total holiday season retail sales. – eMarketer
This colossal success can be attributed to factors brooding over a couple of years such as the increased number of online shoppers and the extended BFCM run (due to the pandemic-induced change in the shopping habits).
If you remember, BFCM was a time when order volumes were high and shipping carriers were straining to meet delivery promises, increasing the magnitude of the problem multifold for the upcoming Holiday season.
Ensuring quality customer support helps you handle all of these without a worry. On the other hand, failing to do so can cause further trouble to your e-commerce business.
But was it truly exceptional customer service that helped businesses equip themselves to handle these challenges better?
To understand the magnanimity and study the impact of this behavioral shift, we partnered with our friends at Zoho Desk to study the metrics on customer service around BFCM. Here’s what we found.
Channels used to raise tickets
Let’s start with the most obvious. How did customers reach out to businesses with their queries in the first place?
Knowing your customers’ preferred channels can help you be prepared to reach them at any of them and not miss out or provide a delayed response. Because not doing so can result in weaker relationships and customer churn.
During BFCM 2021, Emails were primarily used to raise tickets, accounting for more than 90 percent of the tickets raised. Telephony and chat assistance took the consecutive places after email.