April 2, 2019 at 17:29As we searched (and did not find) new tools for communicating with customers
I lead the GLASHA Linguistic Online School. And more recently, for communication in our company most often used e-mail and Skype. But the culture of communication is evolving. Numerous unsuccessful Skype updates have turned many users away from this program. Many of our students massively demolish this program from their gadgets. In addition, people refuse e-mail, replacing it with FB and VK messengers. Non-urgent phone calls are now considered a violation of etiquette, an invasion of personal space and just bad manners. Companies have to adapt to these changes in communication.
And although most of the communication takes place on social networks, WhatsApp is the favorite of the customer-oriented service. It is an ideal tool for communication. Some lessons at our Skype school are held using this service. Teachers can send students files, games, photos, videos - to make lessons interactive and boring, which is especially important for children.
Most students and their parents install this particular messenger on the phone. It allows you to timely inform about the cancellation or rescheduling of the lesson. We can call teachers anywhere in the world for free.
But WhatsApp can not be used by several different people from the same number. For example, in corporate Skype, we have operators on a common account on duty around the clock, quietly replacing each other. So we quickly review the message history and control the lessons. If the student and teacher have a green “light”, then as a rule, this means that both are online and the lesson is going on normally.
After numerous global failures of Skype, almost all the teachers switched to Zoom. The quality of communication in this service is much higher, and there are much more functions for teaching. For example, the ability to preload files is built-in and thus saves time for opening them during the lesson, you can correct errors with the teacher. In a word, both for conducting lessons and for their coordination, Skype, unfortunately, is hopelessly outdated.
We tried to do a group on WhatsApp with a student and three operators, but it turned out to be extremely inconvenient. WhatsApp Business service is also not very clear, as it allows, as we at GLASHA think, only to write the name of the company, but it does not allow people from different phones to access the same account.
Our second important channel for communication is social networks: Facebook, Instagram, VK and LinkedIn. With the help of these messengers, we not only recruit new teachers, but also conclude contracts.
The best strategy for a company with customers around the world is to combine all communication channels. Therefore, our operators at the same time open all possible contacts of students and teachers, from the profile on Facebook to the completely forgotten ICQ in case of force majeure.
This allows you to always "keep abreast" and instantly respond to any requests from students and teachers, but the ideal would be a kind of program that combines these channels. I try to monitor new developments in this area, but so far I do not see anything suitable, although the need for such a system is long overdue.
And although most of the communication takes place on social networks, WhatsApp is the favorite of the customer-oriented service. It is an ideal tool for communication. Some lessons at our Skype school are held using this service. Teachers can send students files, games, photos, videos - to make lessons interactive and boring, which is especially important for children.
Most students and their parents install this particular messenger on the phone. It allows you to timely inform about the cancellation or rescheduling of the lesson. We can call teachers anywhere in the world for free.
But WhatsApp can not be used by several different people from the same number. For example, in corporate Skype, we have operators on a common account on duty around the clock, quietly replacing each other. So we quickly review the message history and control the lessons. If the student and teacher have a green “light”, then as a rule, this means that both are online and the lesson is going on normally.
After numerous global failures of Skype, almost all the teachers switched to Zoom. The quality of communication in this service is much higher, and there are much more functions for teaching. For example, the ability to preload files is built-in and thus saves time for opening them during the lesson, you can correct errors with the teacher. In a word, both for conducting lessons and for their coordination, Skype, unfortunately, is hopelessly outdated.
We tried to do a group on WhatsApp with a student and three operators, but it turned out to be extremely inconvenient. WhatsApp Business service is also not very clear, as it allows, as we at GLASHA think, only to write the name of the company, but it does not allow people from different phones to access the same account.
Our second important channel for communication is social networks: Facebook, Instagram, VK and LinkedIn. With the help of these messengers, we not only recruit new teachers, but also conclude contracts.
The best strategy for a company with customers around the world is to combine all communication channels. Therefore, our operators at the same time open all possible contacts of students and teachers, from the profile on Facebook to the completely forgotten ICQ in case of force majeure.
This allows you to always "keep abreast" and instantly respond to any requests from students and teachers, but the ideal would be a kind of program that combines these channels. I try to monitor new developments in this area, but so far I do not see anything suitable, although the need for such a system is long overdue.