HubSpot Ideas

KateVertigo

Customer Input before using Messages

We are currently using the beta of Messages and the biggest fault we see is the lack of information it collects/provides to us when a customer attempts to chat with us. This makes it incredibly difficult to reach out to the person contacting us to follow up on a chat. Because Hubspot collects no info, I have no way of reaching out to that customer to answer their question and hopefully lead to a sale.

 

Based on this, my strong recommendation is to allow us to create certain required fields to use the chat. For our company in particular, we'd likely ask for a first name (maybe last name?) and an email address. Not only does it give us a way to follow up with this customer, this will also allow us to connect the customer with the right person on our team if they're already a customer with an agent assigned to them.

15 Replies
rlawless
HubSpot Product Team
 
jorth
Member

Absolutely agree with this, I often ask for name or email to follow up, but they have left the page and I never get a chance to follow up. Feels fairly useless as a sales tool when it so hard to know who you are talking to, and are unable to follow up.

 

markusarvidsson
Contributor

This is a very important function bot when the chat in live and when someone want to leave a message when it is offline.

BryceHarenburg
Member

I completely agree with this! This is a great suggestion!

AnthonyStretten
Participant

Nice to see the messages feature working now, but without the user entering a name and email you have no idea who they are and if you have engaged with them before. 

This should all be tied into the contacts timeline so you can see a history of what has been said to better support them and push them to become a customer.

nicoles
Member

Agree! At minimum, when our team is offline, it would be great if Messages could prompt for name and email before they submit their question.

quentinsolal
Member
Email or phone collection should be triggered when a lead asks the first question or until we get his email address.
If we are here but don't have time to reply, the lead has already left and we've just lost a contact... Smiley Mad
hroberts
HubSpot Product Team

We now provide an optional setting on a per message basis that will prompt a visitor to enter their email address after initiating a chat with a user! This can be found by clicking Edit > Message. Under the Welcome Message, you can toggle on the "Capture email address after visitor sends first message" setting.

KateVertigo
Member

Unfortunately, I strongly disagree with the new 'Delivered' status of this request, and here's why:

  • It is relatively common for someone to pop onto our website, ask a quick question, followed by silence and leaving the page. This was what prompted my original request to ask for information BEFORE the potential client reaches out to us. Asking AFTER they message will likely lose us the same people it lost us before.
  • Knowing if the person reaching out to us is a current/past/potential client directly affects how we deal with them and what information we need to have at hand to converse appropriately. By not asking the contact information at the outset, it limits our ability to respond well.
  • The addition of an email request is a start, but having a first and last name tells us much more of the picture. Why not ask for the name?
  • While I appreciate the concept that other companies are different than ours on whether they would like to collect this information, I cannot fathom why there wouldn't be a universal on/off option for this information collection. We have tailored our messages to each page of our website, which means we have more than a few (though likely less than some companies). The fact that an employee had to go through each and every one to update them when it makes a lot of sense that many companies would want this all on or all off is ridiculous.
  • The box that asks the chatter for an email address isn't likely to make most people answer the request since it appears to only relate to the staff person sending them an email instead of continuing the chat. This is taken further by the response that the staff person will email them. This makes is appear as if we're dumping them off instead of continuing the chat and doesn't seem like a good customer service step at all. Instead, when they open the chat, just put in an entry for first name, last name, and email. Then it can thank them for filling it out and tell them someone will be with them right away.

Give us a universal on/off switch (while keeping the option to opt the other way in each message), give us the option to move this information request to the beginning of the message, ask for first & last name, and do not make the customer think we aren't going to chat with them. It's important.

willcritchlow
Member

I agree with @KateVertigo - I would like to be able to make at least email (to connect to a hubspot record) and possibly name as well required to start a chat. For all the reasons listed.

CTMQ
Member

We were using Zendesk before moving on to Hubspot and the Zendesk Chat feature was alot more useful in collecting Customer's Information before starting a chat and it allowed us to have that Customer record and if needed we could get in touch with them after the chat was complete. Or if needed we could just give them a call up whilst the chat was going on if needed. 

 

So I think it would be great if the feature was able to have a setting to capture at least the Customers First Name and Last, as well as email BEFORE starting the chat. Phone Number would be a great bonus too. 

jasonzimmermann
Participant

Definitely! As most chat tools do as well - you enter your info, maybe even provide a short message and you're redirected to a person who greets you by name, knows a bit about why you're reaching out, etc...

 

The option to enter an email at the beginning of the chat is unfortunately not enough. First name, email, and a quick message would a million times more valuable. 

mcbuchanan
Member

I agree! Please make this change HubSpot!! 

troenicke
Member

@hroberts I agree with @KateVertigo. I'd like to see at least a name options as well. It would also be nice to be able to manually prompt this (by our service reps) so it could be inserted into the conversation more organically vs a bot throwing it out there at the begining of the conversation. 

hroberts
HubSpot Product Team

@troenicke I encourage you to file a new and separate idea post detailing how you would like to see something like this work and the benefits for your use case. Idea posts once Delivered are not the best places to have that discussion since this serves more as a historical record at this point. Feel free to link back here for reference in your new post!