A live chat provider is offering the trade a discount to try its services as travel firms gear up for the peak booking period.
Agents and suppliers can receive 25% off set-up costs and monthly fees on Yomdel’s live chat platform until 31 January.
Yomdel recruited Bhav Taylor as business development manager in September to drive expansion within the travel, leisure and hospitality sectors.
Taylor said Yomdel’s offer had been inspired by TTG’s Holiday To Help Out scheme and was its way of supporting travel firms amid the pandemic.
The company aims to ease the amount of time firms spend reacting to customer service enquiries and also help generate web-based leads to drive new business.
Yomdel’s live chat is run via its 24/7 contact centre and has an average customer response time of 15 seconds, Taylor said.
“We want to take the heavy lifting out of things,” she said. “Using live chat can free up staff to focus on more complex tasks that you seem to have no time for – especially right now as everyone is so busy.
“We’ve seen a lot of businesses from different sectors turning off their chat boxes during the pandemic because they don’t have enough people power but the ones who have excelled have kept that interaction going.”
Taylor said Yomdel’s chat boxes could be added to company websites and social media channels. The technology builds up a “knowledge bank” of a firm’s product and customer language to become “an extension of our clients customer service team”.
“We know there’s pent-up demand for travel out there but right now nobody really knows if peaks will land on 26 December or a bit later,” added Taylor. “We can create a service that suits different companies and get things in place to switch on when they’re ready and when they need it during peaks.”