1. Why snooze a conversation?
While it is generally more interesting to address and resolve visitors' questions live, snoozing a conversation for a set period of time, or until visitors respond, will give more flexibility when responding.
It can help you put aside idle conversations, which allow you to be more available and therefore help to engage and advise more visitors on the site.
A green or red dot visible on each statebox allows you to see if the visitor is still online or if he has left the website.
A green dot shows you that your visitor is still browsing your website
A red dot means that your visitor is no longer on your website
2. How to snooze a conversation?
Click on the snooze button.
It is then possible to snooze a conversation for a certain length of time (3 hours, 24 hours, or custom). The conversation in progress will disappear from the conversation panel.
If the snooze is for a custom duration, you will have to click on the clock to validate.
This option allows a better follow-up of the conversation, as well as a better reactivity in case the conversation is reassigned to another respondent.
Note that you are not considered unavailable when your maximum number of simultaneous chats is reached, in this case the snooze conversation stays assigned to you and waits for a slot to open up on your desk.
3. When should you snooze a conversation?
The green and the red dots are useful to indicate how to use the snooze during a conversation.
Here are some practical cases :
- An expert chats for an online sales site and advises visitors who ask him questions about buying a refrigerator
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Case N°1: the dot is red and there is no resolution for now
A visitor asks the category of the refrigerator to the expert, without further explanation. The expert answers him on the energy class because he thinks that this is probably what the visitor wanted, but he is not 100% sure that this was indeed the meaning of his request...
At this point, a red dot indicates that the visitor has left the website. The expert considers that he might return - he may simply have been away - and that his request is not completely resolved. So in this case, the expert will not close the conversation definitively.
He may prefer to snooze the conversation - here for 24 hours - to free up a slot. He will then send a canned answer message from his library and then pause the conversation.
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Case N°2: The dot is green, but the visitor is not responding and there is no resolution yet
The expert sees that the dot of the conversation in progress is green, so the visitor is on the website. However the expert asked him if he was looking for a refrigerator that also includes a freezer, and it has been 2 minutes since the visitor has not answered despite his reminder.
Again, the expert is unlikely to be able to consider this conversation as resolved. But that in the meantime, he may also be able to answer to someone who needs him more. So he does the same thing: he snoozes the conversation after warning the visitor.
Nevertheless, the snooze here will be for a duration that is not too long because the visitor may have simply gotten lost in his navigation. The expert will, therefore, take for example 15 minutes, and in the meantime, he changes its status to available for someone else.
After 15 minutes, if the visitor decides to answer, the conversation will automatically return.
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Case N°3: The dot is green but the resolution comes later
The visitor is online and chats with the expert. But he would like to put an American fridge in his future apartment and forgot to measure the space that will be available in his kitchen and only returns in two days.
We are here in a case where the visitor really can't make up his mind right away.
The expert, therefore, tells him that he will snooze the conversation and that he will be able to resume it by returning to the website on the same browser, or that he will be restarted if he has left his e-mail address.
Again, since there is no resolution, the expert does not close the conversation. He snoozes it, and since he knows that he will have an answer in two days, he puts it on hold for 48 hours.
4. Can a visitor be notified when an expert responds to them?
Yes. There are two possible ways.
The first one: The visitor will receive the response when he returns to the website. A number representing the number of messages from the expert will appear on the notification which is in a reduced state.
The second one: The conversation queues must be activated. Only an administrator can configure this.
A visitor will then be asked to fill in his e-mail in order to be notified when he receives an answer from an expert or agent.
5. Best practices
- Always choose to live interaction when possible.
- Avoid checking this box if you are about to go on vacation!
- The conversation history provides information about conversations that have come out of snooze. Take the time to consult it so you avoid asking your visitor the same questions all over again.
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Don’t forget to set your status to unavailable before logging out. All your conversations must be snoozed or closed before you log out.