Customer preferences and needs change over time. Among the recent rising consumer trends is the demand for self-service options. A recent report revealed that 81% of consumers want more self-service options — yet, only 15% of them expressed a high level of satisfaction with the tools available to them today.
In other words, there’s a huge gap between what customers want and what they’re currently getting. This presents a golden opportunity for businesses to step up their game with their self-service offerings. By providing more tools — like well-crafted customer support videos — you can not only meet this demand but also set your brand apart from competitors.
So what’s behind the appeal of self-service? The reasons are many but, in general, it saves users time from interacting with a business. Customers often seek quick solutions or answers to simple questions, wanting a convenient option that efficiently and clearly solves their problem.
Videos, in addition to being engaging, are versatile. Whether it’s a step-by-step tutorial or a quick FAQ answer, customer service videos are a clear and efficient way to deliver information. When added to your customer portal, they can not only have a positive impact on your customers’ experience but also increase your retention rate.
Before we discuss the tips you can use to create support videos for your customer portal, let’s review the criteria to consider when choosing the most suitable software.
Choosing the Right Customer Portal Software
A customer portal helps you scale support offerings as your business grows. Therefore, it is vital to choose the best customer portal software that will meet your needs and expectations.
To begin, we recommend looking at the system’s features and cost.
Among the core features of a customer portal are:
- Knowledge base
- Custom branding
- A customer forum
- Tracking and filtering of tickets
- Live chat
- Advanced privacy and security options
- Centralized dashboards
The best customer portal software can be customized and integrated with other software tools to boost customer experience. Choose software that easily blends with your existing workflows to help streamline your team’s activities. On the same note, the cost of customization should be reflected in the pricing plan.
For example, if your CRM system and customer portal are well-integrated, your support agents can access customer history without switching platforms, making their jobs easier and the customer experience smoother.
On the same note, the cost of customization should be reflected in the pricing plan. Some portals may charge extra for add-ons or upgrades, so make sure you understand how much it will cost for you to achieve the functionality you need.
It’s also important to consider scalability. As your business grows, your customer portal needs may evolve, so choosing software that can grow with you is essential. Not all customer self-service portals are the same, but the ideal solution will be the one with the most relevant features to satisfy customer expectations.
Customer Portal Benefits
A customer web portal allows users to access numerous self-service options 24/7, making it a valuable resource, even more so when it’s optimized for search and web indexed.
These self-service options put the power in the hands of your customers, letting them resolve issues or get the information they need without having to wait on hold or navigate through complicated resources. Upon logging in, customers can, for instance:
- Create support requests
- Review the status of submitted support tickets
- Look up invoices and quotes
- Check updates on new products or services
- Fill out the feedback form
In many cases, a customer portal also links to a knowledge base with helpful reference materials, including FAQs, community forums, product documentation, how-to guides and video tutorials.
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Ultimately, it’s more convenient for customers to find video answers in a knowledge base than waiting for support to get back to them. By letting them self-serve, you not only boost user satisfaction but also improve your support agents’ productivity.
This direct contact line to self-service options saves customers time, decreases the need for support calls and ultimately reduces your company’s customer support costs and ticket resolution time. With less time spent answering routine questions, your team will be able to concentrate on complex inquiries that directly impact customer satisfaction.
As self-service grows in popularity, online customer portals are now considered essential components of any customer service package rather than an optional feature. This package would be incomplete without quality support videos.
Why Bother With Customer Portal Videos?
Most businesses expect that improving their customer experience will result in higher customer satisfaction scores and a higher return on investment. This holds true across various sectors, from small companies to large B2B organizations.
As customers have become more technologically adept, it is now more common for them to search for information online before deciding whether or not to call for assistance. Additionally, when asked how they’d like to learn about a product or service, a majority (44%) of consumers prefer to watch a short video, as opposed to materials like manuals (16%) or articles (13%).
Luckily, the ease with which we can create and view videos today is unprecedented. Creating a great piece of video content does not require you to have a degree in film-making. Nowadays, even your phone has embedded in it the capability of creating videos. Plus, there are plenty of video creators out there that make the process simple and accessible for any business.
While videos may have traditionally been considered an advertising and promotional medium, they’re now an integral part of customer service strategy and online marketing.
A big reason for this is that video content is incredibly effective at simplifying complex topics and providing visual demonstrations. This can be particularly useful for troubleshooting steps or explaining features that may be difficult to understand through written instructions.
For instance, imagine a customer trying to figure out how to set up a new software feature — a quick video can walk them through the process much easier than a text-based guide or even a customer service agent over the phone. Case in point, we’ve seen dynamic data-driven video be used to reduce call center traffic by as much as 73%.
The video below is a good example of how this format can be used to break down complex terms into easier-to-understand segments for the viewer.
Notice how the presence of actual people adds a human touch to the video. You want to create a personal experience for the customers interacting with your company. Having real people explaining the subject matter makes for a much more relatable approach, as well as a warmer welcome.
Including personalized voiceovers is another way you could do this. So long as you have someone directly answer their questions, you can craft an experience where the customer is able to feel like they’re getting the information they’re looking for from a real person, not a bot.
Are you ready to boost your customer service portal experience with video content? Here are 5 effective and practical tips.
Tip #1 — Have the Right Equipment To Make a Quality Production
As mentioned above, agents can be a great addition to customer portal support videos. However, poor video production can lower the value, undermine the desired effect and diminish the credibility of your brand, with 87% of consumers saying that video quality impacts their trust in a brand.
This means that investing in the right equipment isn’t just about making your videos look good — it’s about maintaining the trust and confidence of your audience. Your support agents need to have professional video production gear. At the very least, you should ensure that your team has access to the following essentials:
- Webcam or camera with HD (720/1080p) capabilities: Crisp, clear visuals are essential. A camera that records in high definition will ensure that your agents look professional on screen.
- High-quality microphone: Audio quality can make or break a video. Nothing’s more frustrating than having to strain to hear what’s being said. A good external microphone can eliminate background noise and capture your agent’s voice clearly.
If a computer or mobile device with a built-in microphone is used, don’t forget to test and verify that the audio isn’t distorted. Carry out a training exercise where you record your agents talking about a new product or service. Then replay the video back to them to determine its quality.
Be sure to remind the agents making the videos about the proper lighting setup. Low lighting will reduce the amount of information a camera can capture. Adding a few lamps around the camera will improve the picture quality.
Tip #2 — Make Sure the Videos Are Relevant and Relatable
When developing ideas for your customer support videos, you need to consider whether the topic is meaningful to the viewer. Try to map out the various concepts first and understand the links between them.
For example, if you have a new product in the market, you can add a video tutorial on how to use your product in the “getting started” part of your customer portals. Find out where in your knowledge base this video tutorial will add the most value.
Tutorial videos are one of the most effective instructional methods for educating and onboarding your customers. However, they sometimes lack a personal touch or have trouble keeping viewer interest. This happens when the presented content doesn’t correspond to the main topic or covers a large general subject.
To address this, consider incorporating Interactive Video features. Tools like chapter markers or branching options allow users to jump to specific sections of the video to access information quickly. This makes the video more engaging and user-friendly, as it caters to different user scenarios.
You can check out interactivity for yourself in the video below, which breaks down different topics regarding mortgage forbearance.
A quick tip: Listen to your customers. Create a public forum within your online customer portal where customers will be able to interact, share ideas or send you feedback and suggestions. That way, you’ll know if the videos you produce are relevant, engaging and relatable to your targeted audience.
Tip #3 — Keep Your Video Short
Even though product videos are easier to consume compared to text, the video’s duration is a significant factor. Lengthy video presentations don’t entice customers to use a service portal.
According to YouTube, the ideal video length ranges anywhere from 15 seconds to 3 minutes. However, relevance plays a big role in how long a viewer is willing to stick around. Ideally, your videos should efficiently address an issue or topic, only delivering information that a viewer would find helpful.
If your content is complex and the video has to be longer, break it down into sections. You have 2 options for how to use those sections:
- Create a series, one video for each section. This works best when the section can “stand alone,” providing all the info a user needs for a specific topic.
- Include these sections in the same video with interactive chapter markers so viewers can jump ahead or go back to find what they’re looking for.
A script is essential to guarantee adequate use of time. It helps customer support representatives to stick to the topic and get straight to the point. However, the agents should avoid sounding like they are reading from a script. Instead, they should engage directly with the camera as much as possible to create a more personal feel. Remember, the goal is to make your videos as engaging and informative as they are brief.
Tip #4 — Leverage AI for Easy Video Creation
It can be easy to feel overwhelmed by the complicated process of video creation. Fortunately, creating support videos is now a lot easier with the latest advancements in AI technology. With AI video creators, you no longer need to spend hours crafting every video manually.
Take our Enterprise AI Video solution, which uses retrieval-augmented generation to streamline video creation. This means you can turn your company’s online knowledge base into engaging video content with just a few clicks. Rather than relying on external sources, the technology pulls relevant information from your existing content so that your videos are always accurate.
For instance, the video below was effortlessly generated from WhatsApp’s FAQ page, showing how quickly you can transform existing content into a dynamic visual format.
Tip #5 — Review Your Video Analytics
Keep track of what works and what doesn’t for your support strategy. If the context of your support videos is unclear to the user, it can result in negative feedback — or worse. Data shows that as many as 74% of customers would switch to competitors due to poor experiences, with 46% saying it would only take one or two negative encounters for them to leave.
The good news is that, with the right video analytics, you can track key metrics, such as when a user pauses, rewatches and what portion of the video they watch in one sitting. Measuring the collected data can help you upgrade your output, evaluate your team’s performance and set KPIs.
Analytics also provide agents with a rich source of insights that are crucial for improving customer satisfaction through appropriate training. Here’s how:
- If users tend to skip your intro sequence, it’s best to trim it down and present the critical information they care about more quickly.
- If customers often watch a video on Feature A, more so than Feature B, you know to add more interesting content and agent support training on Feature A.
- If an agent’s video leads to lower handling time, you can use that to analyze what they are doing differently. Then share that information with the rest of your team.
In addition, the more information you collect, the better and more Personalized Video content you can create, leading to a more engaging and satisfying customer experience overall.
Wrapping Up
Now that you know all the benefits of customer portals and support videos, think about the tremendous value they provide to your business. High-quality support videos not only enhance customer satisfaction but also streamline your customer service processes and reduce costs. And with 81% of customers wanting more self-service options, investing in effective content is more crucial than ever.
As brands grow and strive to boost their online presence, they can’t afford to overlook providing high-quality support videos on their customer portals. We are now in the digital self-service era, and the more a company can personalize its products and services, the greater its chances of retaining customers.
Ready to enhance your customer support experience? Discover how video solutions like ours can help you create engaging, impactful content for your customer portal.
