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If you have to do it more than twice, automate it. – Adam Stone
How many times have your agents typed out the same response today? Whether it’s answering “What’s your return policy?” or “How do I track my order?”, these repetitive tasks pile up quickly, eating away at precious time and leaving little room for meaningful customer interactions.
It’s not just about the time lost. Every second spent manually crafting a response means slower replies, inconsistent communication, and, ultimately, frustrated customers. With 74% of consumers expecting instant answers, the stakes for customer service teams have never been higher.
But here’s the thing: repetitive doesn’t have to mean manual. What if you could automate these recurring conversations while ensuring every response is quick, accurate, and aligned with your brand voice?
In this blog, we’ll show you what is a canned response and how canned responses can help your team work smarter, not harder.
Canned responses are quick replies to common questions that you can use for customer service, sales, or marketing to boost response time. In another way, canned responses are predefined answers or messages for the frequently asked questions typically for queries related to sales, customer support, or marketing. They are used to engage customers better during an ongoing conversation to deliver a faster & consistent response.
With canned replies, agents can provide personalized and accurate information promptly which makes the conversation effective. Using these responses correctly across different conversations improves agents’ productivity. These replies can be used for chats, messages, or emails to improve team key performance indicators (KPIs).
Canned responses mean templated responses or pre-written messages. It provides significant benefits for businesses and a customer support team. Canned responses improve productivity consistency & time efficiency, reduce errors, and agents get rid of repetitive tasks. Let’s have a look at some of the major benefits of canned responses.
Imagine cutting down on the repetitive work your team faces every day. With canned responses, that’s exactly what happens. Instead of typing out the same reply for the hundredth time, agents can quickly select a pre-written message and get back to helping more customers. It’s an easy way to save time and keep the focus on trickier issues that need more attention.
Nobody likes waiting, your customers included. Email Analytics research shows that 90% of customers expect an immediate response from customer service, and 60% define “immediate” as within 10 minutes.
With canned responses, your team can reply to inquiries in seconds, whether it’s through email, live chat, or social media. Quick answers mean customers aren’t left hanging, and your team gets to handle more requests in less time.
Have you ever contacted a company and gotten different answers from different agents? It’s frustrating. Canned responses eliminate that by ensuring every customer gets the same clear and professional reply, no matter who’s handling the chat.
Canned responses are not just a shortcut, it is a tool that helps your team to provide service to customers more effectively.
Here is the secret, “A perfect canned response shouldn’t sound canned at all”.
Canned replies should be tailored to give your customers the best experience possible. We have prepared an analysis of different scenarios across sales, support, and marketing departments. We have also added examples of best-canned messages to combat the situations.
Let us discuss the scenarios and the examples of canned answers in detail that can serve your customers effectively.
Impressions matter and first impressions really matter. A warm, sincere greeting can create great first impressions and opportunities for memorable experiences, which will make them want to come back again.
An effective greeting should help in starting up a conversation. You can prepare canned responses for different categories of different customers: visitors, returning customers, and new customers to deliver a personalized experience. Here are examples of customer service responses that can be used to greet clients.
Start a free trial with REVE Chat which allows you to set canned responses to welcome different types of customers and visitors. It allows you to engage your customers instantly with a personalized welcome message.
In this scenario, a customer has reached out to the company with a query or concern via email, phone, or another communication channel. The customer service representative acknowledges the receipt of the inquiry, assuring that their message has been received and will be addressed promptly.
A customer contacts the company to report a problem or express dissatisfaction with a product or service. The representative acknowledges the customer’s frustration, expresses empathy, and assures them that their concern will be addressed promptly and effectively.
Collecting information is an important part of getting work done in the right manner, but it needs to develop trust and comfort. Information can be general, credit card, billing, address verification, or personal.
Acquiring all the details related to the issue helps the agent in providing the right solution to the customer. Designing canned replies that help in asking for more details to the customer queries shortens the duration of providing answers. Here are some examples of the best-canned answers that fit the above scenario.
A customer is interested in learning more about a product or service offered by the company. The representative provides a brief overview of the product/service, highlighting its key features or benefits, and offers to provide more detailed information based on the customer’s specific needs or interests.
A customer expresses uncertainty or concern about resolving an issue. The representative reassures the customer that help is available and encourages them to provide more details about the problem so that appropriate assistance can be provided.
An angry customer expects you to listen and then respond. What you say (or write) can make or break the experience. What you say next is vital because when customers are asked to rate their experiences, their opinion is based on how they feel they are being treated.
Actively listening to customers is the first step to handle angry customers. Do not interrupt the customer in between and let him vent. Meanwhile, you can take notes on the facts. Then acknowledge emotions, the situation, or something clearly important to the customer. Prepare canned responses that carry positive words and phrases:
The customer wants to know when the company’s customer service team is available for assistance. The representative confirms the availability of support and assures the customer that help is accessible whenever needed.
Customers are an asset to every business. They are the ones who use your product and provide you with insights about the white and gray areas. Hence, it is crucial to acknowledge their issues as early as possible.
Promptly admitting the problem and giving an estimated time of when you are going to resolve their issue make a huge difference. It gives the feeling that they are valued and their problem is being looked into, which reduces customer churn rate. Some canned replies examples that fit perfectly to such a scenario are:
When customers raise a request, they expect a faster resolution. Delivering instant response is one of the customer service tips followed by many businesses. Addressing customer queries in real-time also boosts customer satisfaction.
Having canned responses helps agents to update about ticket resolution. Follow the examples mentioned below to handle such situations:
While the prime goal of businesses is to assist customers to the best of their ability, there are instances when they have to say NO to them because. It could be what they are asking is not available or you don’t offer or they might be making unreasonable demands.
But knowing when and how to tell a customer no is just as important as knowing why you are doing it. While it is okay to say no, it can be problematic if you don’t know how to say no to a customer. You can shape your customer expectations by creating the best-canned responses for saying NO politely. Here are some examples that you can follow:
Imagine you are a SaaS company that allows businesses to embed payment options on their website. The payment gateways will process the online transactions in the backend.
If one of the payment gateway integrations stopped working unexpectedly, it would create a huge disturbance for customers who rely on that payment gateway. As a result, customers get annoyed and vent on the support team seeking immediate action. So how should you frame a perfect canned apology message?
When the customer is telling about the problem, gather all the details and if needed ask questions to handle the situation. Using empathetic phrases and genuine apologies can help. Here are some examples fitting for such scenarios:
Every business has its own refund policy. Customers can raise a refund request based on the policy. If the duration for refund has exceeded, you have to explain to the customers that you can not accept the request.
You should have canned responses that show your refund policy. It will provide them with the complete details for getting a refund or not. Here are some examples of canned responses that can be used for such scenarios:
Customers request to cancel subscriptions when they find that the products or services are not meeting their business objectives. Having well-defined canned replies for such scenarios helps you handle the conversation without making the customer feel bad. You can follow the canned response examples mentioned below:
Customer feedback, no matter positive or negative, brings new opportunities for your business. When customers share their opinions about your products/services, you should be grateful to them. They are the most reliable source of acquiring actionable feedback.
Action-based feedback is highly beneficial to getting real-time insight into how customers feel, such as at the end of every conversation, after checkout, or a product demo. You need to prepare canned responses for thanking customers for providing feedback at different times across different channels. Here are some of the best-canned response examples.
A product demo or appointment booking is the most critical process of a B2B SaaS company. It is an opportunity to demonstrate the value of your product to a prospective customer. When customers make a demo booking, it is a great chance to make your prospects understand how your solution truly solves their pain points.
Having canned answers for the prospects who want to book a demo or an appointment, helps in converting the opportunity and closing the contract faster. Some examples that can be followed for the demo booking scenario are:
There are times when customers are not aware of all the features. They want to understand all the features that your brand offers. For such scenarios, you need to create canned responses that provide access to the support content or links that explain the features elaboratively. Some examples of canned replies are as follows:
The customer requests a specific feature or solution that the company does not currently offer. The representative suggests alternative options or workarounds that may meet the customer’s needs or recommends similar features that are available.
The customer prefers to seek assistance through a different support channel, such as phone support or live chat. The representative provides information on alternative support options and encourages the customer to reach out through the preferred channel for immediate assistance.
The customer seeks guidance or assistance with a common issue or question. The representative directs the customer to self-help resources such as an online knowledge base, FAQs, or tutorial videos that can provide immediate assistance.
The customer’s issue requires further investigation or escalation to a specialized team. The representative assures the customer that their request has been escalated and promises a follow-up from the appropriate team member to provide further assistance or updates.
A well-designed queue message sets clear expectations and does not frustrate the customers. At times, when all the agents are busy handling conversations, you can set a personalized queue message that gives an idea about the wait time for getting connected to the agent.
Queue messages can be created in a way that customers know what is the queue position so that they can make a decision. Setting customer expectations and meeting them improves your brand credibility. Here are some canned response examples for queue messages.
Sometimes you do not have the solution to the problems asked by your customers and it is completely okay. Carrying on the conversation without accurate information won’t make it effective. But what the agent does on the spot makes the difference.
The agent should politely admit that he may not be the right person who help and transfer the chat to another agent who can handle the conversation efficiently. Having such canned answers for customer service, helps both agents and customers to get the right solution at the right time. Here are some canned response examples:
Customers deserve to be treated with respect. A customer should be thankful for being allowed to give you their hard-earned money. Since most people don’t have your product or service, they’re choosing you out of thousands of competitors. Be grateful that they even give you a chance. Use this phrase to show them gratitude;
The customer wants to know when the company’s customer service team is available for assistance. The representative confirms the availability of support and assures the customer that help is accessible whenever needed.
“Our team is here to support you! Feel free to reach out if you need any assistance.”
Creating a canned response can help you avoid repetitive typing of replies during customer conversation so that you can be more efficient. However, following some tips while creating canned replies helps in making conversation effective and boosting customer satisfaction.
To create canned responses, you need to identify the requests faced frequently by sales, support, or marketing teams. It gives you clarity about the issues and you can develop the best canned messages.
Ensure that your pre-drafted replies should convey genuine information to the customers. Accurate answers engage customers in a better way and deliver a great experience. Eventually, they turn out to be your best brand advocates.
While designing the messages, keeping them precise and meaningful is essential. Creating canned replies to the point provides effective information that fulfills their purpose in minimal time.
Personalization adds sparkle even to the canned responses. Sending a personalized response leaves a deeper impact on customers along with instantly resolving their issues.
Canned responses offer a practical solution and allow businesses to automate replies to common queries and issues. It reduces response times and ensures that communication remains consistent and professional. With the above-mentioned canned response examples, you can engage with customers by providing accurate and faster replies. Hence, canned responses can be considered an excellent tool for your sales, support, and marketing teams to improve customer satisfaction scores and increase customer retention rates.
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