Top 3 Benefits of Virtual Communication for Businesses

Vishal Soni
Bits and Pieces
Published in
6 min readJun 22, 2020

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Palmer Freeman Luckey is a 27-year old American entrepreneur well known as the founder of Oculus VR and the designer of the Oculus Rift, a virtual reality wearable that is hugely credited to create a disruptive growth in the virtual reality industry.

He says,

“Today the best way to communicate with someone is still face to face. Virtual reality has the potential to change that, to make it where VR communication is as good or better than face to face communication because not only you get the same human cues as real-world communication, you basically suspend the laws of physics, you can do whatever you want, you can be wherever you want to be.”

Businesses are adapting to new ways of operations because it is working for them. Virtual communication is on the rise as it easily replaces person to person communication.

Here are some reasons why businesses are opting for this new way of communicating.

1. Saves resources

(Source)

The Angel Investor founder of Indian origin, Naval Ravikant once on Joe Rogan Experience said that he hates going to business meetings. What is it that can’t be done over the phone?

And even this may be counter-intuitive to many it is something to think about. Physical meetings in the boardrooms always contain more than just what is required to take away. In other words, they are rarely to the point. And, participants need to sift through the fluff of jargons, and PowerPoint slides to understand what is of value to them.

Work-related or business meets are not always limited to the boardrooms, they also often require international or domestic travel. Thus physical meetings not only take up more time than but also require more operating expenses.

People are accustomed to the traditional ways of work-related meetings that they cannot think of any other way to communicate, yet they continue to dread meeting almost all the time.

It is time to make some disruptive changes in the way we work, that have been proven to work for pioneering businesses and corporate giants.

Virtual communication is the new trend where the interests of businesses and the people are flocking towards. Technologies like video conferencing are getting a trajectory. Here are the main reasons why virtual conferences are better than physical meetings

More convenient

Modern video conferencing tools can allow people to create team meetings anywhere anytime, regardless of where the people are. It is also possible to customize every online meeting according to the agenda, making the experience more profound.

Cost-effective

Virtual communication tools are cost-effective as they drastically reduce your operational costs. They also allow you to skip the expenses to travel long distances or even have a huge office space.

They save time

Long-distance travel not only requires money but they also take up a lot of time. And. Furthermore, video conferencing tends to be very to the point and information-oriented saving everyone their precious time.

Some of the best tools for effective virtual communication are:

  • Microsoft Team — a collaboration too by Microsoft allows for internal chat, screen sharing, and video calls.
  • Viewup — an online communication tool prioritizes the safety and quality of video conferencing, allows for internal chats and screen sharing.
  • Skype — offers online calls, texting, paid international calling to mobiles or landlines for effective collaboration

2. Increases employee productivity

(Source)

Even though it is now cliched, the fact that communication is the key will forever be relevant. Especially in workplaces the better the internal communication, the better a business fares overall.

Virtual communication technologies like internal chat, video conferencing facilities, screen sharing, and emails can ensure that everyone in the company is on the same page not only when they physically work together but even while remotely located.

Now, in times where remote working is promoted and at times a necessity it is important to note that the quality of the communication does not suffer. Virtual communication tools are a great resource when it comes to handling internal communication even when employees are remotely placed.

Did you know that one of the most elaborate studies by Stanford Graduate Business School found that remote working employees outperformed others by 13% and also were 50% less likely to switch companies?

Another recent research concluded that 71% of employees that worked remotely reported being happy at work compared to 55% of the in-house employees. And, it is needless to say that happy employees are productive employees.

Virtual communication tools that can help in-house or remote working employees with productivity are:

  • Google Meet — This app allows a large number of employees to have a video conference
  • Google Chat — an easy to use internal communication tool.

3. Enhanced Customer Experience

(Source)

Now that even little pop and mom shops are going online, the need to offer the same, warm, traditional in-store customer experience is on the rise. Regardless of the size and type of business, the customer experience strategy has to be of importance.

Online customer service and engagement tools have allowed businesses to offer the same quality of customer service if not better than in-store customer experience.

Technologies like AI-based conversation chatbots, Live Chats, Co browsing, Screen Sharing, Tele/Video Calling, etc have a profound positive impact on the customers.

Here’s why…

More in-personal interactions

Digital does not mean less human, on the contrary technologies are mentioned above allow businesses to deliver a more human customer experience to its patrons.

For instance, Acquire’s Co browse feature allows for 2-way interactive browsing, this can allow customer service executives to be with the customers as they shop and also shop for them. This is especially helpful when dealing with old or specially-abled customers. Or while carrying out complex tasks that may come while making a purchase.

Quick solutions

People need quick service when it comes to gathering information about a new product or needing guidance post-sales. This makes it imperative for businesses to provide customer support round the clock.

Conversational chatbots can answer the most asked questions 24/7 tirelessly and with patience. Integrating your business’s knowledge base with chatbots is fairly easy. Acquire allows agents to create, edit, and upload new articles on the go in multiple languages through the easy knowledge base and chatbot integration

This not only offers unambiguous information to the customers quickly but also saves agents a lot of time and effort.

Tools that can help you provide better digital customer experience are:

  • Acquire — a unified customer experience enhancing tool. It offers features like unified agent dashboard, co-browsing, HD video conferencing, VoIP, emails, AI-based chatbots, etc.
  • Zendesk — a customer support app offering live chat, messaging and other support services.

TL; DR?

Here are the reasons how virtual communication can help fare business in a better way:

more convenient meetings; anyplace, anytime

· More convenient meetings; anyplace, anytime

· Saves time

· Saves money

· Allows for a flexible work culture

· Productive and happy employees

· More humanness in customer interactions

· Quick solutions to customer problems

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