The benefits of having live chat on your website

Live chat is the informal sales assistant of the digital world – there to help boost customer confidence by answering quick questions about products and services without submitting a formal email request.

How effective is it?

This research study – “Making Proactive Chat Work” was conducted by Forrester Research and it found the following:

“Many online consumers want help from a live person while they are shopping online; in fact, 44% of online consumers say that having questions answered by a live person while in the middle of an online purchase is one of the most important features a Web site can offer.”

There was also an e-marketer.com survey that showed that 63% of customers were more likely to return to a website that offers live chat. The survey goes on to say that:

“62% reported being more likely to purchase from the site again. A further 38% of respondents said they had made their purchase due to the chat session itself. All these attitudes were even more prevalent among respondents who bought online at least weekly.”

This convenience creates a more inviting shopping experience and has a direct impact on customer satisfaction giving you and edge over your competition and driving sales up. Customers are much more likely to return to websites where they know that they are going to receive the support they need with minimal effort.

What is it, really?

Ultimately, live chat is a real-time messaging system – between you and your customers, your team and your customers or a third party and your customers depending on what level of support you need. They range from free services (with a small setup and installation charge) to subscription based services depending on your needs and budget. The chat window can be fully branded for an additional cost or might have some branding for the provider – we are very open with our supplier partnerships and you’ll notice that we leave the branding on our live chat windows.

Talk to us today

If you’ve been thinking about installing a live chat system on your website and would like to find out more information then get in touch today and we’ll run through the various options available.