Has anyone had any experience with using a Live Chat Service?

Looking to build one into a new site.

Cheers.

annoying. if I want to chat, i’ll phone someone up.

Personally I hate them, but a client wants to build one into his web site, so that ‘customers’ can contact him directly.

Just another method of communication.

Brilliant, I actually prefer them. However if no one is available (during the stated hours) its annoying. Which, to me would hurt your business if you can’t say hand on heart you could commit a member of staff to being dedicated to it 100%.

It actually is better for me than using the phone in some circumstances.

For example, if I need to quickly contact my forex broker about a technical query in relation to my trading platform, I’m currently sat in open plan, so it’s not really appropriate for me to start making calls asking about Error 130s in MT4 when other people are trying to work. So I can just use the webchat.

Also, when you are contacting a company about a technical query, or dealing with someone whose first language isn’t English, it can be easier to use webchat rather than spell things out on the phone.

Ok thanks, can anyone suggest a live chat service/provider for a clients web site?

The BikeChain use a good one.

Check out liveperson. They are the rolls royce of chat service providers but they deliver a fantastic service.

The charge more than other chat providers, but it’s worth it. Speaking from experience of several providers and their responses to our procurement exercise last year to select a long term, scaleable chat partner.

I quite like them, saves me having to call someone and usually they “answer” in seconds. What’s not to like?

Liveperson is good but pricey. We’re implementing desk.com which comes with chat for “free” and there are also open source versions out there.

I find that the picture of the girl you think you’re chatting with, rarely tallies up with the gruff, husky, 40-a-day voice at the other end of the line.

This is what we’re on about right?

DrP

TheBikeChain use this one: http://www.whoson.com/

TBH, I don’t think the software/hosting is the important part 😉

onion is right, we use whoson.

Cheap as you like, just drop in the code, add a custom GIF if you like, set the hours you want it to be ON or OFF and go for it.

It serves certain people very well and is dead useful.

One really useful feature of it is it’s SEO reports. It shows real time web use and you can compile reports of all sorts of info,

Think we pay about £25 a month or so.

EDIT: Modz is spoilsportz!

Just downloaded and set up live2support chat service for a demo. Looks good.

I was never that impressed with Whoson. We (at a previous job) used it for lots of clients and high traffic levels. I didn’t think it performed that well and the recommendations for users per server were silly (e.g. box with spec x can support 2000 concurrent users, box is at max so you need a new box, box y has spec twice as powerful as box x but will still only support 2000 users). I also found the client software annoying, to many bits that weren’t finished properly.

That’s useful alexme. What bike do you ride?

Am I missing something? Why is this 8 month old thread showing updated 17mins ago??

*Prepared to be embarassed at something obvious*

Spammers

Ask live chat