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9 Benefits of Having Live Chat on Your Website in 2024

benefits-of-livechat-software

In today’s fast-paced environment, users generally expect a business to act fast with instant customer support. According to Ifbyphone, 59% of customers are more likely to buy when brands answer their questions in under a minute.

Customer Service is an integral part of any business. To cope with the latest trends, a business needs to offer an instant solution to their customers. Here live chat is the game-changing solution. 

Live Chat is an untapped potential that can boost your sales and help you understand your visitor’s behavior on your website. According to research by Intercom, organizations saved an average of $300,000 in 2019 by using chatbots with live Chat

86% of live chat tickets end with a satisfied customer. If that isn’t convincing enough, live Chat is more than 50% cheaper than phone calls and email support.

In this blog, we will discuss the benefits of having Live Chat on your website and justify whether live Chat is that awesome.

What is live chat support?

Live chat is an instant messaging platform that enables customers to communicate in real-time with support agents. Customers can easily find information or a solution, resolve a problem or even get acquainted with the business’ website.

Live chat is best used as an alternative to email support. With the help of AI or, to be more specific, chatbots, businesses can provide immediate real-time support to customers, increases customer satisfaction, and provides an overall better customer experience with extensive integration like a knowledge base and shared inbox tools.

Beyond support, live chat also lets customers stay in control and helps with customer retention. This helps the business gain customer trust and makes customers more likely to buy more products or services and leave more positive reviews. 

Why is live chat important for a business?

In this digital age, live chat has become an integral part of any business. According to a report, 75% of respondents prefer live chat to all other channels, and 63% of millennials want their fundamental customer service questions resolved by live chat.

In contrast to merely 61 percent for email and 44 percent for phone, live chat yields satisfaction levels of 73 percent.

Live chat is the best way to go beyond your customer’s expectations and improve customer experience when communicating with them. Companies that deliver good live chat support see an increase in customer satisfaction and higher sales. In fact, more than 63 percent of customers said they are more inclined to revisit a website if live chat is available.

Businesses that treat their customer well can be benefited in the long run for sure. In that case, live chat is undoubtedly the best solution to do so. 

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Benefits of live chat support for a business

The benefits of live chat support for a business are infinite. It provides round-the-clock customer service which is cost-effective. This is because it empowers the customer and creates a sense of urgency – they know that they won’t have to wait long for a response.

Here we listed out some of the notable advantages of having a live chat on a website, 

Live chat boosted conversions and sales

Live chat software has the potential of creating a delightful customer experience, but at the same time aid in boosting conversions. According to research, companies that use live chat experience a 20% increase in conversions. 

While browsing your website, customers may have questions about your product or service and with live chat, you can answer them immediately. Live chat gives you the chance to hold your buyers, guide them properly and help them make a purchase choice. 

Turning visitors into customers is key to any successful business, and so most companies will do whatever they need to boost their chances of conversion. 

To be even more precise, visitors who chat via live chat are 2.8 times more likely to convert than visitors who do not.

This is what makes live chat so powerful.

Live chat provides a competitive advantage

Offering live chat to your customers helps you to gain a competitive advantage to outperform your competitors. It does not matter if you are a small, medium-sized, or a corporate, live chat gives you an advantage over the competition in any field.

Even big businesses like Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft use customer support chat to stay one step ahead of the competition and prevent clients from switching to a rival website.

Benefits of Having Live Chat On Your Website

According to Finance online, 66 percent of enterprises use live chat mostly for support, while 85 percent use it primarily for sales. Approximately 85% of companies will offer live chat help on their websites or mobile apps by 2023.

Live chat builds long-term relationships and increased retention

Building long-term relationships with clients are crucial for the viability of your company. When customers feel you are there to listen, bonds are easier to form, and loyalty comes from that. And retention rises naturally when your consumers are happy and satisfied.

Customers who are happy with a company are less likely to switch to a rival. According to a survey of American online consumers, 68% engage in live chat and 63% prefer getting back to a website with live chat for repeat purchases.

In fact, 73% of customers say that excellent customer service makes them fall in love with a business and 86% of consumers are willing to pay a 25% premium for a superior customer experience.

Live chat improves the efficiency of your Support team and marketing effort

Driving traffic to your website requires serious marketing and SEO efforts. With less budget and time it is even harder. But you can overcome this if you effectively capture the leads through live chat. 

Live chat software allows you to greet your customers and engage with your support agents immediately.

You can later measure and track your support team’s performance with valuable insights like visitor statistics, conversation history, agent performance reports and wait time reports provided by Live Chat Analytics.

Through continuous monitoring, you can increase team efficiency, improve your customers’ chat performance, and learn which areas need improvement.

Live chat helps to deliver a great website experience

The use of live chat significantly lowers the bounce rates of websites.

Businesses that use live chat solutions can easily interact with customers in real-time and respond to their inquiries about purchases, which boosts website engagement and significantly lowers bounce rates.

According to Forrester Research, 57% of customers abandon their purchase if they don’t receive a prompt response to their query.

The same survey found that 44% of the online customers considered their questions answered by a live person in the middle of purchase as one of the most important features a website can offer.

Benefits of live chat for customers

A successful marketing campaign always starts with the customer. You must first determine what your clients want, and then start developing and providing that. The same applies to the live chat feature.

Live chat is convenient for customers

Live chat is convenient for many reasons:

  • Customers and support agents can communicate instantaneously using live chat. No need to call a number and keep pressing buttons before you can even speak to an agent.
  • Customers are able to multitask. Perhaps the biggest advantage of using live chat. Over 51 percent of customers like live chat precisely for this reason. 
  • The wait is hardly noticeable as compared to the phone call and email support. With live chat customers, inquiries can be swiftly handled.
  • The conversation can be saved for later. It’s easier to guide users through issues when their previous interactions can be referred back to for context.
  • Customer questions are answered promptly. Unlike email support, which needs a long time to back and forth; live chat can resolve issues in one session.
  • Customers can get immediate answers to questions about their purchases. This is a significant benefit as most of the customers genuinely value your assistance with purchasing selections.

Live chat provides a higher customer satisfaction rate

Live chat support has the highest customer satisfaction levels with 73%, compared to 44% for phone assistance and 61% for email. In comparison to online forms and emails, live chat resolution times are 13X faster. 79% of business owners claimed that implementing live chat, enhanced their clientele, income, and sales.

No wonder that live chat sets the records here. But how live chat ensures customer satisfaction? Let’s see,

  • Live chat is fast and convenient as already mentioned. In general, customers don’t require to go through any queue or other hassles to reach an agent as a phone call does.
  • As a millennial customer who is more likely to stick to their phones or laptops, chatting is the best form of communication at the current time. Most millennial customer prefers texting over calling someone.
  • People can have trouble talking with agents on call, due to fear of interaction, accent barriers, lack of privacy, and more. Live chat eliminates these problems with ease.
  • Live chat is secure and private. With live chat, prospective customers do not need to share their information and will be treated the same way with complete acceptance of their anonymity.

Live chat ensures a better customer experience

If you want to take care of your customers and earn their credibility, you must provide a better customer experience. No exception accepted. ‍

A bad customer experience can cost you and drive away your customers to leave your brand, as 48% of people reach customer service through live chat. A good customer experience can increase retention, boost recurring revenue, and, most importantly, earn customer loyalty.

Customers are less likely to have a bad experience with your brand when they always have a way to contact you. Even if they do, you must find a way to resolve it and retain your brand reputation.

Eventually, customers will recommend your brand to friends and family, increasing brand awareness and enhancing brand reputation.

Live chat delivers proactive assistance 

Live chat can engage customers instantly and gives them the best chance of explaining exactly where they are stuck and what they need. Many people find it easier to express themselves in casual conversation than in formal writing. 

For instance, If you want to get the best out of email support, customers must precisely describe their problems and include all pertinent information in which customers are not always experts. Sometimes it could be a days-long or a week-long back-and-forth conversation.

With live chat, it could be a 10-minute chat. That’s it! 

Best Live Chat Software in 2022

Here, we have listed some of the best live chat solutions available in the market to give you a comparative costing idea. 

Free VersionOffers TrialStarting Price
ThriveDesk$12 per month per user (Annually)
HubSpot Live Chat$45 per month per agent (Annually)
Zendesk Chat$49 per month per agent (Annually)
LiveChat$16 per month per agent  (Annually)
Intercom$79 per month per agent
Crisp$25 per month per agent
Tidio Live Chat$10 per month per agent

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How much does live chat cost?

The benefits of having a live chat on a website are far beyond. But there will be some significant barriers preventing your business from investing in it: How much does live Chat cost? 

Nowadays, there are plenty of live chat solutions, platforms, or software, available in the market. Some provide service for free, whereas some offer premium features and charge a good amount of money.  

The global live chat software market size is projected to reach $997 million by 2023. But the question is how much they cost and how much do they cost? Let’s find out. 

  • Free live Chat: Businesses with comparatively low budgets can use this. These packages may only include the bare minimum. However, they’re enough to get the job with a limited number of monthly chats. You may have to sacrifice features like chat reports, targeted Chat, white-labeled branding, and many more. 
  • Pay per agent: Many live chat services charge their clients based on the number of agents. Zendesk, LiveChat, and Olark all bill their client monthly based on the number of agents using their service or tool. 
  • Volume-based pricing: Volume-based live chat pricing models are similar to pay-per-agent plans; therefore, you have to pay based on the traffic volume no matter how many agents you have. 
  • Pay per lead: Some live chat service companies bill their customers based on performance rather than charging monthly or annual fees. If live Chat generates five leads in a given month, the customer will only be charged for those five leads. 
  • Additional features: Live chat pricing can depend on the features you choose. Some live chat providers offer add-on features for a fee. For instance, the chat provider must register a new phone number to integrate SMS. They include a monthly charge in the bill to cover the cost of retaining the number.

Final Words

Is live chat really that awesome? The short answer is yes. Live chat is really THAT awesome. 

In terms of boosting sales conversion, providing real-time help, automating responses, and improving customer experience, live chat has incomparable value. Businesses should review their customer service strategies and determine to enhance the client experience by providing speedy, individualized, and in-the-moment assistance.

The advantages of live chat are worth every penny of the investment.

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