3 Reasons to Add a Live Chat to Your Website NOW

Ding, ding, ding.

As I was sitting at my desk at Boucher + Co.’s offices last week, I heard a distinct ring from across the room. Immediately, I knew this was no ordinary notification, but rather a very important one: a notification from our site’s live chat software.

A few years ago, live chat software was mostly limited to providing customer service for product or software businesses. Today, it’s becoming increasingly ubiquitous among service businesses and startups, due to it’s ability to enhance and grow these companies.

Here’s why you need to add a live chat to your website today:

1. You can close more deals, almost immediately.

It’s true, especially if your website is already receiving a lot of traffic. When I instructed my team to add a live chat to Boucher + Co.’s website, I was excited to see its effect on our business, but had low expectations. I thought we’d get a lot of spam messages through this new avenue of communication. Instead, we only received very qualified leads from people looking for digital marketing services.

The first few days of having our live chat on our site saw the first leads trickle in. First, someone was wondering if we provided pay-per-click advertising management services. We said yes and promised to get in touch over email.

By the end of the first week of using our live chat, we had closed a client. And here’s the best part: the entire transaction essentially happened on our site. The first time we exchanged emails was to get the contract signed, sealed, and delivered.

2. You can answer buyer’s questions in real-time.

With a live chat on your website, you can replace a number of emails from interested buyers that contain nothing but questions. Typical questions that can be addressed directly through a website’s live chat include:

What services are provided?
How much does it cost?
How long does X take?
What’s your refund policy?

And so on. Being able to answer buyer’s questions right on your website speeds up the sales cycle, helping you close deals faster. It also helps you qualify possible leads early on in the exploration process. Are you out of the buyer’s budget? You’ll know right away.

At Boucher + Co., we utilize our live chat daily to speak to interested buyers, many of whom go on to become customers. Thanks to our live chat, we’re qualifying potential customers sooner and easier, and buyers are happy that we can respond to their questions so quickly.

3. You can provide (really) quick customer service to your clients.

Having a live chat on your site helps you respond to existing customers’ questions, too. Sometimes, customers may find it easier to use the live chat to ask questions rather than calling or emailing.

One of Boucher + Co.’s customers had a question about the best time to post on Instagram, but thought this was too brief a question to call our offices for. They messaged us via our site’s live chat. One of our team members got back to them immediately. Our customer was even happier.

My advice to anyone considering adding a live chat to their website is simple: tell your customers about it. Promote it. Consider it a serious part of your sales strategy. It will do wonders.

By the way, we strongly endorse Olark for your live chat needs. They’ve been great – and very easy to use.