The blue message icon at the bottom of the page is a live chat widget. When you click on it you get the option to converse like shown in the image below.

You can instantly start to type your queries and the person behind the chat will help you.

Live chat is as easy as you just heard.

Live chat is a simple process where to learn more about a brand or to ask questions you can just click a button at the bottom of the website and get started. 

For instance, say that you are on a website and you want to enquire about a product, you can just chat with the brand who will share relevant details about the product you are looking for as well as share your related details on the same. This is great because you have instant information at your fingertips and it is pretty quick.

You can decide there and then itself if you want to make the purchase and move on with your life. 

Interesting Read : 15 Best Sales CRM Software for 2020

Live chat makes it this simple. 

Live chat can take place either manually with humans who act as chat agents or with a bot that can do the same work a human chat agent can do. With live chat, you can understand what your prospects are looking for and continue the communication in a manner where their queries are resolved.

An investment in this solution can help your business better. Let’s understand how live chat’s presence can help your business soar higher in 2020.

1. INCREASE IN LEAD CONVERSIONS

When you have an easy communication medium sitting on your website where communication taking place between you and your prospects is happening with just one tap of a button, don’t you think this can impact your lead conversions for the best?

Your lead conversions take place when you reach out to your prospects on time and continue to nurture them with time as well. For this to happen, you first need to tap the leads isn’t it, and for this action to happen you need a communication medium that can help you capture leads quicker which is exactly what Live chat does here. 

Live chat lets you tap leads quicker, gives you the opportunity to speak to the leads, retain leads attention by learning, and solving their issues or doubts and thus making it easy for conversions to take place. 

2. NO CART ABANDONMENT ISSUES

Why does cart abandonment take place? Have you wondered why your prospects have added your product in the cart to purchase them but don’t confirm the purchase? The reasons are multiple such as change of mind and more, but there is one common issue here the fact that there isn’t enough motivation to push your prospects to make that purchase.

See it in this way, what happens when you have decided to purchase a product but by adding it in the cart you suddenly have two minds. Now wouldn’t you like it if you had a chat medium to just clarify your second thoughts once again? It’s like a small push just like how you would ask someone else to tell you if you buying a product is worth it.

When you have someone telling you to go ahead, you will confidently make that purchase, this is exactly what live chat does, it is such an easy and convenient medium where you can just clear your doubts in a second which will let you eliminate cart abandonment. Hence with the reduction of cart abandonment, the lead count increases. 

3. HIGHER CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

What do your prospects ask from you? Or rather expect from you? A product to sort out their needs and above all an easy way to reach out to you. You have a great product in hand and with live chat you now have a convenient communication medium as well. So what happens when you give these two to your prospects?

They become satisfied and content with your brand. They will want to explore more about your brand as well, conduct word of mouth actions so that more relevant prospects can know about you. When you continue to increase your customer satisfaction count, you also increase the chances of your brand growth which is what live chat presence aims to give to your brand.

Interesting Read : Top 30 Free Web Scraping Softwares in 2019

4. COMFORTABLE COMMUNICATION PLATFORM

Live chat isn’t complex. It’s just a window where you can ask multiple questions and have them all answered and clarified at the same moment. Such communication platforms are easy because they make the process of enquiring about a brand’s solution more comfortable. Live chat is similar to texting and in 2020 texting is a new way to ask, find out, and be informed about anything.

Live chat serves this purpose well which is why its popularity is growing higher. 

5. CAPTURES PROSPECT DATA EASILY

When you interact with your prospects via live chat there is an advantage you can receive. The advantage of capturing your prospects details such as their name, contact number, email address, and more. This information will help you reach out to such prospects and pitch well for them to make an investment in your brand.

Capturing vital information is so easy with live chat because it never makes the prospect feel that you are taking their details for just a sales process, with the conversation continuing on a smooth sail, you are capturing the information in such a manner where your prospects would believe that you wish to help them sooner. 

6. MAKE USE OF CHATBOTS

Live chat can be done manually with real human agents but as technology is growing, the need to make everything quickly becomes mandatory. For instance, with the use of chatbots, your prospects can be catered to immediately. 

This is an example of chatbots:

Chatbots function the same way as a human would do since they will be programmed in that manner. As you can see in the image above, could you tell if the chat agent was a human or a chatbot? Chatbots are quicker and in a time where catering to prospects needs to be faster than your competitors, this is a better option. 

7. TRACKS PERFORMANCE AND IMPROVE

No process can be conducted in a business without the ability to track the performance. Tracking performances of your tactics is a great way to grow your business well. With live chat, this is possible also. You can go on to track how many leads were captured, what went well, what went wrong, what can be improved in the chats as well. 

All of this will contribute to enhancing your live chat medium with your prospects. The better you make your prospects' needs answered soon, the higher are your chances to tap them faster and this is exactly what the use of live chat is all about. 

8. FASTER MEDIUM TO COMMUNICATE

Live chat is fast when compared to emails or calls. The reason being with calls and emails you need to wait for the prospect to come back to you to explore and learn about your product and even to clarify your doubts. This takes up multiple times in follow-ups and more.

With live chat, this isn’t the case. The medium is always available for prospects to just land on your website and start communicating. The minute your prospects type a question, the answer is reverted in seconds to them. The medium to communicate needs to be easy and quick in 2020 because that’s how far you need to go to beat the competition, if you slow down you lose out on potential prospects and that isn’t what you need to receive. 

9. CHEAPER COMMUNICATION MEDIUM

Live chat is a cost-efficient tool. You just need to place a code or invest in a software that can help you conduct this action. You also get loads of features to enhance your live chat actions at a reasonable price. 

Pro tip: We have covered the top best live chat softwares for you which you can find in this article below. 

Live chat is such a solution that due to its cost-efficient advantage, even small businesses can benefit from its presence. Live chat provides such an opportunity for small brands whose aim is to grow and excel higher. 

10. SOLVES ISSUES QUICKER

Live chat as stated earlier in the pointers, with just one question, your answers are resolved instantly. You can just type your queries and can expect your answer to be in front of you in seconds. Live chat makes it this simple to solve issues. By understanding and going deeper into the prospect's issues, live chat provides an instant solution that solves such issues with ease which is why it is considered to be a preferred tool by brands. 

See it in this way, the only way to grow your business is by catering to your leads and that can happen when you resolve prospect’s issues quicker which is why live chat is necessary. 

11. DOESN’T MISS OUT ON POTENTIAL LEADS

Not all your leads will be a confirmed lead, some would just be a cold lead. But apart from the cold lead you still have a few hot and warm leads coming to you. Luckily with the quick assistance of live chat, converting such potential leads into a sales lead doesn’t take up much time. 

Your live chat is present to solve queries, help your prospects learn more about yours, and when this is done efficiently to all of the leads that interact with you, there are no chances of missing out on potential leads. 

Interesting Read : Everything you need to know about Jarvee

12. PROVIDES THE ADVANTAGE OF INSTANT COMMUNICATION

A prospect comes on your website, types a question, and gets an answer. It is this simple with live chat. It solves the basic need of answering your prospect’s needs and catering to them. 

13. MAKES A DIFFERENCE IN YOUR SALES ACTIVITIES

When you cater to your prospects at the right time and with the right solution, what happens? You make them happy, you draw their attention towards your brand more to explore, you convert their actions from a doubtful buyer to a confirmed buyer. And what happens after this?

Your sales start to impact, you start to see a rise in conversion rates, lead count, and more.

Live chat makes this as simple as you saw above. 

14. LET’S YOU TAP THE PAIN POINTS OF PROSPECTS EASILY

Why does a prospect come to your brand to enquire? The reason being they have a need and want to know if your brand can answer their needs. The need arises because the prospect has an issue which can’t be resolved, once they state that to you over live chat, it becomes easy for you to understand them better and place the solution you are offering them in places where they understand themselves how their needs are being catered too.

All of this taking place on one platform and so conveniently.

15. RECEIVE COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES

If you have a close check on your competitors, you will realize that not many of them are making use of live chat, they are using more forms which means using live chat can give you a high leverage. By the time your competitors are reaching out to your prospects after they fill the form, you would have tapped more prospects with just a few conversations. 

16. TAPS PROSPECTS NO MATTER THEIR LOCATION

Lastly, another great reason to invest in live chat is the ability to tap your prospects from anywhere across the globe. You have the opportunity to go beyond your local prospects, you can tap a huge and wider audience which benefits your brand well. 

Did these reasons convince you enough to fall in love with live chat?

Let’s give you more reasons to love live chat more.

So now you have understood about live chat, let’s move further to understand why you need to use this medium for your communication with prospects and lead generation.

So let’s say you're using your cold emails for your lead generation activities.

Cold emails are great with the great use of subject lines, your chances of your prospects opening your emails can be high. Also with cold emails, you have the potential to send multiple emails and then follow up with the prospects to revert to you.

Now all these follow-ups take place accordingly so your reverts are high in number.

Why don’t you answer this question here, do you consider cold emails as a great medium to communicate with prospects instantly?

See it in this way, cold emails are great but once you send it, it does take time for reverts and the reason could be multiple such as the prospects didn’t see it yet, or forgot to reply and more.

The purpose of the cold email being sent fades away in the minds of the prospects.

Now, what happens when you use live chat?

Your prospect would see your website, they would explore it and see a live chat window, they would start to engage with it to clarify their doubts.

Why would they do this instead of replying to the email you sent them?

Because they have doubts and they aren’t sure about their investment in you. They want something easy to clarify their doubts on the spot which is why live chat is useful here. You are aware that your prospects need to be confident in investing in your brand and that can only happen when their queries are resolved instantly.

Let’s take another example here of cold calling.

Cold calling is still popular because it reaches out to prospects sooner and has the ability to make lead conversions skyrocket faster. 

Cold calling lets you schedule meetings and also reach out to prospects instantly. You can always conduct follow-ups with your prospects to get on a call with them. 

But the scenario here is not many prospects would prefer a cold call because they believe it sounds like a sales pitch and instantly ignore or cut the call. Because of this, it has become difficult for sales reps to retain their attention for longer.

With live chat this isn’t the case, prospects are asked those questions or rather guided on questions that they have enquired. It’s like if you choose a book to read from your favourite author, the chat agent is suggesting books of the same author or another author who has the same genre as your favorite author.

Live chat is necessary, important, helpful, efficient, and very lead generic which is why you need to start making use of it to the maximum.

Now there are multiple live chat softwares available in the market but how can you know which one is better, or which has the best features? Luckily for you, we have conducted all of that research and have listed out only the top live chat softwares for you.

Let’s get you on a tour.

1. DRIFT

Drift is on the list for the top live chat softwares you need to get started with. Its main focus is to increase sales, closed rates, make the customer experience better, improve sales pipeline, retain customers, and more. Close to 50,000 businesses across the glove make use of Drift’s live chat feature.

Best features:

• Provides integrated knowledge base responses
• Provides conversion analysis
• Provides real-time lead qualification
• Provides the option to book sales calls 24/7
• Let’s you sync meetings with calendars

Pros:

• Easy tracking of leads on your website
• The option to create customized chat is available making every chat experience better

Cons:

• Explaining their features in a much better manner would be preferred
• The pricing structure can be confusing for certain users to take a call about their investment in this application 

Pricing:

Free plan, Essential- $400/month, Premium- $1500/month, Enterprise- Custom

Capterra Ratings:

4.5/5

2. OLARK

Olark is the next top live chat software for you to get started with. This is a very simple and easy to get started live chat software. It has a built-in CRM, let’s you answer prospects queries quicker, collect feedback from your prospects and do so much more in just one application.

It is an affordable tool that also focuses on capturing vital data so that engagement with prospects are much better. Also, Olark’s interface is clean and easy to understand. 

Best features:

• All live chat transcripts can be found
• Straightforward application
• Integrates with multiple tools such as WordPress, Hubspot and more
• Focuses more on sales and marketing actions

Pros:

• Chat communications are taking place in a simple manner, easy to get started with and easy to understand what to do next
• Let’s users store pre-written responses so that while communicating it will be handy

Cons:

• The screen sharing feature can be enhanced better
• The reporting feature can be more detailed

Pricing:

2 week free trial, Monthly- $19/per agent, per month, 1 year- $15 per agent, per month, 2 years- $12 per agent, per month

Trustradius Ratings:

8.1/10

3. INTERCOM

Intercom is the next top best live chat software for you to get started. Intercom is a well-known name and has been designed to cater to customer communications as a priority. They cater to multiple customer communications where live chat is a part of it. Trusted by 30,000+ businesses across the globe Intercom makes use of advanced technology such as AI to enhance its customer communications better.

Intercom gives its users the opportunity to make use of its platform at the maximum. Intercom also provides add ons which can make your live chat experience better. 

Best features:

• Makes capturing and converting leads easy
• Provides self-service support
• Uses machine learning and AI which is evident in its chat process
• Provides multiple options for users to choose when using live chat

Pros:

• Provides easy customizations option to suit each user
• Let’s users access pre-determined KPIs

Cons:

• Product tours can be better
• The process of resolving issues can be better 

Pricing:

Essential- $87/month, Pro- $153/month, Premium- Custom pricing

G2 Ratings:

4.3/5

4. HUBSPOT

Hubspot is another top best live chat software you need to get started with. Hubspot is another well-known name when it comes to sales and marketing. The tools being offered are great for any user who makes use of Hubspot. Hubspot offers its live chat feature for free and along with it, you can even make use of Hubspot CRM that helps you manage your lead management.

The live chat option given from Hubspot is different, instead of you having to type out your answers in the live chat window you have the option to choose from the options which makes it even more easier to communicate.

Best features:

• Provides targeted welcome messages
• Provides instant support answers
• Integrates with Hubspot CRM tool for better lead management
• Customizations of chat windows take place easily

Pros:

• Provides a well-designed interface
• Allows agents to block users who are abusive

Cons:

• Despite it being a free application, you will still have the Hubspot name being advertised in the chat widget and to eliminate it you will have to upgrade to a paid plan
• In this free application, only one team can be created

Pricing:

Free tool for live chat service

Livechat labs Ratings:

4/5

5. SNAPENGAGE

Snapengage is another top best live chat software for you to get started. It is considered to be an enterprise chat solution best fitted for business websites. Snapengage ensures that your live chat communications go like a breeze. Snapengage also provides multiple options for you to connect with your customers such as on Facebook messenger, tweet to chat, WeChat, SMS to chat, and even mobile chat.

Another great thing about snapengage is the factor that it lets you integrate with multiple tools, where a few are social media. The software is best suited for the industry with security provided for the necessities such as healthcare and any other relevant ones. 

Best features:

• Integrates with multiple application such as Basecamp and more
• Automatically optimizes for mobile
• Integrates with 20+ social media platforms
• Provides advanced security for multiple industries using their live chat solution such as healthcare and more

Pros:

• Customer engagement is always on point for brands who make use of this platform
• Transferring chats to another agent takes place instantly and easily

Cons:

• Adding attachments in chat messages seems to be a hassle
• Manual effort is more when using this application

Pricing:

Essentials- $16 per user per month, Professional- $26 per user per month, Enterprise- Contact the team

G2 Ratings:

4.4/5

6. PURECHAT

Purechat is another top best live chat software for you to get started. It is a dedicated live chat software where the main focus is to enhance live chat activities. Purechat is the perfect fit for any kind of business, be it a small business or large because it is so simple to get started with.

The features provided will help you to conduct live chat better because every feature is dedicated to it. Purechat is easy, simple and the perfect live chat solution for those brands who are looking for affordable pricing with more value being drawn out.

Best features:

• Integrates with 1000+ applications such as Slack and more
• Is a dedicated live chat software
• Provides customizable chat widget
• Provides visitor tracking option
• Provides trigger-based alerts and actions
• Provides detailed real-time analytics

Pros:

• Provides convenience when a prospect can connect with the agent directly
• Very easy to set up the chat software on the website

Cons:

• Chat notifications at times arise little late which can cause a delay when the traffic on your website is high
• A few users experienced disconnection with the software so they had to go through the trouble of re logins often

Pricing:

Growth- $39/month, Pro- $79/month

Capterra Ratings:

4.6/5

7. CLICKDESK

Clickdesk is another great top best live chat software for you to get started. This is a live chat solution but it is also dedicated to customer support more. Integration of Clickdesk can also happen with social media handles which means that connecting with prospects can take place easily.

Trusted by 185,000+ websites from across 120+ countries which means this is a well-known platform. It is easy to invest in clickdesk as you have the option for a month to month pricing.

Best features:

• Provides ticket management
• Provides one-click integration with third-party tools
• Provides audio calling with live chat
• The best solution for customer support

Pros:

• Communication with prospects are much easier
• Provides a simple and easy interface 

Cons:

• Would prefer a built-in option for creating avatars
• When opting for the free plan, the features it offers are very limited which makes it difficult for new users to learn about this product

Pricing:

Free for 10 users, Lire- $14.99/month, Pro- $24.99/month, Enterprise- $39.99/month

G2 Ratings:

3.9/5

8. KAYAKO

Kayako is another top best live chat software for you to get started. Kayako is considered to be a unified customer service software. It is a platform that is trusted by 131,000+ brands from across the globe, to name a few are MTV, Toshiba, and more.

The great feature about kayako’s live chat solution is that chats can be assigned, managed, and routed to the right person in your team with just a single click which means that lead management on your live chat window is being taken care of well. Kayako’s main focus here is to focus more than just live chat which is evident in its features. 

Best features:

• Provides built-in ticketing
• Provides customer activity tracking
• Provides tailored real-time service to users
• Supports desktop and mobile devices
• Let's the users choose the welcome message and colours for the chat

Pros:

• Kayako’s every feature is on point and is evident that it was made for its customers to use at maximum
• Easy to get started and manage prospects

Cons:

• Customer support can be improved
• Could work better on the customer feedback option so that more information can be extracted for brands to function better

Pricing:

Inbox- $15 per agent, per month, Growth- $30 per agent, per month, Scale- $60 per agent per month

Capterra Ratings:

4/5

9. VELARO

Velaro is another top best live chat software for you to get started with. Velaro is a great live chat software that offers a good amount of features that is perfect for any brand to conduct live chat activities.

It is an omnichannel chat service. It also gives you the option to customize your live chat window accordingly as well which means for every brand the live chat window will be unique. This platform is also best suited for any type of industry such as ecommerce, education, technology, and more.

Best features:

• Provides click to chat option
• Gives real-time visitor tracking insights
• Provides reporting and KPI tracking facility
• Provides canned response A/B testing
• Provides geo-tracking in an advanced manner
• Provides chat histories and survey submissions

Pros:

• Allows communication to take place using either a desktop or mobile platform
• Downtime of the application is at its minimal always

Cons:

• The reporting tools could use a frequent update
• It will take time for you to get acquainted with this software

Pricing:

Small business- $64.95/per user, Professional- $179.95/per user, Enterprise- Custom

G2 Ratings:

4.2/5

10. BOLD360

Bold360 is the last top live chat software that you require to get started. It makes use of the AI chatbot to conduct live chat activities. To engage with your prospects, bold360 makes uses of automation which means faster interactions and more chances of lead conversions increasing soon.

Another great reason to love this application is the fact that personalization is present which means the live chat conversations don’t sound like a robot. Multiple prospects stop talking in live chat because they feel the agent doesn’t relate to their issues, but with bold360 this isn’t the case with personalization being the high priority. 

Best features:

• Provides personalization for your live chat
• Uses automation to drive more customer engagement
• Provides either a live or virtual chat agent option to interact with your prospects

Pros:

• Is a user-friendly application
• Conducts toggling in between chats which many users prefer 

Cons:

• This application conducts multi-tasking which is great but it can be improved further
• Hold times before a chat is completed can be stretched for long

Pricing:

Need to request for a quote for any of the pricing packages it offers such as agent, service and more

Trustradius Ratings:

8.8/10