Imagine you’re at a bookstore and trying to find a book by your favorite author. If you can’t find it, you would start thinking, is it out of stock? Or is it located somewhere else?
You wouldn’t want to go write an email or make a phone call and wait endlessly for a response as it is a very simple, basic question. You might lose interest in the purchase and discard the process.
This is what happens when customers don’t get quick responses in eCommerce stores.
In this scenario, live chat comes to the rescue by offering rapid, seamless, and personalized communication and helping businesses, especially eCommerce players, boost online sales.
However, there are a lot of live chat tools in the market, and choosing one requires time and effort. To sort this out, we have curated the list of popular eCommerce chat solutions that helps businesses boost online sales and conversion.
What is eCommerce live chat?
eCommerce live chat appears as a pop-up on the window whenever people visit your website. It allows customers to quickly interact with businesses and get their doubts clarified before/ after making a purchase without leaving the browser/app.
Through the eCommerce chat widget, customers seek information about a product, delivery date, return and refund policies, payment, and more. Offering a swift resolution of customer queries boosts their confidence in the brand and accelerates the buying cycle.
A robust eCommerce embedded chat app is equipped with templatized responses to answer the FAQs automatically while directing the complicated ones to the customer care agents.
Why do eCommerce businesses adopt live chat?
From helping businesses minimize costs to enhancing customer service quality, eCommerce chat tools offer several advantages. Here are other important reasons.
1. Reduces costs and time
eCommerce live chat tools help quickly resolve customer inquiries, saving time and cost. When compared to other mediums like email, live chat enables a quick response.
According to estimates, the average time to respond to a message on live chat is 46 seconds, while for email, it is 18 hours.
With live chat tools, agents can handle multiple inquiries simultaneously. Also, responses to FAQs and basic questions like product information can be automated via canned responses or chatbots. All these reduce the need for a large customer support team.
So, live chat helps reduce operational costs by maximizing resource utilization and minimizing response time.
2. Boost online sales
Live chat allows businesses to engage with customers, offer personalized assistance, and answer their queries in a timely manner. All these accelerate conversion and decision-making.
Moreover, chatbots can be used to qualify sales leads and direct them to support agents, boosting conversion. Adding a live chat widget to your website enhances conversion rates by 20%.
The chatbots and AI-powered live chat tools with triggers send automated promotional messages and email campaigns if the visitor matches certain criteria.
These upselling techniques boost sales and average order value. Research shows that
people who use live chat spend 60% more on purchases.
3. Increase customer satisfaction
As live chat helps eCommerce businesses promptly resolve customer queries, their satisfaction levels and trust in the business improve. Customers appreciate an immediate response to their queries.
Also, live chat tools offer omnichannel support, meaning customers can seek support in a channel they choose.
As a result, live chat offers higher customer satisfaction levels at 73%, compared to 61% for emails and just 44% for phone support.
4. Gives insights into customer behavior
Live chat tools can offer valuable insights into trends and patterns in customer preferences and behavior. Businesses can put forth corrective actions and informed decisions that optimize customer service quality by analyzing the chat history.
Using customer data, businesses can also offer personalized assistance and recommendations. As per Finances Online, 95% of customers prefer high-quality, personalized assistance when it comes to e-commerce purchases.
5. It’s become the standard
In today’s fast-paced world, customers expect instant support and resolution of their queries. It's almost impossible to find an eCommerce store that doesn't offer live chat support to its customers.
So, live chat has become the norm for eCommerce and other B2C businesses. Those who have not opted to use live chat tools stand a chance of losing out on the competition.
Top eCommerce chat software in 2024
1. Rocket.Chat
Rocket. Chat is a popular eCommerce live chat tool with robust features that help businesses answer customer queries in real-time. It is open-source software, so you can customize the features and white label the chat widget to match your business requirements.
Rocket.Chat can be integrated with other eCommerce tools to ensure a seamless experience. It supports on-premises as well as cloud deployment and is equipped with advanced security features like two-factor authentication, end-to-end encryption, access controls, and more.
Rocket.Chat allows file-sharing so customer support agents can share videos, images, and documents while addressing complex queries. Businesses can set automated responses to FAQs and basic questions like product and delivery information, reducing agents’ workload.
Key eCommerce features
- Auto-response templates
- Share documents, videos, photos, for quick resolution
- White-labeling and brand customization
- Supports integration with 5000+ tools
- Customizable user controls
- Threaded conversations
- Feedback surveys and campaigns
- Advanced search feature
G2 rating:
4.2★ out of 5
Best for:
eCommerce businesses of all scales as it is open source and completely customizable. Highly secure live chat ideal for security-conscious businesses
Get started with Rocket.Chat’s secure collaboration platform
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2. Tidio
Tidio is an AI-powered eCommerce chat tool with advanced features that help businesses enhance customer engagement and boost sales. A defining feature of Tidio is that support agents can see what the customer is typing even before they press the send button. This allows agents to respond swiftly.
Tidio's embeddable live chat tool can analyze evolving trends and patterns in customer behavior, allowing you to make informed decisions. You can install the tool using a plugin or JavaScript. It has a free version with basic features, but you must subscribe to the premium version if you require chatbot templates, live visitor monitoring, and more.
Key eCommerce features
- Shared inbox that promotes consistency
- Visitor profiles with tags about location, preferences, and more
- Omnichannel support
- Mobile app for iOS and Android
- AI functionality
- Conversation history for future references
- Multilanguage support
G2 rating:
4.7★ out of 5
Best for:
Small-scale eCommerce stores that operate on a limited budget.
3. Intercom
Intercom is one of the most sought-after live chat tools for eCommerce businesses. It offers an AI-based shared inbox that allows customer support agents to collaborate faster.
Intercom has real-time dashboards that allow supervisors to monitor agent performance and customer satisfaction levels and promote informed strategies.
The style, design, and layout of the Intercom chat messenger can be customized to match the brand requirements. Intercom offers omnichannel support through email, SMS, and social media channels. It has no/ low-code chatbots, which you can use to customize the conversation flow.
Key eCommerce features
- Shared inbox to centralize conversations
- No-code customization
- Omnichannel support
- Automatically route tickets to live agent
- Integration with 300+ tools
- Customer self-service using chatbots
- Trigger automatic messages based on criteria.
G2 rating:
4.4★ out of 5
Best for:
Businesses of all sizes that require self-service customer support tools.
4. LiveChat
As the name implies, LiveChat is one of the leading eCommerce chat tools focused on offering live customer support. The chat widget can be customized with features and design elements to meet your branding requirements. You can set up canned replies to common questions to enhance agent productivity.
LiveChat allows two-way file sharing between customers and agents. It can be integrated with 200+ eCommerce tools like Shopify, BigCommerce, Stripe, Pipedrive, and more.
Key eCommerce features
- Add filterable tags to customer chats
- Allows sharing of screenshots and other files
- In-chat customer feedback surveys
- Canned responses to FAQs
- Live chat monitoring and supervision
- 200+ integrations with popular eCommerce tools
G2 rating:
4.5★ out of 5
Best for:
Medium and large-scale businesses that deal with a high volume of customer queries require advanced sales and customer support analytics.
5. Freshdesk
Freshdesk is a cloud-based live chat tool that helps eCommerce businesses boost conversion and customer support quality. It supports 1000+ integrations and goes well with other Freshworks CRM, sales, and marketing tools. It is a no/ low-code app, so it does not require hard-core technical skills to be able to use the tool.
On Freshdesk, you can dish out personalized email campaigns and promotional messages to enhance the reach of your business and promote conversion. You can automate these triggers so these messages are automatically delivered to the visitors if they match the pre-specified criteria like location, preferences, behavior, and more.
Key eCommerce features
- Advanced analytics and forecasting
- Automatic routing of queries to live agent
- Integration with 1000+ tools
- Targeted action through customer segmentation
- File sharing between agents and customers
- Trigger promotional messages or email campaigns
- AI-powered chatbots
G2 rating:
4.5★ out of 5
Best for:
Large-scale organizations that handle a high volume of customer tickets
6. Zendesk
Zendesk is a robust communication tool offering advanced features to elevate customer support quality. It collects data from your inventory, order history, billing, etc., to deliver personalized customer support.
On Zendesk live chat, you can upsell to customers by offering recommendations and promoting similar products based on their shopping history. It offers omnichannel support, so you can connect with customers on social media, website, or mobile.
Key eCommerce features
- AI triggers that route customer to relevant agents/ resources
- Integration with Shopify, Magento, BigCommerce, etc.
- Omnichannel support via email, social media, etc.
- Shared inbox and dashboarding
- Queue management
- Offline pre-chat forms to collect customer data
G2 rating:
4.3★ out of 5
Best for:
Large-scale businesses and enterprises that require advanced features.
7. HelpCrunch
HelpCrunch is a popular live chat tool that can be integrated with your eCommerce website. Along with live chat, it also offers sales and marketing tools. It has a shared inbox that allows agents to collaborate internally and gain a consolidated oversight of the conversations.
HelpCrunch is fully customizable, and you can change the color, style, and design to match your business requirements. It has a chatbot that allows businesses to automate the support and sales conversation flow.
Key eCommerce features
- Integration with Shopify and WordPress
- Omnichannel communication
- Customer analytics
- Shared inbox that helps assign or merge conversations
- Chatbot that automates responses to FAQs
G2 rating:
4.7★ out of 5
Best for:
eCommerce businesses that require customization in terms of design, style, background, theme, etc.
8. Olark
Olark is one of the well-known eCommerce chat widgets for small businesses and startups. It can collect visitor details like device and location, and maintains the conversation history for future reference.
The tool can be programmed to send automated messages to visitors so they feel heard and warm as soon as they land on the site.
Key eCommerce features
- Automated chat routing
- Live chat transfers
- Pre-chat forms and post-chat surveys
- Automated greetings and promotional messages
G2 rating:
4.3★ out of 5
Best for:
Small businesses and startups that have a single-user chat.
Choosing the best tool for your eCommerce business
Looking for the best tool to fit your needs and support you in growing your business is no easy task.
Rocket.Chat is a versatile chat tool that helps you centralize all your communication: with customers, partners, and team members.
Reach out to our team to see how Rocket.Chat can support your eCommerce store.
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