1.Speed.

The most obvious benefit! Live Help software lets you communicate with your customers instantly. Remember, it only takes one tiny doubt in a customer's mind to kill a sale and it only takes a second for them to leave your website. With your competitors only a few clicks away, by the time you've written an email it could be too late.

2.Customer relations.

Chatting with a customer in real time is a great way to establish trust. It's far more personal than email and often creates an immediate bond and sense of loyalty in the client. Once people feel that they have got to know you personally they are much more likely to turn into repeat buyers. You will find that customers often come back to chat after a sale just to say hello and thank you.

3.Efficiency.

It's simply less time consuming than email. Which means you have more time free for improving and expanding your business.

4.Inspires confidence.

A large majority of customers may never use the service. But it's reassuring for them to see a Live Help icon because it suggests seriousness and professionalism. It also shows that help is available if needed and that the website is run by real people!

5.Website tracking.

Most services provide this to a lesser or greater extent and it can be just as valuable as the help function itself. For example, most provide the ability to track your customers progress around your site in real time. This is allows you to quickly identify user patterns, isolate under performing pages and improve the functionality of your site.

6.Keyword data.

Most services provide real time information about the search terms your customers have used in finding your site, as well as identifying the referring urls. The internet is a fast moving place and traffic trends can change on a daily, even hourly basis. Unless you check your web statistics every five minutes, it's easy to be caught out.

Recently a very popular blog linked directly to one of our products causing a flood of unexpected buyers. Our chat software allowed us to see what was happening immediately and within 5 minutes we were able to prepare ourself by ordering more stock. Without it there is no doubt that we would have reacted far slower and lost a lot of business.

7.Proactive help.

This is a very useful and powerful tool which allows you to initiate a chat with a visitor, as well as the other way around. For example, if you see that someone has been stuck on a checkout page for 5 minutes you can create a little pop up to ask them if they need any help. This is ideal for snagging confused customers who are on the verge of giving up.

8.It brings your site alive.

Not only for the customer, but for you the webmaster. Running a website can often feel like a somewhat anonymous endeavor. Web- statistics may tell us who has visited and when and for how long, and of course emails provide a form of contact with our customers. But with Live Help you witness everything as it happens. Your previously invisible customers suddenly become visible. Your once silent site suddenly starts to talk to you. This can be hugely satisfying and encouraging on a psychological level, particularly on days when actual sales are slow!