Ever landed on a website with a question, spotted a little chat bubble in the corner, and thought “actually, that’s handy”? You’re not alone. Live chat has quietly become one of the most useful tools you can add to your website, and if you’re not using it yet, you might be leaving money on the table.
I get asked about this at least once a week by our clients, so let me share what I’ve learned running InfaCloud and building sites for over 500 businesses.
Why Are So Many Websites Adding Live Chat?
Here’s the honest answer — because it works. Research from HubSpot has shown that live chat can significantly increase conversion rates compared to relying on a contact form alone, and I’ve seen this play out on our own clients’ sites too.
Think about it from a customer’s perspective. If someone lands on Magic Moments at 9pm on a Sunday wanting to know if a particular balloon is available for their party next weekend, they don’t want to fill in a form and wait until Monday morning. They want an answer now, or at least a “we’ll be back to you first thing” reassurance. Live chat gives them that.
But Won’t It Be a Ton of Work to Manage?
This is the pushback I hear most often, and it’s a fair worry. But live chat doesn’t mean sitting glued to your laptop 24/7. Most decent live chat plugins (I usually recommend Tawk.to or Tidio for smaller businesses) let you set your availability, so it only appears during working hours. Outside of that, it swaps to a “leave a message” style form.
You can also use canned responses for the most common questions — the ones you get every single day — which saves you typing the same reply over and over. And if you’ve got a mobile app installed, you can respond from your phone while you’re making a cuppa.
Honestly, once you get the hang of it, it takes less time than answering emails.
What Should You Look For In a Live Chat Tool?
My advice? Keep it simple. You don’t need enterprise-level software with AI bots and CRM integrations unless you’re running a call centre. For most small businesses, look for something that offers a free tier to start with (so you can test it without committing), mobile app support so you can respond on the go, and easy WordPress integration (most plugins these days plug straight in).
What I’d steer clear of is any tool that requires long contracts or charges per conversation — that gets expensive fast, and you want to be encouraging chats, not rationing them.
The Honest Downside
Right, I’ll be straight with you — live chat isn’t for everyone. If you genuinely can’t respond within a few hours during the day, don’t add it. A chat window sat there with nobody home is worse than no chat window at all. It signals that you’re not paying attention, which is the opposite of what you want.
But if you or someone on your team can commit to keeping an eye on it, it’s honestly one of the highest-impact additions you can make to your site. I’ve seen it turn browsers into buyers on client sites time and time again.
Want us to set up live chat properly on your website? Get in touch with InfaCloud today and we’ll have it running for you within a couple of hours — no faff, no long contracts, just a proper setup that actually works. Why not drop us a message today!
