Learn How Easy the System is to Set-up Many of the earlier solutions for adding chat to a website are based on the traditional desktop software model. The problem with this is that software will need to be installed on each computer that an operator will be sitting at to respond to chat. These traditional applications usually limit the number of times the software can be installed and require additional licenses for each computer. In addition they limit the ability to access the operator console from mobile devices and public computers such as a hotel business office in an emergency. The alternative is web-based solutions that provide an operator consol that can be reached on any computer using any browser. Some of these solutions will provide a limited number of log-in names, but not a limit to what computers they can be used on. This frees up the ability for different people to easily cover chat without moving physically in an office. Adding chat to each web page on a site or onto multiple sites can also be a tedious and highly technical process with older more traditional solutions. Look for a solution that provides a simple cut and paste method, with a minimum amount of code that takes advantage of easy customization. Newer solutions provide a way to customize the chat button and public facing window, provide a single line of code and give clear instructions to cut and paste it onto multiple pages in minutes. Make Sure the Solution Can be Customized Look for a solution that provides customization, but doesn’t require a heavy amount of help from the IT department and programmers to install on your web-pages. Newer web-based solutions provide automated ways to simply upload a logo and pick from a theme to change the appearance immediately on every page that chat has been installed on. This type of feature set will let the company personalize the chat window with logo’s and appropriate messages and department listings to give customers the best presentation. Choose a Solution that Includes Free Web Analytics Look for a system that provides more than chat. Newer web-based systems can provide the bonus of ways to track who is visiting a web-site and how often. These types of stats can help a company better understand the effectiveness of their web-presence and how visitors behave when viewing pages. Systems can provide much of the information for free that companies pay special firms to provide them with about their web-traffic and that’s a great bonus included with some chat software solutions. Choose a Solution that Provides Support to Visitors Even When Operators are Off-line Choose a system that provides enough control over business hours and how that information interacts with the performance of chat on a web-pages. This type of control will switch the online presence of chat to offline or in addition provide the ability to have customers leave a message. The best systems will let an operator reply directly to a message via email.
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