[Sigia-l] Live Chat: Pros/ Cons?

[Juan Ruiz]

Hi Lisa,

Recently, in my organization, we wanted to implement an interaction
feature between administration staff and prospect teachers, in an effort
to quickly answer any questions that a prospect teacher might have and
also to allow prospect teachers who don't feel like calling the
organization (for whatever reason) to have their questions answered. So
we looked at having a live chat feature as well.

Some of the issues that having a live chat raised where:
- What would be the hours of operation? 9am to 5pm? Weekends? 24x7?
- How much traffic do we expect? This will determine the number of staff
members that will be checking the chat constantly.
- How quickly do we expect to answer each enquire?
- What would be the main goal of the chat, to provide answers to general
questions? Who will moderate it so it does not become a social tool?

Doing more analysis, we came with the following
PROS
- Chat allows for instant answers
- User feels direct connection with the staff member

CONS
- Chats do not allow sharing of information, meaning that an answer to a
question has to be repeated for each user, increasing the workload of
the staff.
- No search.
- It is harder to moderate. Comments cannot be reviewed for editing if
needed (ie. the use of non appropriate words, etc)
- Chat will only be available at particular times: when there is a staff
member looking after it. What happens is there is no one to answer the
questions?
- A live chat might increase the hours of operations to cater for all
possible users in different time zones.

At the end, we are moving towards implementing a forum instead.

I hope this helps.

-Juan



-----Original Message-----
From: sigia-l-bounces at asis.org [mailto:sigia-l-bounces at asis.org] On
Behalf of Lisa Colvin
Sent: Tuesday, 10 July 2007 9:52 AM
To: Sigia-l at asis.org
Subject: [Sigia-l] Live Chat: Pros/ Cons?

Hi all-

I'm interested in your opinions on Live Chat- and some examples of good
and bad implementations.  

Background:
We have a web based application (subscription model) as well as sales
and corporate sites. Our marketing department is considering
implementing lie chat as a sales tool- for visitors who are, for
whatever reason, not inclined to call or send an email for more
information before purchasing. Essentially- it's a lead generation
opportunity for them.

It's possible that if we implemented it on the sales site that we would
implement it in the product application in the future.

I've never personally been a big fan of live chat, and haven't seen much
research, anecdotal or otherwise, that demonstrates efficacy/ ROI. 

I'd appreciate any feedback or pointers.

Thanks!
Lisa



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