Is it a good idea to have a Chatroom on your site?

[WebCrazy]

I was just wondering when you get your website all set up and 'live', would a live chatroom be a plus or minus? I've heard different opinions and wondered what anyone here has to say about it.

[Rock]

I was just wondering when you get your website all set up and 'live', would a live chatroom be a plus or minus? I've heard different opinions and wondered what anyone here has to say about it.

Chat gives human touch to any website making it a notable feature of increased customer satisfaction due to instant support & improving sales along with corporate branding too.. Also, if the chat software is multitask (ie: if an operator can pick up more than one chat at a time) it reduces operational costs as well.. Hence it's always a 'plus' to have Live chat option available on your website

[Caboodle]

It can be - but remember that you may have to stay glued to your computer, or at least have a moderator on to answer questions or to make sure that nothing gets out of hand.

[Rock]

It can be - but remember that you may have to stay glued to your computer, or at least have a moderator on to answer questions or to make sure that nothing gets out of hand.

You can also have a "Live chat offline" message displayed (rather temporarily) on the site if you'd want to move out for a while than having being glued to the box

[WebCrazy]

Thanks for all the advice. It wouldn't be just for 'business' purposed but also for anyone who wanted to pop in for a chat with someone else from the forum. I guess the main thing like was mentioned is always having someone to monitor so if you did have members popping in, someone would actually be there. I will keep it in mind as it sounds like a good idea to me.

[Rock]

Thanks for all the advice. It wouldn't be just for 'business' purposed but also for anyone who wanted to pop in for a chat with someone else from the forum. I guess the main thing like was mentioned is always having someone to monitor so if you did have members popping in, someone would actually be there. I will keep it in mind as it sounds like a good idea to me.

You're welcome

[WeRollin]

Let me just say, you'll have to be careful with bandwith. Chatrooms really kill you in terms of bandwith, let me tell you. I have had a shoutbox as well as a chatroom and I couldn't afford to have both. One or the other is a little more affordable, but just again be careful with your bandwith.

[onlinemedia]

I think a forum or discussion portion would be more efficient to have in your website. chat room is not much good in my opinion.

[Rock]

Let me just say, you'll have to be careful with bandwith. Chatrooms really kill you in terms of bandwith, let me tell you. I have had a shoutbox as well as a chatroom and I couldn't afford to have both. One or the other is a little more affordable, but just again be careful with your bandwith.

I think a forum or discussion portion would be more efficient to have in your website. chat room is not much good in my opinion.

Exactly, chat would consume a certain amount of bandwidth, but it'd also improve your sales, more than what the forums or a discussion portion would ever be able to do provide that type of direct interaction Also, having a chat feature would also mean better privacy, than posting on forums publicly & support assistance in real/live time.. hence improving the services to.. what do you say?

[WebCrazy]

Well again, thanks for all the advice! I guess I hadn't thought of it taking up bandwidth so would have to consider that. Do they have chatroom that you don't have to 'host' on your own server? Is there such a thing?

[PizzaBoy]

What about if you had a customer support forum, and you visited it every couple of hours and provide support for every new thread/question/problem...?

Also, do you know what chat software is the easiest to install? Is there one that consumes less bandwidth than the others?

[Caleb55]

I would say not to have a live chat because then people typically find something to talk about that gets out of hand and I personally wouldn't want that kind of behavior on my website. Even if you were to moderate it 24/7, people might get mad if you boot them off your site for getting out of control and then strike back at you on your website.

[DPS Computing]

I think this topic is very subjective. Some sites lend themselves to a chat feature of some description while for others it is a bad idea. As has been mentioned the practical issues of moderation and someone being at the computer have to be taken into account as well as the bandwidth. Also, some chat software can be difficult to configure and maintain but I'm sure there are some fairly easy to use lightweight options out there .

[Gregory]

Let me just say, you'll have to be careful with bandwith. Chatrooms really kill you in terms of bandwith, let me tell you. I have had a shoutbox as well as a chatroom and I couldn't afford to have both. One or the other is a little more affordable, but just again be careful with your bandwith.

I think a good solution for this problem is using a shoutbox hosted by another company like Shoutmix or CBox. Doing this, you don't have to worry so much about the bandwidth it consumes because it use the company's bandwidth and not yours.

[DPS Computing]

I think a good solution for this problem is using a shoutbox hosted by another company like Shoutmix or CBox. Doing this, you don't have to worry so much about the bandwidth it consumes because it use the company's bandwidth and not yours.

Don't they place adverts on your website for this service? I don't know, I'm just asking because I know similar services do and this could be undesirable depending on the website .

[AlexMarkets]

I agree about the need for having the chat moderated. That can be very time-consuming. You have to ask yourself if having a chat area on your website offers benefits that outweigh the time or expense of constantly monitoring what's posted in the chat and therefore on your website.

[BizzyBlythe]

Chat rooms do not seem to me to be a good idea for businesses. The free chat room services post advertising that is beyond your control and any advertisng on your website reflects on you. You could also run into an issue with ads that would compete with your business.

[MattBarthorp]

Chat rooms do not seem to me to be a good idea for businesses. The free chat room services post advertising that is beyond your control and any advertisng on your website reflects on you. You could also run into an issue with ads that would compete with your business.

It needn't be the case always. You can look for an open source Chat Script which can be embedded in the website.

You might want to refer the following URL to know a list of such scripts :

opensourcescripts.com/dir/php/chat.html

[webwanderer]

I can see how a website could benefit from a chat room. With social media being so successful, a chat room would cultivate participants who would tell others about your chat room and therefore your site.

[Lindsay]

Could you use a chat room as a platform for presenting webinars? You could use it as a regular chat room at other times, but webinars seem to be very useful marketing tools for businesses.