Okay, well done. You're halfway through the mini course. In this video, we are covering secret number three, and that is how adding a live chat to your website can actually double the number of leads that you receive. One of my secret weapons that I use on my website and all my client websites is a live chat functionality. It's a very simple add on that you use in WordPress and Squarespace, there are lots of plugins that you can add, and they have increased conversions and leads by at least 45% on my website clients, as well as research has shown that 45% increase in leads purely by adding a live chat functionality. It is so simple and I'm really surprised that not a lot of people have it, and a lot of people do abuse it, but I will explain that a little bit later.

What are the benefits of using live chat on your website? What is great about having it is that you can talk to your visitor right now, whilst they're on your website and they're active. So it's very much a dialogue going on and they're very present with you because they're right there and then. You can answer any questions that they may have that is actually holding them back from taking the next step, like scheduling a call or booking a service or making a purchase.

So you're able to squash that objection right there and convert them much quicker, or sometimes they might just leave and you don't get that chance to do it, but with a live chat you're able to do that. You can calm them down and help them so that they can make the decision much easier. People also have this illusion that they don't have a lot of time and want the answers now. So not in two days when they, after sending you an email, do they want an answer. They want it right now, while it's still fresh in their mind, and they are the hottest basically in terms of potentially converting into a lead.

There are lots of different live chats out there. I have tried a few and I have my favourites, but... I'm not saying this is the full list. It depends what you're looking for and what works for you, but what I highly recommend and what I use and by the way, I'm not earning any money on this at all, is I currently use Tidio. There is a free option, and I use the free option because I don't have a need for the paid option and it works perfectly fine. I can see what page the user is currently viewing or where they actually came from, so if they came from Organic, Google or from a Facebook post or from Pinterest, I know kind of their journey now, that's what Tidio actually shows me. So I already know what frame of mind they're in, where they came from, and I'm able to converse with them.

On the paid options, which I might upgrade to very, very soon because I have tried it out, and it's really cool. You can actually initiate a chat with them as they're on a particular page. So you would get a notification on your phone if you have the app or on your computer, that somebody is on your website right now and on a particular page. Now, for example, if they're on my Google ads page, I could then initiate the chat. I could, from my phone, to write them a message asking them if they need any more information about Google ads and if I can help them along that. So it's very specific and it will actually pop up on their screen. I've many times been able to have a dialogue with these viewers, which is really cool.

There are also other ones of course, Zendesk is also a very popular one, and Live Chat. Live Chat is one that you can actually connect to your WhatsApp. So once they initiate the chat on your website, you would then carry it on with your WhatsApp and their WhatsApp. It's just a different platform, some people are more comfortable with WhatsApp and don't have so many different apps to use. So these are some of the recommendations that I would tell you to go and check out if you're looking at installing your live chat on your website.

What I mentioned before are chat bots. You might be tempted to use an automatic chat facility for automated responses. This can be really, really effective, but it really needs to be thought through, and it can save you a lot of money if it's set up correctly. But personally, I'm not a fan because you lose that personal touch you bring with it when you're in fact in a live chat with someone, and that's what people want. They want to chat to someone really in person, not to a computer because... Yeah, I just feel, it just creates that disconnect. But the choice is yours. A lot of these live chat plugins that I mentioned, they also offer these chat bot functionalities, so you can also try them out.

But either way, I highly recommend that you use a live chat plugin on your website. It's it can be very discrete, like a little chat at the bottom right hand corner, or it can be really in your face. That's what you need to test, see what your particular clients feel comfortable with, but don't bother them. If they want to chat with you, then they can go there, I would say rather, instead of just being in their face all the time. So have a think about that. They are free, most of them are free, and they're very easy to set up. So give it a go, and see you in the next lesson.