Small bug: the fixed-position "See Plans & Pricing" link that shows up at the bottom of the page when you scroll is partially hidden by the fixed-position "Talk to Us" link when the browser window is narrower than 1245px or so.
good catch
Olark launches "Targeted Chat"
61–65 of 65 posts
Re: Olark launches "Targeted Chat"
#62I use Olark for my hobby programming blog - http://programthis.net and I love it. Problem is that I don't have my account set up on my work computer, but when I'm home I love chatting with readers. They've got a neat product, and this is an exciting change to see.
Competition lets you chat from the mobile app, you should check it out.
Re: Olark launches "Targeted Chat"
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
It depends on your business. I'm not an Olark user, but I've been running some back of the envelope calculations. One year of the Bronze plan, at $180, is several orders of magnitude lower than my average customer lifetime value, so it's easily worth it, even if it only gains me 1 customer per year. Your mileage may vary. But right now, most of my customers are coming through my email marketing, so I won't signup now…
You need to also count the cost of your time spent talking to prospects
It can be tricky assigning a cost to something that's so important to a startup (customer development). In almost every startup I've been involved with, the engineers who spent the most time talking to customers ended up being the ones who created the most valuable features.
Re: Olark launches "Targeted Chat"
#64For some reason, Olark tabs really bug me as a user. They seem extremely intrusive and distracting sliding in on every page and invariably blocking content.
This. I didn't know what Olark was until I clicked on the link here, then I saw that all-too-familiar box that I try to avoid out of the corner of my eye. It's great that people are getting real feedback and having conversations with their customers, but in my experience, it doesn't distinguish itself from "Hi! Click here to talk to a REAL LIVE person!" chat windows that you see on so many ecommerce sites that either direct you to a new page entirely, bounce up and down continuously or create a modal after a few seconds of surfing to remind me that it is there.
Re: Olark launches "Targeted Chat"
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
You need to also count the cost of your time spent talking to prospects
It can be tricky assigning a cost to something that's so important to a startup (customer development). In almost every startup I've been involved with, the engineers who spent the most time talking to customers ended up being the ones who created the most valuable features.
agreed. I think Live Chat is a great idea (I use it for my own product) for the customer development aspect. I was just saying there is an opportunity cost involved as well.