[2024 Guide] Chatbot vs. Live Chat: Which is Right for Your Business?

This article will help you look at the key differences between chatbots and live chat, and understand the strengths and weaknesses of each option. We’ll guide you in deciding which solution is best suited for your business need and also introduce the concept of hybrid solutions that combine the benefits of both chatbots and live chat and allows you to provide an exceptional customer experience.

So, let’s jump right into the world of chatbot vs. live chat and discover the right fit for your platform.

Part 1: What Are the Key Differences Between Chatbot and Live Chat?

Live chat vs. chatbot systems have become essential tools for customer interaction today. Both offer unique benefits, but they serve different purposes depending on your specific business needs.

Chatbots

In the simplest terms, chatbots are automated systems that simulate human conversation. They can answer frequently asked questions, guide users through processes, and gather customer data without requiring human intervention. Chatbots are often integrated into various messaging platforms and can operate 24/7, making them an efficient solution for handling routine queries.

Live Chat

On the other hand, live chat is a real-time communication channel that connects customers with human agents. When customers have questions or need assistance, they can reach out via a chat widget on your website or through messaging platforms like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. This tool allows for personalized conversations and makes it ideal for addressing complex inquiries or providing tailored support.

To better understand the differences between these two tools, let’s look at a comparison chart of chatbot vs. live chat:

Key Industries Benefiting from Each

Certain industries have found particular success with either chatbots or live chat. For example, e-commerce and retail businesses often leverage chatbots to manage high volumes of inquiries, streamline order processes, and improve customer engagement. With the ability to handle multiple requests simultaneously, chatbots are perfect for answering FAQs or guiding customers through purchase decisions.

Conversely, B2B services frequently rely on live chat to provide personalized support. Here, human agents can address complex issues and foster relationships with clients that ultimately ensure satisfaction and trust in their services.

Part 2: How to Choose Between Chatbot vs. Live Chat?

When deciding between chatbots and live chat for your business, it’s essential to weigh the pros and cons of each solution. This will help you make an informed choice that aligns with your customer service needs.

When deciding between chatbots and live chat for your business, it’s essential to weigh the pros and cons of each solution. This will help you make an informed choice that aligns with your customer service needs.

For retail and e-commerce businesses, the choice between chatbot vs. live chat often hinges on customer service needs. Chatbots are excellent for handling routine inquiries, such as order status, product details, and FAQs. This frees up human agents to focus on more complex customer interactions, such as resolving issues or providing personalized recommendations.

However, live chat for retail can significantly enhance customer experience, especially when customers are making purchasing decisions. Human agents can guide customers through the buying process, address concerns about products, and provide tailored suggestions based on customer preferences.

When to Choose One Option Over the Other

Making the right choice between live chat and chatbot depends on specific scenarios and customer needs.

Here, we will explore some of the most common situations of when your customers would prefer one option over the other:

1FAQs – Chatbot > Live Chat

For handling frequently asked questions, chatbots are a highly efficient tool, capable of quickly delivering consistent and accurate responses without human involvement. They can instantly provide answers to common inquiries, such as:

• Product availability
• Shipping information
• Return policies
• Account queries

Why Choose Chatbots?

• Immediate Responses: Chatbots excel in delivering instant replies and reducing wait times to zero. Customers appreciate quick access to information, and studies show that 90% of customers view immediate responses as critical to good customer service. For frequently asked questions, this speed is invaluable.
• Efficiency: Chatbots can handle multiple inquiries simultaneously, which means that while one customer is getting answers, others can be served at the same time. This efficiency helps businesses manage high volumes of queries without overwhelming their support staff.
• Cost-Effective: Since FAQs usually require minimal human intervention, using chatbots can save costs. You won’t need to dedicate human agents to answer repetitive questions that will ultimately allow them to focus on more complex customer needs.

224/7 Customer Service – Chatbot > Live Chat

Living in today’s fast-paced digital environment, customers demand immediate assistance at any time of day. Chatbots excel in this area, providing round-the-clock customer support, regardless of time zones or business hours.

Why Choose Chatbots?

• Always Available: Chatbots don’t need breaks or downtime and they can consistently provide support around the clock, which ensure customers can get assistance whenever they need it. This is crucial for businesses operating in different time zones or those with customers who shop late at night.
• Quick Resolution: Chatbots offer consistent and speedy answers. Unlike live chat, where response times can vary (with an average of about 1 minute and 35 seconds across various industries), chatbots provide immediate responses and enhance customer satisfaction.
• Handling High Volumes: If your business receives a significant number of routine inquiries during off-hours, chatbots can manage this load effectively. They can answer common questions like order status or account issues without requiring human intervention and allow your team to focus on more complex queries during business hours.

3High Scalability – Chatbot > Live Chat

When faced with a high influx of inquiries, particularly during peak periods like sales or holidays, chatbots prove invaluable by managing large volumes of interactions simultaneously, preventing delays and ensuring timely responses for every customer.

Why Choose Chatbots?

• Unlimited Capacity: Chatbots can manage thousands of conversations at once without waiting times which makes them perfect for businesses that experience spikes in customer inquiries, such as during sales events or holiday seasons. In fact, chatbots can handle up to 80% of routine questions without human intervention that will allow your support team to focus on more complex issues.
• Consistent Responses: Chatbots provide uniform answers to frequently asked questions in order to ensure that all customers receive the same level of service. This consistency is vital for maintaining brand reliability and customer trust, especially when you have a large customer base.
• Cost-Effective Scaling: Implementing chatbots allows companies to scale their customer support without incurring significant additional costs. Instead of hiring more staff to manage increased inquiries, a single chatbot can take on a substantial load, which is especially beneficial for startups and small businesses looking to grow.

4Handling Complex Inquiries – Chatbot < Live Chat

When it comes to addressing complex customer issues, live chat is undoubtedly the superior option. Human agents can interpret nuanced inquiries, offer customized solutions, and handle intricate situations that require deeper problem-solving capabilities.

Why Choose Live Chat?

• Human Understanding: Complex issues often require human judgment and the ability to understand nuances in customer situations. Live chat agents can ask clarifying questions, empathize with customers, and provide personalized solutions that chatbots cannot. For instance, if a customer has a technical problem that needs troubleshooting, a human agent can collaborate with other teams to find the best resolution.
• Flexibility and Adaptability: Live chat agents can think on their feet and adapt their responses based on the conversation flow. This flexibility is crucial when dealing with unique or unexpected questions that cannot be easily addressed by pre-programmed chatbot responses.
• Personal Attention: For cases that require detailed explanations or personal interaction, live chat for retail/ecommerce can create a more engaging customer experience. Customers often feel more valued when they interact with a real person, especially when discussing sensitive or complex matters.

5Providing a Human Touch – Chatbot < Live Chat

In customer interactions that require emotional intelligence, live chat stands out. Human agents can empathize with customers, provide thoughtful responses, and build meaningful connections that enhance the overall customer experience.

Why Choose Live Chat?

• Personalized Responses: Human agents can access customer data that enables them to tailor their responses to each individual’s needs. For instance, an agent can recognize a returning customer and greet them by name, which creates a more welcoming atmosphere. This personal touch makes customers feel valued and understood, fostering loyalty and encouraging repeat business.


• Empathy and Understanding: Complex issues often require a level of emotional intelligence that chatbots simply cannot offer. Human agents can listen to customers’ concerns, empathize with their frustrations, and respond in a way that acknowledges their feelings. This human touch is vital for creating a positive customer experience, especially in sensitive situations.


• Dynamic Conversations: Live chat agents can adapt their communication style based on the customer’s tone and mood. They can engage in meaningful conversations, ask follow-up questions, and provide nuanced answers that a chatbot may not be able to deliver. This level of interaction is especially beneficial in sectors like retail, where customers may have specific concerns about products or services.


• Contextual Awareness: When using live chat for retail/ecommerce, agents can pull up previous interactions and customer history in real time. This context allows them to provide informed responses and ensure continuity in conversations, which make customers feel like they are being taken care of by someone who truly understands their situation.

Part 3: Hybrid Approach: Combining Live Chat and AI Chatbots

As we’ve discussed earlier, finding a cost-effective solution for customer support is essential. While both live chat and chatbots can operate effectively on their own, each is better suited to specific situations. Businesses should select the appropriate solution based on the unique needs and challenges they encounter. However, a hybrid approach that combines AI chatbots and live chat offers a powerful way to optimize both human and automated customer support, which can lead to significant reductions in employee costs while ensuring 24/7 availability and multilingual service.

Benefits of a Hybrid Approach

💡 Cost-Effective Solution

By deploying AI chatbots alongside live chat agents, businesses can manage customer inquiries more efficiently. Chatbots can handle routine questions and allow human agents to focus on more complex issues. This division of labor not only enhances productivity but also reduces the number of agents needed and lead to lower operational costs.

💡 24/7 Availability

One of the standout features of using AI customers chatbot is now live is the ability to provide support around the clock. Chatbots can engage customers at any hour, addressing their basic inquiries and gathering necessary information. If a complex issue arises, the chatbot can collect details and pass them on to live agents during business hours in order to ensure no customer is left waiting.

💡 Proactive Engagement

Chatbots can send targeted proactive messages to website visitors and initiate conversations based on user behavior. If a visitor shows interest but hesitates, the chatbot can step in to offer assistance. If the interaction escalates, the information gathered can be seamlessly transferred to a live chat agent for further support.

💡 Instant Responses

With chatbots handling common queries related to pricing, product details, or service information, businesses can significantly reduce wait times for customers. This allows live chat agents to focus on resolving complex issues, which will ultimately lead to quicker resolution times and improved customer satisfaction.

💡 Multilingual Support

A hybrid system can break down language barriers by providing support in multiple languages. Chatbots can be programmed to communicate in various languages, while live agents can assist with more nuanced interactions. With live translation capabilities, businesses can instantly translate messages into over 33 languages that make it easier to serve a global customer base.

Part 4: How to Add Live Chat to AI Chatbot Without Hassle

As we have discussed, the hybrid approach of combining live chat with AI chatbots can significantly improve business operations and customer experience. A seamless chatbot-human handoff ensures that when a customer requires immediate assistance, their issues can be communicated to a human agent in real-time, all within the same conversation window. This smooth transition enhances the customer experience by reducing wait times and ensuring that agents have the context of previous interactions.

To implement this effectively, it is crucial to use the right tools that facilitate the integration of live chat into your AI chatbot. And the best option available for this purpose right now is GPTBots. It provides a modernized, drag-and-drop visual builder that allows users to create chatbots tailored to their specific needs without requiring any coding skills. Additionally, GPTBots allows you to configure your chatbot to recognize scenarios that warrant a human handoff. When a customer requests human support, the chatbot can smoothly pass the conversation to a support agent through systems like LiveChat, Intercom or any other live chat agents.

How to Integrate Chatbot with LiveChat

By integrating your AI chatbot with LiveChat, you can enhance your customer service capabilities significantly so that your AI customer chatbot can handle initial inquiries, while human agents can step in when necessary.

The following is a brief guide to integrate GPTBots with LiveChat. For a detailed, step-by-step guide on integrating GPTBots with LiveChat, visit our tutorial at https://www.gptbots.ai/docs/tutorial/integration/livechat.

Step 1: Create PAT Authentication in the LiveChat Developer Console

• Log in to your LiveChat account and navigate to the Developer Console.
• Go to the authorization page under Settings and select “Personal Access Tokens” and click on “Create new token +”.





• When prompted, select “Select All” for access scopes and scroll down to the bottom and click “Create token +”.








• After creating the token, copy your “Account ID” and “Token.” You will need these later for the configuration in GPTBots.

Step 2: Build an App in LiveChat

• Go to the “Apps” section of the Developer Console and click the “Build app” button to start creating your application.





• Enter a name for your app, select “LiveChat” for the Product, and click “Create app” to proceed. Click on the newly created app to enter its details and navigate to the Blocks page, and then click the “Add Building Blocks” button.





• In the pop-up, choose the “App Authorization” option and click “Add block.”
• Choose the server-side app option and click “Save.”
• Copy and save the “Client ID” and “Client Secret,” as you will need these for the GPTBots configuration.

Step 3: Configure LiveChat Integration in GPTBots

To configure LiveChat integration, log in to your GPTBots account and navigate to “Bot Settings.” Click on “Integration” and then select “LiveChat.”

Now, you will need to input the saved information:

• Account ID: Use the Account ID from your PAT creation in LiveChat
• Token: Enter the Token generated in LiveChat
• Client ID: Paste the Client ID from your LiveChat app
• Client Secret: Enter the Client Secret saved earlier
• Agent Email: Provide the email address of the Agent account that the AI Bot will take over. This should be an account of a human customer service representative in the same project

After entering the required information, click the “Submit” button to complete the configuration.

Once you've completed the LiveChat integration configuration in GPTBots, your AI customer chatbot is now live, capable of taking over the designated agent's conversations.

How to Integrate Chatbot with Intercom

In addition to LiveChat, you can also integrate your GPTBots with Intercom to enhance customer support. However, the process for integrating with Intercom is a bit different from LiveChat. You'll need to follow specific instructions tailored for Intercom to ensure that everything works smoothly.

For detailed guidance on how to integrate GPTBots with Intercom and set up human handoff support, please refer to our dedicated document. This will provide you with all the necessary steps and information for a successful integration.

Chatbot vs. Live Chat: The Final Verdict

We hope this article has helped you choose the right solution for your business. Both chatbots and live chat have their pros and cons, and each is suited for different situations.

However, combining both options could be the optimal customer support approach for your business. Chatbots can handle simple tasks, while human agents focus on complex queries. This hybrid approach not only enhances customer service but also improves overall efficiency.

Ultimately, the right choice depends on your specific needs and goals. By understanding the strengths of both chatbots and live chat, you can create a customer support system that works best for you.