Introduction
The Slack Live Chat niche in the live chat industry is not large. We can count competitors in this space by using one-hand fingers. Well, at least those who are really good at adding superb value in Slack live chat integration.
This blog post introduces the differences, advantages, and downsides of Slack live chat software provided by SignalZen, Chatlio, and Social Intents. These are the 3 main competitors (Slack live chat apps) in the customer support space directly from Slack.
How does Slack Live Chat work?
Before we jump into the comparison, it makes sense to understand how the integration works and what attributes it has.
Slack App Directory
Each Slack live chat widget integration has a Slack app behind the stage. You can find all verified Slack apps in the Slack app directory. The Slack team has a strict review process. To be on the Slack app directory, you must successfully complete the process.
Providers who are present in the over there give a clear signal that they are a trusted Slack integration provider.
How does the app work exactly with live chat?
The first thing to do is to integrate your Slack workspace with the desired Slack live chat app. The app adds basic automated workflows to mediate your entire team's communication with website visitors who initiate live chat sessions.
For example, let's say website visitors message in real-time through live chat. The following step is that each new conversation will create a notification in a Slack channel. The Slack channel you will select during the installation process of the app. Received conversation notifications enable other workflows to start.
The following workflow is about replying to a direct message from the Slack channel to a visitor. Your Slack team members will make this happen. They can do this from a newly created Slack channel or the notification thread. Either way, the notification will explain how to reach this.
By having these 2 workflows, you are able to talk with your customers directly from your Slack account. However, this is a very basic usage level. Usually, your customer support team will use Slack slash commands for easier control of the widget. Also, messages with files attached, search over the history of chats, access additional information about relevant conversations, etc.
These workflows will save time for your team because you will need just Slack for Customer Support. No need to leave Slack to do any type of communication (external or internal).
Chatlio and Social intents
We pulled two competitors out of the hat that offer chat software with Slack integration. They are very close to our service and implementation quality level - Chatlio and Social Intents. We will replace Social Intents here and on for everyone's convenience with the acronym "SI". There will be no small print, we put all cards on the table and reveal some tricky similarities and differences.
Let's get going with our comparison which consists of several parts. All these 3 customer support products help to extend what Slack can't offer by default.
Pricing
| Trial |  |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trial length | 30 days | 14 days | 30 days |
| Starter/Basic plan | |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Widgets amount | Unlimited | 1 | 1 |
| Operators amount | 5 | 3 | 2 |
| Subdomains amount | 1 | 1 | Unlimited |
| Conversations amount | Unlimited | 200 | 200 |
| Price per month | $25 | $49 | $29 |
| Price per year | $249 | $468 | $348 |
| Pro plan | |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Widgets amount | Unlimited | 5 | 2 |
| Operators amount | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Subdomains amount | 10 | 5 | Unlimited |
| Conversations amount | Unlimited | 5000 | 3000 |
| Price per month | $49 | $132 | $99 |
| Price per year | $490 | $1188 | $1188 |
| Business plan | |
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
| Widgets amount | Unlimited | 10 | 5 |
| Operators amount | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Subdomains amount | Unlimited | 10 | Unlimited |
| Conversations amount | Unlimited | 10000 | 5000 |
| Price per month | $99 | $265 | $199 |
| Price per year | $990 | $2388 | $2388 |
We compare, you decide, but cost benefits are obvious.
Integrations
It would be fair to dive deeper and investigate possible integrations that offer all the above analyzed providers.
SignalZen service is compatible with Slack, Microsoft Teams, ChatGPT, Wordpress, Shopify, Drupal, Joomla & Zapier.
Now, let's look at our colleagues and their integrations. SI also integrates with MS Teams ChatGPT, Dialog Flow, and BigCommerce, but eliminates Drupal and Joomla.
Chatlio has the most enriched list of platforms. It includes almost all mentioned above and also appends even more including Squarespace, Tumbrl, Weebly, and Segment. It is important to mention, that at this point Chatlio doesn't have ChatGPT integration.
The question is, why choose SignalZen for Slack Live Chat as your provider? The answer is simple: we can offer you a 2-type Slack live chat integration. Still enables support agents to chat via threads and Noisy which allows them to do it through channels.
Clients may try both and choose the right one to suit their needs. This is a significant advantage because our colleagues can only offer you the Noisy version.
Features
Let's look at the main features that all 3 Slack Live Chat providers offer.
One that all three of us can deliver is definitely – Slack slash commands.
All providers support inline-styled widgets with multiple layouts for the Live Chat widget. SignalZen and Chatlio offer more flexibility in customizing the widget's appearance. You can choose a color, position on the window, and customize other traits.
SI does not have so many capabilities to let you personalize the designs of the widget. But there SI has other you can do. For instance, configure the widget behavior (enable/disable features) or customize the text on the widget.
Now communication, let's go through the process. When a visitor opens the website, a pop-up is auto-triggered to catch the eye. This function is available with SignalZen, Chatlio, and SI.
Screenshot sending is a different story; only SignalZen and Chatlio enable this action as well as the file attachment.
SignalZen offers an advanced build of form for prerequisites. Chatlio gives only a prompt email and name registration form.
Chatlio also offers you a reminder for every 30 seconds. if nobody has replied to the question this can be really irritating at times.
The transcript of conversations feature is possible if your provider is either SignalZen or Chatlio.
When the conversation is over, Chatlio and SignalZen systems allow you to close it. Closing also prompts a chat rating request directly to the visitor.
Metadata defining in the code is what SignalZen and Chatlio offer, but not supported by SI.
SignalZen and Chatlio have a working hours feature. If a visitor sends a message out of hours, he gets a reply that the agent replies during specified times only. Meanwhile, SI offers to hide a chat button when the operator is not available.
Translation to other languages is available on SignalZen and Chatlio, but the activation way is different on each platform. SignalZen makes it easier via Console, and Chatlio makes translations available just via JS API. SI speaks one language.
SignalZen enables saved reply template suggestions and shortcuts via a command or button. Chatlio has the same function and adds question groups. You can trigger question groups when meeting multiple conditions at certain times, or by using Slack command. Here SI presents a DialogFlow configuration which then enables another category of conversation – ChatBot.
Speaking about Chatbots, SignalZen, and SI offer ChatGPT integration for creating your own custom chatbot based on information on your website. This is a game changer when your operators are offline. Chatlio does not have this capability as of now.
Another great feature that has only SignalZen is Email integration. It enables you to receive emails directly to Slack and respond to them from Slack. SI and Chatlio do not have this capability.
Advantages and Downsides of SignalZen
The biggest advantages of SignalZen are:
- Fair pricing (business saves cash);
- Mobile App (Neither Chatlio nor SI can offer this option);
- Email integration (Neither Chatlio nor SI can offer this option);
- Microsoft Teams integration if you will need to switch at some point (only SI has this too)
- Two different types of Slack integration (Still and Noisy).
And some disadvantages that we are resolving:
- Less integration diversity than competition;
- Some features are still working on a basic level;
Chatlio can offer you only Slack-oriented service, a big set of features, and awesome designs. But it doesn’t have a mobile app and offers only new channels route for working with conversations. All this comes at a higher price than SignalZen offers.
SI design and administration parts are outdated, the feature set is limited, no mobile app. But SI puts more effort into marketing. Again, all this is for a very high price compared to SignalZen.
We hope this helps to find out which software is the best for you. Trying SignalZen is very easy and you can find details on the setup of embedding Slack Live Chat on your website here.
