The Bad Chat Effect

We investigated the results of proactive chat as well. A proactive chat is one in which the visitor is sent a graphical invitation based on a set of business rules (pages viewed, for example). Not surprisingly, the results were similar.

On a scale of one to five (see figure 2), we asked respondents to indicate their reaction to being proactively invited to engage in live chat. A vote of one equaled, “It annoys me,” while choosing five indicated “I’m happy to know there's help available.” Receptiveness to being invited was defined as three, four or five. A little more than half of the respondents were receptive to live chat while, again, the "Bad Chatters" were less receptive than those who’d never chatted before. When we look only at the most annoyed response — those that answered with a one — we again see the effect bad chat can have.