Olark Review

Olark
Product:
Vendor:
Founded:
Headquarters:
Olark
Olark
2009
Ann Arbor, MI
Ownership:
Customers:
Deployment Model:
Free Trial:
Private
40,000+
Cloud
Yes

Olark At A Glance

Good: Chat transcript for easy reference, real-time analytics on agent activity and other metrics, optional advanced PowerUp features.
Bad: A native mobile app is not currently offered.
Bottom Line: Real-time communication tool that helps companies improve their customer service.

Product Overview

The Olark live chat software enables companies to provide exceptional and quick support to their customers. Users can deploy a chatbox on their website that captures a visitor’s information in real time and then routes the visitor to the right agent. They can also analyze agent responsiveness and other metrics in order to improve customer service.

Olark has many benefits, including:

  • Quicker alternative in responding to customers compared to phone or email
  • Chatbox availability even when agents are offline
  • Ability to manage chatbox on multiple websites from one account
  • Integration with customer relationship management (CRM) software and other third-party applications
  • All-inclusive pricing plan that’s based on a per agent, per month strategy

Features

Here are some of Olark’s key features.

Customization – Olark has customizable chatbox options, such as color, shape (button or tab), position and appearance (rounded or sharp corners). It supports an unlimited number of domains, so users can place a chatbox on multiple websites. They can also attach their company logo to the chatbox, and agents can upload their headshots as gravatars.

The software has a drag-and-drop custom form builder where users can add questions, messages and call-to-action links. The form asks for a visitor’s information before a chat is initiated, and those responses can be saved in a transcript or sent via email.

Automated live chat messages – Users can create automated live chat messages that are based on triggers, such as visitor location, referring URL or browsing behavior. They can also set up canned responses for frequently asked questions.

Analytics – The software provides real-time reports and analytics on metrics including chat volume, agent activity and customer satisfaction. Users can sort and filter chats by conversational tags or satisfaction ratings. They can also receive summary reports by email daily, weekly or monthly, and they can export data to Google Analytics for further analysis.

Live chat transcripts – A live chat transcript stores the data on each visitor (e.g., name, email, location and page they landed on), their chat rating and the entire conversation. Users can search, sort and filter the transcripts in different ways, such as by tags, keywords and dates.

Other chat tools – Agents can share files (e.g., PDF, JPEG, GIF) via the chatbox, transfer chats and receive new message notifications. Supervisors can create groups for routing chats by department or specialty. In addition, Olark has two chat routing types: “round robin” (new chat assigned to the next available agent) and “all agents” (chat stays open until an agent answers it). Supervisors can also monitor the agent activity and chat volume in real time and limit the number of chats per agent.

PowerUps – Olark offers four add-on features called PowerUps. The Visitor Cobrowsing feature lets visitors share their screens with the agent, so the agent can provide personalized guidance. And with the Visitor Insights feature, users can collect real-time visitor data from public social media profiles and company websites.

The Live Chat Translation feature automatically detects the visitor’s language and translate both the visitor’s and agent’s chats in real time. Finally, with the last add-on feature, users can opt to have a non-branded chatbox that removes the Olark link.