They’re all over the web: ”Live Chat Now,” ”Chat Now with a Customer Service Rep.”
I put one on my company’s www.sundaysoftware.com website and my customers really like it.

I work in front of my computer every day, so it makes sense for me to be available to “chat now” with people who are visiting my site, looking for stuff, and placing orders. About 1/3 of the chats are just quick comments from customers who just want to say “hi” to me. I like that.

Your church website ALSO has visitors, and your church ALSO has staff members sitting near computers in the church office on weekdays. So why shouldn’t a STAFF MEMBER at your church be available to visitors coming to your church website?  Your CHURCH website could have a “Talk Now with a Church Staff Member” feature. It’s free and takes maybe 15 minutes to setup

I use a free plug-in from www.plugoo.com  So far, it has been very reliable. I will eventually pay for their service, but don’t have to, just like to support good ideas. $5 a month. It’s a Flash based plug-in that works in all browsers.

Setup is as easy as 1-2-3:

ONE: You go to their site, register, fill out the form, and copy the html code they generate for you.

TWO: You copy that code they gave you into a spot on your church’s website. Upload that page and you’re in business.

THREE: Turn on your Instant Messaging software (the one you told plugoo that you use) on your computer and sign in using the screenname you provided to plugoo. Now if anyone uses your chat form on your church website, the message will instantly pop up in your instant messaging program and you can chat away!

SETUP NOTE: They’ll ask you which instant messaging service you use, and what your screenname is. So if you don’t already have an IM acccount, go to either yahoo.com or aim.com to download the free IM software. It’s quick and easy.

You might want to consider setting up a “STAFF” screenname, so that anyone on your staff can sign in to their instant messaging account and be the “designated receiver” of any chat requests coming from the church website.

How it works:
You can pay a lot or a little, or get this for free, but they all work basically the same way.  You place a “chat” box on your website that visitors can type messages into. When they click “send” their chat request is sent to the Internet’s built-in “chat relay” system which will route the message to your instant messaging program that you have installed and turned-on on your computer.  I use AOL Instant Messenger (AIM), so I’ll use that as the example. But these plugins work with any number of IM services (Yahoo IM, MSN Live, etc).

Example: The chat plugin at www.sundaysoftware.com sends a request to the plug-in service provider (in my case www.Pluggoo.com) which routes the internet chat request to my AIM account (My AOL Instant Messenger screenname is “TalkingwithNeil”).

When someone types a message into that Chat plugin on the main page, my AIM WINDOW POPS UP saying I have received a request to chat. I click OK, and start to type my reply to them. It’s instant and seamless.

The visitor to your website doesn’t have to install anything. They see and use only the form on your website. But I am using my AIM window to reply. My AIM window has an audio alert too, so anytime someone requests a chat, I hear a “ding” alerting me, which is nice if I’ve stepped away from the computer.

And here’s the other great feature… when I walk away from my computer, I can turn on my default “away” message on AIM, and the plugoo plug-in posts an “away” message on my website!  It even has a green and a red light on the plugin to let you know if I’m online or not. (In the plugoo.com account settings you can customize the appearance of the plug-in on your website and the away messages).

FURTHERMORE…. I can monitor my website chat plugin from ANY computer where I have AIM installed. If you’re familiar with Instant Messaging, you know this is one of it’s nice features, you can sign-in on ANY computer and the network alerts your “buddies” that you’re online. The Plugoo plug-in works the same way. It connects to my AIM account and can tell people at my website that I’m ONLINE NOW or offline.  Thus, you don’t even have to be in the church office computer to receive chat requests from people visiting your website.  Very nice.

OK…how many people will use this?

I get maybe 9 or 10 ‘chats’ a day. If your church gets 1 a day, that would be great. And if that 1 person was looking for a church to visit and was able to connect “live” with a staff person… that’s gold.

Members may use it as well, especially if they’re surfing your site and not by the phone. YOUNG PEOPLE use chat all the time, so the concept of “chatting live” at your site is an idea on the verge.