Small-business minimum
Seven requirements matter more than seventy features
- a website and mobile visitor path that can be tested before launch
- visible acceptance, owner, cover and escalation for each enquiry
- routing by sales, support, language or location
- honest availability, offline capture and a defined follow-up promise
- SSO, roles, DPA, deletion and history export evidence
- a licence metric that exposes add-ons and usage costs
- staging, rollback and a support path the business can actually operate
Candidate categories
Align the shortlist with how the company works
| Small-business scenario | Test first | Documented reason |
|---|---|---|
| Teams-first with many occasional responders | WebChat | channel/thread model and per-channel logic |
| several collaboration platforms | Social Intents | Teams, Slack and Google Chat are marketed |
| service hours, files and meetings | Chat365 | these service functions appear in Marketplace |
| translation and skills | uWebChat | skills, service hours and realtime translation are named |
| voice plus digital channels | CentrePal or CoreInteract | contact-centre scope rather than only a widget |
Procurement
Model cost around small-business reality
Do not count only dedicated support agents. Sales, managers and specialists often answer occasionally, so a per-agent price behaves differently from a per-channel model.
Build a twelve-month scenario containing websites, languages, channels, seasonal conversations, social-platform charges, AI consumption, implementation, training and privacy review. Because current numeric WebChat prices are not independently verified, a written scenario quote remains mandatory.
Ten-working-day rollout
Start small and expand only from evidence
- 01
Name one owner
Give one person responsibility for response time, routing and release approval.
- 02
Use one channel
Test one site and team with real questions, offline handling and escalation on staging.
- 03
Run one-week pilot
Review volume, missed requests, response time and transfers every day.
- 04
Expand deliberately
Add languages, social channels or AI only after the core path is stable.