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Countless software solutions offer a chatbot for customer service, but sifting through them can be overwhelming. You want a chatbot that not only handles customer inquiries across multiple channels but also escalates complex issues to human agents seamlessly - and need to find the right one for your team. I’ve got you covered! In this post, I draw from my professional experience as a seasoned CX specialist to curate a list of the top chatbots designed to improve the effectiveness of your customer service operations.

What is Chatbot for Customer Service?

A chatbot for customer service is a software tool that automates conversations with customers, offering quick responses to inquiries and support requests. It employs artificial intelligence to handle routine queries and guide customers to relevant information. These tools are particularly valuable for teams facing high volumes of inquiries, and they include natural language processing capabilities, integration with various messaging platforms, and customization options for dynamic teams.

The implementation of chatbots enables businesses to scale their customer service operations, by enhancing efficiency and alleviating the workload of human support agents. Additionally, they can assist in marketing and lead generation efforts by autonomously promoting products and services to potential customers.

Overviews Of The 27 Best Chatbots For Customer Service

Here’s a brief description of each chatbot for customer service to showcase each tool’s best use case, some noteworthy features, and screenshots to give a snapshot of the user interface.

Best for chatbot and reputation management in one

  • Free demo available
  • From $299/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 4.8/5

Birdeye is a holistic online reputation management software designed to help local businesses keep track of customer reviews, feedback, and messages. Its chatbot functionality is robust and useful to various needs and contexts. Chatbot messages are brought together in a shared inbox with email, SMS, and social media messages for easier management in a single place.

The chatbot has AI and automation capabilities that speed up responses and alleviate manual work from your customer service team. You can set up automated flows to respond to customer FAQs, and also respond in real-time chat for more specific inquiries.

In addition to its chatbot capabilities, the software also offers a well-rounded suite of features for overall online reputation management. This includes the ability to track customer reviews across over 150 different online review sites, and to solicit feedback from customers via automated surveys. You can also schedule appointments and manage payments through the platform, among other key tasks.

Integrations include QuickBooks, Square, Zoho CRM, Zoho Books, Zoho Invoice, Pipedrive, Thryv, Keap, HubSpot, Lightspeed, and hundreds of other SaaS tools.

The software costs from $299 per user, per month. A free demo is available.

Best for scaling customer support on any channel

  • 21-day free trial
  • From $15/month for small teams
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Rating: 4.4/5

Freshchat is a customer messaging tool that offers multichannel support, AI-powered bots, and a unified agent workspace to provide personalized and proactive customer service. With the ability to engage customers on any channel of their choice, this platform allows businesses to deliver experiences and scale support to keep up with demands and improve overall customer experience.

The AI-powered chatbots are designed to handle routine customer service queries and provide support around the clock. By automating responses to common questions, they help reduce the workload on human agents, allowing them to concentrate on more complex issues.

One standout feature is journeys, a proactive messaging functionality that enables businesses to initiate conversations with customers based on their behavior. It allows for targeted outreach, which can be used to inform customers about new products, services, or updates, and provide personalized communication.

Freshchat integrates with many other tools, including WhatsApp Business, Instagram, email, Google Business Messages, Facebook Messenger, LINE, Freshdesk, Freshsales, Shopify, Zendesk, Slack, WordPress, and more.

Best for its easy-to-use interface

  • 15-day free trial available
  • From $7/operator/month
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Rating: 4.4/5

Zoho SalesIQ is live chat software that allows you to engage with your customers in real-time. It's best suited for small to medium-sized businesses looking to improve their customer service and increase website conversions. The live chat feature is particularly useful in engaging with potential customers who are browsing your website and can help convert them into paying customers.

It's easy to set up and use, even for someone who is not particularly tech-savvy, and the user interface is simple and intuitive, which makes it easy to navigate and customize the settings. It includes visitor tracking, which provides valuable insights into visitor behavior and helps you identify potential leads. It also has an auto-triggering feature that can be set up to prompt visitors to engage in a chat conversation based on certain criteria such as time spent on the website or pages visited.

Another feature that I found particularly useful was the ability to create chatbots. While chatbots are becoming increasingly common in the customer service industry, Zoho SalesIQ's chatbot feature stands out for its ease of use and customization options. It's simple to create a chatbot that can provide basic information or route the conversation to a live agent if needed.

Zoho SalesIQ also offers integrations with other popular business tools, such as Zoho CRM, Google Analytics, and Salesforce.

Plans start at $7/operator/month, and they offer a 15-day free trial.

Best for ease of setup

  • 14 Days Free Trial
  • Pricing available upon request
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Rating: 4.7/5

Tars chatbot platform helps marketing and customer service teams optimize conversion funnels and automate customer interactions. With over 1000 template choices available, chatbots can be built for any purpose using the self-service drag and drop builder.

Chatbots can then be published either as website widgets, as a standalone page or on the WhatsApp platform. Managers can view and analyze data using the Tars dashboard to better understand how bots are performing.

Data can be moved automatically to CRM or database applications. This tool provides integrations via Zapier and webhooks.

Tars offers customized pricing on request. A free 14-day trial is available.

Best building chatbots at scale

  • 14-day free trial + free plan available
  • From $45/month
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Rating: 4.4/5

HubSpot’s Chatbot Builder helps you build chatbots at scale to automate the conversations on your website. This free tool allows you to create bots without coding, using canned chatbot templates and an intuitive interface.

The visual editor helps you customize the conversation in accordance with the tone and voice you want.The software integrates with HubSpot’s contacts database, so bots can deliver personalized messages based on existing contact information.

Data collected by bots is stored and synced automatically.This tool integrates with Gmail, Google Workplace, Outlook, and Office 365 for Windows.

The Chatbot Builder is included with HubSpot Marketing Hub, which costs from $45/user/month. There is no free trial.

Best for simple customer interface

  • 14-day free trial
  • From $74/month (billed annually)
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Rating: 4.4/5

Intercom helps businesses acquire, engage and support customers. This is achieved through a bot-based algorithm, supported by targeted emails, push notifications, in-app messages, and an integrated helpdesk. After engaging prospects in conversation, Intercom can auto-assign leads either directly or in a round-robin manner, according to the setup.

The app tracks data and referral URLs, as well as organizing multi-channel conversations and follow ups.Other Intercom features include customer context management, call-out collaborations, scheduling, metrics and chat volume management.

The software can also be used as a mobile app, allowing users to respond to leads using iOS or Android devices.

This tool integrates with platforms such as Salesforce, Slack, Segment, and HubSpot.

Intercom offers customized pricing on request. There is no free trial.

Best for turning conversations into sales

  • They don't offer a free trial.
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.4/5

Drift chatbots are focused on leveraging customer conversations to create sales opportunities. They pre-qualify website visitors then help them schedule a meeting with a sales representative.

The result is a better return on marketing spend and more qualified meetings booked for reps. The software also helps refine top-of-the-funnel messaging. Drift’s A/B split testing features allow you to try different hooks to see which works best.

By analyzing this data, you can continually improve chatbot and funnel performance. This tool provides over 50 integrations, including SalesLoft, SalesForce Marketo, and Pardot.

Drift offers customized pricing on request. There is no free trial.

Best for balancing chatbots with the human touch

  • 30-day Free Trial
  • Starts at $40/month
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Rating: 4.7/5

Kommunicate helps you build AI-powered chatbots without code to generate more leads and improve the customer experience. You can create bots that qualify leads, schedule meetings, or provide direct answers.

All customer conversations can be managed easily from a single dashboard.The software is designed to provide the optimal balance of automated and human interaction. Bots hand over to live support agents when a more nuanced response is required.

Bots can handle conversations via live chat, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Line.This tool integrates with CRMs such as Pipedrive, Zendesk, and Agile CRM, plus other popular business tools.

Kommunicate costs from $40/user/month, and a 30-day free trial is available.

Designed for more human-like automated chats

  • Free trial available
  • From $25/user/month + $500/month base fee
Visit Website
Rating: 4.2/5

Acquire is a customer engagement solution that deals with all sales and support queries through one widget. This includes inquiries via chatbots, live chat, email, video calling, SMS, screen share, and co-browsing.

Managers can see all these communication touchpoints in a single dashboard. The data analytics includes customer profiles that give a better understanding of the customer journey. Using this information, managers can optimize the customer experience and engage visitors more effectively.

Acquire integrates with the company knowledge base to improve live chat performance and show which support content resonates the most. All customer communications can be tracked in a single timeline.

This tool integrates with platforms such as IBM Watson, Azure QnA, and Dialogflow. Bots can also be connected to third-party messaging apps using webhooks and the Acquire API.

Acquire offers customized pricing on request. There is no free trial.

Best for customer-centric brands

  • Free Trial
Visit Website
Rating: 3.9/5

ActiveChat specializes in conversational AI bots that automate conversations and make human teams more productive. They combine the ability to understand natural language with the simplicity of decision trees.

The bots can interact with customers in real-time over various channels, including your website, Facebook, SMS, and Telegram. Over 50 conversation building blocks are available for creating advanced, complex bots.

The software tracks customer sentiment to prevent errors in automated conversations. Where necessary, the bot hands over to a live agent for further interaction. This platform integrates with major business and ecommerce platforms such as Google Sheets, Google Calendar, WooCommerce, and Shopify.

ActiveChat offers customized pricing on request. A free trial is available.

The Best Chatbots For Customer Service Summary Table

Tools Price
Birdeye From $299/user/month
Freshchat From $15/month for small teams
Zoho SalesIQ From $7/operator/month
Tars Pricing available upon request
HubSpot From $45/month
Intercom From $74/month (billed annually)
Drift Pricing upon request
Kommunicate Starts at $40/month
Acquire From $25/user/month + $500/month base fee
Activechat No price details
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Compare Software Specs Side by Side

Use our comparison chart to review and evaluate software specs side-by-side.

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Other Options

Here are a few more that didn’t make the top list.

  1. Quiq Messaging

    Best for integrating with bots from other platforms

  2. Helpshift

    Best for rapid deployment

  3. Genesys

    Best for chatbots that span digital channels

  4. Tidio

    Best for it focus on generating sales

  5. LiveHelpNow

    Best for omnichannel customer support

  6. CoSupport AI

    Best for faster, accurate, and secure customer support

  7. Zendesk Sell

    Excels at reducing repetitive work

  8. Podium

    Best for local businesses

  9. Netomi

    Best for dealing with spikes in support demand

  10. Kayako

    Combines help center, website, and mobile app support

  11. Hiver

    Best for Gmail-based customer service

  12. Kore

    Automates and streamlines customer journeys

  13. Conversica

    Best for turning customers into advocates

  14. Yellow.ai

    Best for total user experience automation

  15. Zoho Desk’s Zia

    Chatbots for sales teams

  16. IBM Watson Assistant

    Best for understanding customers in context

  17. Botmock

    Codeless rapid prototyping of conversation apps

  18. Drift Conversation Cloud

    Best for tailored chatbot conversations

  19. Jitbit Helpdesk

    Jitbit Helpdesk

  20. Chatra

    Website-based customer service messaging

  21. Olark

    Integrates chatbots with live support

Comparison Criteria

What do I look for when I select the best chatbot for customer service? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria: 

  1. User Interface (UI): I look for a modern interface that’s easy to navigate on both mobile and desktop devices
  2. Usability: I’m seeking chatbots that customers will find intuitive to use, even if they have little tech experience
  3. Integrations: I expect a good chatbot to integrate with popular customer service platforms
  4. Value for $: I look for chatbots that offer good value for both large and small customer service teams

Chatbots for Customer Service: Key Features

These are the core features I’m looking for when evaluating chatbot software:

  1. Artificial intelligence: chatbots with the ability to understand open-ended questions and give answers that make sense
  2. A visual flow builder: drag-and-drop functionality that makes zero-code bot building not just possible, but easy
  3. Omnichannel messaging support: supporting communication over social media channels such as Facebook Messenger and What’s App, plus website chat
  4. Live chat handover: a reliable system for handing the conversation over to a live agent when human interaction is required
  5. Detailed analytics: the ability for managers to gain deeper insights into the customer experience and pain points
  6. Chatbot marketing: features designed to promote products and services to customers automatically
  7. Sentiment analysis: mining opinions, thoughts, and feelings from conversations to better understand customer satisfaction
  8. Widget customization: options for tailoring the chatbot’s branding, tone, style, language, and other fundamental elements
  9. Data security: high-level protection against threats that may compromise the chatbot system
  10. Built-in API: the ability to extend functionality by integrating with other tools and software

Why Use A Chatbot For Customer Service?

Chatbots allow organizations to automate many customer service requests. They leverage machine learning to guide inquirers to the answers they need, quickly and efficiently. 

By dealing with customer questions quickly, chatbots can speed up response times and free customer service agents to work on more complex requests. They can also assist with marketing and lead generation—promoting products and services on autopilot to generate additional revenue.

What Do You Think About This List?

Are chatbots the future of customer service, or just another tech fad? Do you agree with my choices for the best apps? Let us know in the comments below. 

You can also check out our article on the pros and cons of customer service automation, how to create a chatbot with no coding skills, plus our thoughts on the benefits, challenges, and ‘how to’ of customer service automation. And be sure to sign up for our newsletter, so you can stay up to date with the latest from top thinkers in the CX world.

Related Read: Optimizing The Website Customer Journey 

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