AOL Remote
We used to use HumanClick, now LivePerson, to provide live chat service to a number of our ecommerce websites, but the hefty monthly price tag did not really make up for what you can get for free today. With the popularity of free instant message clients like ICQ, AOL instant messenger, Yahoo! Messenger and MSN Messenger there is no reason not to have a button on your contact page so that your customers can contact you via one of these free services. I would have to say from my personal experience, that AOL Instant Messenger, built on the ICQ platform, is the most popular. AOL has a free link builder called AIM Remote that allows you to place a link on your website in about 2 minutes. The button will update your status (logged in or logged out of the IM system) and allow users to contact you if they have the IM client installed. I have noticed that this will not work with all-in-one clients like Trillian however. Check it out.