Exciting Updates for 3CX Live Chat Plugin [2023]
At WPNeon, we cover exciting plugins that help you build your business with WordPress. One such plugin, 3CX Live Chat, received a great reception from our audience.
Recently, 3CX Live Chat Plugin saw some exciting changes, and that’s why we are here. Today, we’ll cover the new exciting features of the 3CX Live Chat Plugin and discuss its significant changes.
Also read: 12 Best WordPress Survey Plugins for Collecting User Feedback or Adding Online Polls
Before we start, let’s make one thing clear. It is still free. And, if you found its installation process tedious, you’ll find the new updated installation way easier (we’ll cover it in this post).
What other changes did the 3CX Live Chat Plugin bring? Let’s get started.
What is the 3CX Live Chat Plugin again?
If you landed here, and don’t know about the 3CX Live Chat plugin, let’s do a recap.
3CX Live Chat Plugin is a popular WordPress plugin. It offers a reliable and tested live chat solution to your WordPress site without the need to go through complex installation or maintenance. At the time of writing, it has 30,000 installations. Pretty impressive!
The plugin solves the core pain point of your customers, i.e. seamlessly connects with a real agent so that they can connect and solve the problem. Moreover, its support for integrated voice and video calls makes it more human-friendly.
Furthermore, the plugin is free to use as part of 3CX StartUP plan for up to 10 users. For more sophisticated contact center features and additional users, there’s always an option to upgrade to StartUP Pro or editions designed for larger companies.
However, even the free plan includes a full range of features. For instance, it:
- Improves sales by connecting customers and potential leads in real-time.
- Increases collaboration between teammates with forward chat functionality to either a specific agent or to a group of agents to tackle more complex issues
- Enables conversion to a live call or videoconference without the need for number dialing or additional phone bill charges.
- Allows to switch between chat to voice to resolve calls faster.
- Offers a complete integration with SMS, WhatsApp, and Facebook.
- Get proper customer identity and bring up contact records using available CRM integrations.
- Enables a complete chat box customization with zero coding required.
- Gives access to live chat records.
- Enables customer satisfaction ratings
And much more!
Check our 3CX Live Chat Plugin review to learn more about the plugin.
3CX Live Chat Plugin: what has changed? A Summary
So, what has changed? If it’s not the price, then what is it?
Let’s summarize it below to give you a clear idea of what you can expect from the 3CX Live Chat plugin the next time you pick it up.
- Change 1: The installation and setup process has been drastically simplified. You don’t need to have any prior tech knowledge or an in-house IT team to setup and customize the plugin according to your needs. The whole process takes up only a couple of minutes from start to finish.
- Change 2: The 3CX Live Chat plugin is now part of a free StartUP edition. This is beneficial for small businesses that can centralize communication without the need to pay anything.
- Change 3: You can now fully customize your live chat to fit your needs with no prior coding experience! Adjust the appearance of your chat bubble to match the style of your website, pre-define your own custom greetings, ensure GDPR compliance and set your ‘Default Agent’ to protect your team members’ identity. Get it all done in just 2 minutes!
These significant changes bring a better omni-channel experience to companies to enhance their customer experience, as well as guarantee a smooth workflow for their agents.
3CX Live Chat Plugin Updated Installation Process
The installation process got overhauled completely by 3CX. It is now made simpler. Let’s go through the process below.
Step 1: Sign Up, Choose Plan, And Create 3CX Live Instance.
First, you must go to the 3CX website and sign up for a StartUP account. It’ll ask you for basic details. Once filed up, tick “agree to license agreement” and click Next.
It’ll then ask you about which 3CX you need. Currently, they offer 3CX Hosted or a self managed instance that’s a better fit for larger enterprises.
- Once you’ve selected 3CX Hosted, you need to choose Up to 10 users – 3CX StartUP option to access your free 3CX StartUP account and click Next.
Once done, it’ll create your 3CX StartUP instance and prompt you to create users.
In the add users section, you can add up to 10 users (per your plan selection).
Let’s add a couple. Also, during new user creation, you can set their role as
- User
- Receptionist
- Group Administrator
- Manager
- Owner
- System Administrator
- System Owner
Once done, click on Next to proceed.
Step 2: Setup Live Chat
In this step, we begin setting up live chat on the site. It’ll ask you for confirmation to proceed with the process. You’ll need to fill in all the necessary information. Once done, click on Next.
It’ll also warn you that if you leave the process, the entire data will be lost. You must do it again if you somehow lose the connection or quit before completing all the steps.
It’ll set up your 3CX systems where you need to log in. Click on your client URL and log in with your extension ID and password.
Once done, it’ll redirect you to the 3CX Web Client. This is your communications hub for all of the future communication and system management. All of the message integrations will be available through here and synced between devices, regardless whether you are accessing your account from your iOS or Android app or the Web Client. .
Step 3: Configuring Voice and Chat From System
The portal will look below.
Now, you need to click on Admin in the bottom left and then choose “Voice and Chat”
It’ll open up your live chat already set up. To further customize it, you need to click on it.
Now click on it or click on the right Configuration Icon.
It’ll open up all the options for customization. Here, you can choose which visitor information you want to capture or allow only chat, phone, or chat. There are also other options, including
- Styling
- Messages
- Agent
- Advanced.
Under the Advanced tab, you get to enable privacy controls. All in all these options will help you customize your website to match your branding and give a more native feel.
Step 4: Download and Install the 3CX Live Chat WordPress Plugin.
The last step is to download and install the 3CX Live Chat plugin. Once installed, activate the plugin.
You need to input the generated URL you got during the 3CX Live Chat setup.
Furthermore, you can also choose the pages on which the live chat will show.
Step 5: Test it on your site.
Lastly, you can now go to your site and refresh it. You will now see a chat button on your site. Click on it and send a message. The message should pop up in your system and can be replied to.
You can also test out the call function.
That’s it. Congratulations, you have successfully installed the 3CX Live Chat plugin.
Note: If you’re installing 3CX Live Chat on a non-WordPress site, you must copy and integrate the HTML code manually.
Calling capabilities and team collaboration features
3CX Live Chat is one of the unique offerings that offer calling capabilities and team collaboration. In addition, once every team member is connected to the system, it provides limit-free enterprise-level video conferencing. Moreover, it is free, secure, and easy to use.
Now Part of the StartUP free edition
3CX StartUP is a free to use communication platform. It is also easy to set up, where you can do calls, live chat, video conferencing, and even team communications. It helps businesses to incorporate sophisticated features such as ring groups, call and chat reporting and IVR without the need to spend a fortune. The 3CX Live Chat is included in the StartUP Free edition. So, if you’re a small or medium-scale business, you can easily use it to run and even scale your business.
All you need to do is sign up for a 3CX account and activate voice and chat features.
Final Thoughts
3CX Live Chat has come a long way. These new updates add worthy features and more importantly, ease and convenience for the end user. Moreover, it is still free to use, which makes it more valuable than before.
So, what do you think about the 3CX Live Chat plugin and the StartUP Free edition? Comment below and let us know.