Choosing the Right Chatbot for Your Website in 2025

It’s 2024. Humans don’t need to handle every customer message. Chatbots can help you respond faster and capture demand, well… on demand. 

Offering a self-service option on your website lets you answer questions in real time and reserves your team’s energy for the most critical requests. But there are near-endless choices when it comes to chatbots. How exactly do you choose?

Chat is a crowded space

There are a whopping 626 chatbot solutions and counting on G2. Drift. Qualified. Intercom. Now Chili Piper has a chatbot 😉 

Which chatbot you choose depends on a few factors:

1. Your goals

Are you trying to build pipeline? Answer customer questions? Share content? All of the above? 

Some chatbots are best for customer service. Some are great for all types of conversational marketing. Others (we’ll let you guess which one) are amazing at converting demand directly into pipeline.

2. Your current tech stack

As always, you can’t pick your tech in a silo. It needs to work seamlessly with all your other software. Consider the workflow of your data and which integrations are important, namely: your CRM and Marketing Automation Platform. Chat is only one communication channel, after all. 

3. Your budget

Of course, price is a factor. If you’re just getting started with chat, you might want to go with a lower cost option and create a proof of concept. 

Drift may be right for you if…

You’re focused on conversational marketing.

Pros:

• They’re the OG, which means they’re established and know what they’re doing.
• Bionic Chatbots use AI to answer customer questions.
• They’re part of Salesloft so if you’re using their other products, it can be a good choice.

Cons:

• Integrations sometimes have friction. (Example: If you want to schedule meetings through Chili Piper within the chat, customers will be presented with a hyperlinked URL that opens in a new tab. They can’t book meetings directly in the chat.)
• Pricing isn’t transparent, which likely means $$$
• You need to purchase lead routing tools (e.g. LeanData) separately for lead distribution. (You can bundle Chili Piper Distro with Chili Piper Chat for an extra $25/u/m).

Qualified may be right for you if…

You have a big budget and are focused on pipeline growth and webpage personalization.

Pros:

• They’re focused on pipeline growth, so their chat is focused on conversion.
• They offer AI signals to help with outbounding.
• Their platform includes a diversified range of offerings that cater to personalized experiences on a webpage in addition to the Chatbot.

Cons:

• Pricing starts at $3,500 a month, and pricing for higher tiers is not disclosed.
• You can’t get chat on its own. You can only bundle it with their other products.
• You need to purchase lead routing tools (e.g. LeanData) separately for lead distribution. (You can bundle Chili Piper Distro with Chili Piper Chat for an extra $25/u/m).

Intercom may be right for you if...

You need an in-app Chatbot to engage with customers and create support tickets.

Pros:

• They’re the go-to option if your chatbot is intended for customer service or in-app implementation
• They have a 14-day free trial.

Cons:

• They’re not great if your goal is demand conversion as you may run into limitations with their CRM integrations.
• The version with AI starts at $85/month per seat, and the version with collaboration, security, and reporting tools costs $132/month per seat.

HubSpot may be right for you if…

You already use HubSpot for everything.

Pros:

• It’s included with HubSpot.
• It’s a great option for testing out a proof of concept before you invest in a better solution.

Cons:

• You get what you pay for. It’s free for a reason.
• You may run into routing limitations with more advanced Salesforce features such as: Account Teams, Custom Objects, and related-object routing

What’s different about Chili Piper’s Chat

Every detail of Chili Piper’s Chat has been built to convert demand into pipeline. While there are a lot of Chatbots on the market, when ranked against the criteria above, it becomes apparent most are not equipped to support B2B sales and marketing teams.

Chili Piper Chat provides chatbot-powered handoffs that convert qualified leads faster:

• Pre-qualify leads directly in Chat
• Automatically route them to a live SDR for a more personalized interaction and real-time conversation
• SDRs can then seamlessly route the warm lead to an AE by sharing their calendar directly in the conversation

Above all, you can sleep well at night knowing that Chili Piper uses your territory logic in every workflow. This way your leads are managed the same way no matter where they’re coming from. Demand is demand, after all. 

How to get started with Chat

If you already use Chili Piper, your next step is super simple. You can set up your Chat Journey in minutes and start converting demand right away. I hosted a live webinar to walk you through everything, check out the recording here.

If you’re new to Chili Piper, book a demo to see Chat in action.