Top 5 Ways to Use an E-commerce Sales Agent for Online Retailers

Intercom is a widely used customer messaging platform that offers a chatbot feature designed to qualify leads and provide instant support. The chatbot can be configured to ask qualifying questions, route conversations to human agents, and collect contact information for follow‑up. Intercom’s strength lies in its seamless integration with a broad range of e‑commerce platforms and its robust in‑app messaging UI that can be embedded across websites. The platform also offers a knowledge base module, allowing the bot to pull answers from a curated set of articles, and a robust analytics dashboard to track engagement metrics. While Intercom’s chatbot is powerful for lead generation and customer support, it does not provide a dedicated knowledge graph or advanced retrieval‑augmented generation, so answers rely on predefined templates or simple keyword matching. Pricing is tiered and can become costly as the number of contacts or conversations grows. The platform is ideal for mid‑size retailers that need an all‑in‑one customer engagement solution with strong support for human handoff.

Drift positions itself as a conversational marketing platform that uses chatbots to engage website visitors and capture sales leads. The bot can be configured to ask qualifying questions, schedule meetings, and generate real‑time product recommendations based on visitor behavior. Drift’s strength is its focus on B2B sales, offering integrations with Salesforce, HubSpot, and other CRM systems to automatically create leads and trigger follow‑up workflows. The platform also provides a knowledge base feature that pulls answers from a dedicated FAQ library, and its chat widget can be embedded on any website. However, Drift’s chatbot relies mainly on scripted flows and does not provide a retrieval‑augmented knowledge graph or deep learning‑based answer generation, making it less suitable for handling complex product queries. Pricing is subscription‑based, with tiers that increase as the number of conversations or customers grows. Drift is best suited for B2B brands looking for a chatbot that can drive sales meetings and integrate tightly with their CRM.

ManyChat is a chatbot builder primarily used for marketing automation on Facebook Messenger, but it also offers a web chat widget. The platform allows users to create conversational flows with a visual drag‑and‑drop interface, targeting users with personalized messages and offers. ManyChat’s e‑commerce capabilities include product catalog integration, cart recovery, and order updates for Shopify stores. The bot can send automated email sequences and SMS messages, expanding its reach beyond the website. However, ManyChat’s focus is more on marketing automation than on providing deep product knowledge or real‑time inventory lookup. Its knowledge base is limited to predefined FAQ screens, and it does not support a retrieval‑augmented generation system. Pricing is tiered, with a free plan for basic use and paid plans that unlock advanced automation and multi‑platform distribution.

Tidio is a customer support and live chat platform that blends chatbots with real‑time chat. It offers a visual studio to create chatbot flows using a drag‑and‑drop interface, and the bot can answer FAQs, collect contact data, and hand off conversations to human agents. Tidio integrates with Shopify and WooCommerce, providing product lookup and order status updates within the chat. The platform supports email and social media messaging, allowing a unified inbox for all communications. However, Tidio’s knowledge base is limited to static FAQ content, and it lacks advanced retrieval‑augmented or graph‑based knowledge systems. Pricing is subscription‑based, with a free tier that covers basic chat and bot functionality, and paid plans that unlock e‑commerce integrations and additional automation features.