Short answer: a good greeting does three jobs in under twenty words. It says who is talking, it says what this thing can actually help with, and it invites a specific question. "Hi! How can I help you today?" does none of the three, which is why it gets ignored.
Why the default greeting fails
The generic greeting is a question with no context. A visitor reads it and has to do all the work: figure out whether this is a human, guess what the assistant knows, and invent a question that will not waste their time. That is three small decisions, and the cheapest way to avoid all three is to close the panel.
Compare that to walking into a shop where someone says "Morning, looking for anything in particular? I can check stock and book fittings." You now know who you are talking to, what they can do, and roughly what to ask. That is the shape a greeting should have.
The three jobs, concretely
Job one: identity. Say what you are. Being upfront that this is an AI assistant is both honest and useful, because it sets the right expectations for tone and speed. Visitors who think they are talking to a person get annoyed when they discover otherwise; visitors who know it is an assistant are pleasantly surprised when it handles their question well. Honesty costs nothing here.
Job two: scope. Say what the assistant knows. "I can answer questions about our services, pricing and availability" is worth more than any amount of friendliness. Scope prevents the two worst outcomes: someone asking something wildly out of range and concluding the widget is useless, and someone not asking at all because they had no idea it could help.
Job three: invitation. End with an opening that is easy to take. Either a direct invitation tied to your business, or lean on the suggested questions sitting right underneath. The greeting and the suggested questions are one unit; write them together.
Greetings that work, by business type
Dental practice. "Hi, I'm the practice assistant. I can help with treatments, costs and appointment times. What are you looking for?"
Law firm. "Welcome. I can answer questions about our practice areas, fees and how consultations work, and put you in touch with a solicitor when you are ready."
Trades business. "Hi, I'm the assistant for the workshop. Ask me about services, areas we cover, or getting a quote."
Ecommerce. "Hi. I can help with sizing, shipping times and returns. What can I check for you?"
Agency. "Hey. I can walk you through what we do, how projects usually run and roughly what things cost. Where do you want to start?"
Notice what none of them do: exclamation marks stacked three deep, promises of instant human response, or the word "seamless". Notice what they all do: name a concrete capability that a real visitor came to the site for.
Length, tone and the exclamation mark question
Keep it to one or two short sentences. The greeting sits above the input field in a panel that is already dense, and a paragraph of welcome copy pushes the suggested questions out of view on a phone.
Tone should match the rest of your site. This is the part people get wrong most often, because chat feels like it should be chirpy and most sites are not. A structural engineering firm with a greeting full of emoji is not friendly, it is off-brand. Read your own homepage headline out loud, then read your greeting out loud. If they sound like two different companies, rewrite the greeting.
On exclamation marks: one is fine, two is a lot, and none is usually best. Warmth comes from specificity, not punctuation.
Set expectations about humans
The single most valuable sentence you can add is one that says a real person is reachable. It converts the widget from a maybe-useful gimmick into a reliable path to help. Something as small as "and I can pass you to the team if you need" changes how people use the panel, because it removes the fear of getting stuck in a loop with a bot.
This works best when it is true, which means having human handoff configured before you promise it. Clerkzo supports handoff alongside guardrails that keep the assistant inside what it actually knows.
The header subtitle is a second chance
The greeting is the first message in the conversation. The header subtitle is the line under the widget title, and it is visible the whole time the panel is open. Use them differently.
The greeting is conversational and invites a question. The subtitle is a standing label: "Answers from our site, usually in seconds" or "AI assistant, replies instantly, humans on request". Both are editable in Clerkzo, and using one for warmth and one for expectation-setting stops either from getting overloaded.
What to do about after-hours
If your business has hours, say so, and say what happens outside them. A greeting that quietly implies immediate human response at eleven at night sets you up to disappoint someone. Better: acknowledge the hour and be clear that the assistant can answer questions now and take details for a callback in the morning. This is one of the strongest arguments for having a widget at all, and it is covered in do I need a chatbot for my business.
Testing the greeting
Three checks, all cheap:
- Read it out loud. If you would not say it to a customer standing in front of you, rewrite it.
- Show it to someone who does not know your business and ask what they think the assistant can do. If they cannot say, your scope line is not doing its job.
- Open the widget on a phone and check that the greeting plus the suggested questions both fit above the fold of the panel. If the greeting has pushed the questions off screen, it is too long.
Then leave it alone for a fortnight and revisit with the actual transcripts. The questions people ask will tell you whether your scope line matched reality. If everyone opens with something your greeting never mentioned, the greeting is wrong, not the visitors.
Frequently asked questions
Should the greeting say it is an AI?
Yes. It sets the right expectations, it is honest, and it is increasingly what visitors assume anyway. Hiding it only creates a bad moment later.
Can I use the visitor's name or page context in the greeting?
Page context can be useful, a greeting on a pricing page can reasonably mention pricing. Names you usually do not have, and guessing feels creepy.
How long should a greeting be?
One or two short sentences. Anything longer competes with the suggested questions for space, especially on mobile.
Does the greeting affect whether people use the widget?
It affects whether they know what to ask, which is the main barrier to a first message. A vague greeting produces a closed panel.
Where do I edit it?
In Widget Studio, alongside the placeholder, header subtitle and suggested questions, with a live preview. See how it works for the setup flow.