Ever want to just ask a question of a business without getting put on a mailing list? Why not just type in a question on the business’s website, and get a real live person who answers your question right then?

That’s the idea behind a website-enabled chat box, or IM. Check out Chat Roll, a free and amazingly simple script that is put on your website. No, I don’t have a business relationship with these people, but I’ve been playing with their free service on one of our websites under construction. It works well. They also have paid chat services.

Here’s what they say:

“Get up and running in 60 seconds. Simply copy and paste the one-line Chatroll Module code into your existing website, blog or CMS.”

Well, it took me more than 60 seconds — more like 15 minutes. That’s because there’s a way to do it with WordPress, as a plugin, as well as for a static-page website. Fifteen minutes is still quick. Give it a try and let me know how it works for you. That’s Chat Roll.