Zendesk v s Intercom Comparison

Zendesk offers robust reporting capabilities, providing businesses with detailed insights into consumer interactions, ticketing systems, agent performance, and more. Intercom is also a customer service software that integrates entirely with third-party vendors, especially those offering messaging services. Using any plan, this integration is available to all customers, making the customer support experience and onboarding smooth. It can also handle complex interactions and provide real-time insight to customer support agents.

You can create these knowledge base articles in your target audience’s native language as their software is multilingual. Intercom also uses AI and features a chatbot called Fin, but negative reviews note basic reporting and a lack of customization. Fin is priced at $0.99 per resolution, so companies handling large volumes of queries might find it costly. In comparison, Zendesk customers pay a fixed price of $50 per agent—and only Zendesk AI is modeled on the world’s largest CX-specific dataset.

Our guide to Intercom alternatives makes it easy to compare competitors so you can choose the perfect customer service software for your business. Delivering a great customer experience (CX) can set you apart from competitors. Empowering agents with the necessary tools can make their jobs easier and create an environment that boosts the customer and employee experience.

Check out our chart that compares the capabilities of Zendesk vs. Intercom.

Personalized messaging, in-app messaging, product tours, and chatbot capabilities set Intercom apart from Zendesk. Businesses love HappyFox Help Desk for its ease of use, intuitive UI, personalized support and unparalleled customization options. CS, IT, HR, Facilities – all benefit from our flexible ticketing system with customizable features to tackle their unique challenges.

Customerly

And, thanks to the internet, a few taps will lead them right to your competitor! Most businesses use live chats as their main customer communication channel. It is handy for both sides since users can get in touch with customer support teams via a chat widget placed right on the website. While both platforms focus on enhancing customer support, their approaches and specialized functionalities differ. Zendesk offers a comprehensive suite of customer service features, whereas Intercom emphasizes personalized messaging and advanced sales automation tools. Zendesk has a strong customer support reputation, a helpful community, and extensive resources.

• Intercom has a full suite of email marketing tools, although they are part of a pricier package.
• However, if you aim to nurture leads and grow sales, then Intercom is the better option.
• Intercom also offers scalability within its pricing plans, enabling businesses to upgrade to higher tiers as their support needs grow.
• Understanding these differences is essential in determining which platform aligns better with a business’s specific needs and goals.
• Zendesk’s core feature has always been its ticketing system, and it remains the industry’s finest.
• Olark allows businesses to configure routing and automations to streamline support.

You could technically consider Intercom a CRM, but it’s really more of a customer-focused communication product. In today’s business world, customer service is fast-paced, and customers have higher expectations. To enhance customer satisfaction, businesses must equip their teams with customer support solutions and customer service software. Founded in 2007, Zendesk started off as a ticketing tool for customer support teams. It was later when they started adding all kinds of other tools like when they bought out Zopim live chat and just integrated it with their toolset.

Many businesses choose to work with Intercom because of its focus on personalization and flexibility, allowing companies to completely customize their customer service experience. Intercom’s ticketing system and help desk SaaS is also pretty great, just not as amazing as Zendesk’s. Their customer service management tools have a shared inbox for support teams. When you combine the help desk with Intercom Messenger, you get added channels for customer engagement.

Both Zendesk and Intercom have AI capabilities that deserve special mention. Zendesk’s AI (Fin) helps with automated responses, ensuring your customers get quick answers. On the other hand, Intercom’s AI-powered chatbots and messaging are designed to enhance your marketing and sales efforts, giving you an edge in the competitive market.

This means it’s a customer relationship management platform rather than anything else. Customer expectations are already high, but with the rise of AI, customers are expecting even more. Customers want speed, anticipation, and a hyper-personalized experience conveniently on their channel of choice. Intelligence has become key to delivering the kinds of experiences customers expect at a lower operational cost. If you do go with ActiveCampaign, I HIGHLY recommend that you take their paid training. It will really help you get up faster and understand the product deeper, and not waste time.

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One study found that 67% of customers prefer calling an agent to help solve their queries. Some help desk software provides call center tools as one of customer communication channels. So, let’s explore the difference between Zendesk and Intercom call center tools. The answers are analyzed to help streamline the AI and can also be collated into a report for your perusal. Intercom has limited scalability compared to Zendesk, which is unsuitable for large-scale enterprises. If transparency in pricing is not an issue for you and you are a small business, contact Intercom.

It offers a feature called “Mobile Push”  which are essentially push notifications that allow businesses to reach customers on their mobile apps. This feature enables timely alerts and updates to customers, even when they are on the go. Both the platforms offer valuable automation features, and the optimal choice depends on your business’s specific needs. It’s characterized by a clear, organized layout with a strong focus on ticket management. The dashboard provides an overview of ticket volume, agent performance, and other key metrics. The ticket view often includes detailed information about the customer, history of interactions, and other details.

Intercom focuses on personalized messaging, effective lead nurturing, and streamlined communication, fostering a more engaging customer experience. I’ll dive into their chatbots more later, but their bot automation features are also stronger. Zendesk is built to grow alongside your business, resulting in less downtime, better cost savings, and the stability needed to provide exceptional customer support. Many customers start using Zendesk as small or mid-sized businesses (SMBs) and continue to use our software as they scale their operations, hire more staff, and serve more customers. Our robust, no-code integrations enable you to adapt our software to new and growing use cases.

The highlight of Zendesk is its help desk ticketing system, which brings several customer communication channels to one location. The software allows agents to switch between tickets seamlessly, leading to better customer satisfaction. Whether an agent wants to transition from live chat to phone or email with a customer, it’s all possible on the same ticketing page. This feature ensures that each customer request is handled by the best-suited agent, improving the overall efficiency of the support team.

That’s why it would be better to review where both the options would be ideal to use. However, we will say that Intercom just edges past Zendesk when it comes to self-service resources. Intercom is great, but is quite expensive for what you get, and it’s super live chat focused. On the other hand, it’s nearly impossible to foresee how much Intercom will cost at the end of the day.

Related software comparison and alternatives

Zendesk’s extensive feature set and customizable workflows are particularly appealing to organizations looking to streamline and scale their customer support operations efficiently. Zendesk is distinguished by its robust and versatile customer support solutions. It provides a comprehensive platform for managing customer inquiries, support tickets, and interactions across multiple channels. On the other hand, Intercom shines in its focus on conversational engagement and real-time communication with customers. Both Zendesk and Intercom have positioned themselves as key players in this arena, offering unique features tailored to address diverse business requirements.

• Discover how Intercom and Zendesk Chat can integrate to improve user experience overall and optimize workflow efficiency.
• There is a Starter plan for small businesses at $74 per month billed annually, and there are add-ons like a WhatsApp add-on at $9 per user per month or surveys at $49 per month.
• MParticle is a Customer Data Platform offering plug-and-play integrations to Zendesk and Intercom, along with over 300 other marketing, analytics, and data warehousing tools.
• Self-service resources always relieve the burden on customer support teams, and both of our subjects have this tool in their packages.
• Zendesk and Intercom offer various pricing plans, but Intercom is generally more expensive.

While both platforms share the common goal of improving customer support, they differ in their approach and specialized functionalities. Understanding these differences is essential in determining which platform aligns better with a business’s specific needs and goals. Intercom does have a ticketing dashboard that has omnichannel functionality, much like Zendesk. With Chat GPT over 160,000 customers across all industries and regions, Zendesk has the CX expertise to provide you with best practices and thought leadership to increase your overall value. But don’t just take our word for it—listen to what customers say about why they picked Zendesk. Let us look at the type and size of business for which Zednesk and Intercom are suitable.

This feature is great for keeping communication clear and organised because it lets team members work together on jobs, projects, or interactions with clients without any problems. In addition, some of the services Zendesk offers have a free plan (find them below in the tables). The difference in prices between plans is so significant because of the features each of them provides. So, by now, you can see that according to this article, Zendesk inches past Intercom as the better customer support platform. Respond to all conversations across different messaging platforms in one place and avoid juggling between dozens of tabs.

It can automatically suggest relevant articles for agents during business hours to share with clients, reducing your support agents’ workload. Basically, if you have a complicated support process, go with Zendesk, an excellent Intercom alternative, for its zendesk chat vs intercom help desk functionality. You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. If you’re a sales-oriented corporation, use Intercom for its automation options. It also features a built-in customer relationship management (CRM) tool that stores customer data collected via methods like email and chat surveys.

Zendesk integrates with 1000+ platforms, unlike Intercom, which are pre-built and third-party. Users will also find a capable API that they can use for custom integrations. With data retention policies, Intercom allows data retention policy customization depending on need. For example, it encrypts data at rest and in transit and offers multi-factor authentication. Not only that, but dependence on the ticketing system can add complexities to responding to inquiries. However, accessing prior chats requires extra steps that can slow the resolution process.

Test any of HelpCrunch pricing plans for free for 14 days and see our tools in action right away. Just as Zendesk, Intercom also offers its own Operator bot which will automatically suggest relevant articles to customers who ask for help. While they like the ease of use this product offers its users, they’ve indeed rated them low in terms of services. So it will transmit the live data on the users and what they are doing in your app. This option is useful for those who are looking for a smooth switch from Zendesk to Intercom. But, if you just need a secure and quick data transfer, opt for Help Desk Migration.

Expert Plan

This automation enhances support teams’ productivity as they do not have to spend too much responding to similar complaints they have already dealt with. As any free tool, the functionalities there are quite limited, but nevertheless. If you’re a really small business or a startup, you can benefit big time from such free tools. Both Zendesk and Intercom are standout performers when it comes to providing comprehensive multi channel support, catering to diverse customer needs. However, it’s essential to consider the strengths of Zendesk, which offers a comprehensive and versatile customer support platform. While Intercom excels in certain aspects of customer communication, Zendesk offers its own set of strengths that cater to different aspects of customer support and engagement.

Intercom also has a mobile app available for both Android and iOS, which makes it easy to stay connected with customers even when away from the computer. The app includes features like automated messages and conversation routing — so businesses can manage customer conversations more efficiently. Intercom, of course, allows its customer support team to collaborate and communicate too, but overall, Zendesk wins this group. Zendesk has many amazing team collaboration and communication features, like whisper mode, which lets multiple agents chime in to help each other without the customer knowing. There is also something called warm transfers, which let one rep add contextual notes to a ticket before transferring it to another rep. You also get a side conversation tool. Overall, Zendesk empowers businesses to deliver exceptional customer support experiences across channels, making it a popular choice for enhancing support operations.

On the other hand, if you prioritize customer engagement, sales, and personalized messaging, Intercom is a compelling option, especially for startups and rapidly scaling businesses. Gain valuable insights with Intercom’s analytics and reporting capabilities. Track key metrics, measure campaign success, and optimize customer engagement strategies.

And according to research, brands adopting omnichannel customer service software experience a decline in cost per contact by 7.5% every year, so having this feature is definitely a plus. When it comes to customer support and engagement, choosing the right software can make a world of difference. Both offer powerful solutions for businesses looking to enhance their customer service capabilities. In this article, we will compare Intercom and Zendesk, highlighting their features, benefits, and drawbacks.

Zendesk which is less user-friendly and charges more for quality support, might not work for smaller businesses. What differentiates them is the kind of reports they equip your teams with. You could say something similar for Zendesk’s standard service offering, so it’s at least good to know they have Zendesk Sell, a capable CRM option to supplement it. You can use Zendesk Sell to track tasks, streamline workflows, improve engagement, nurture leads, and much more. It will allow you to leverage some Intercom capabilities while keeping your account at the time-tested platform. In this paragraph, let’s explain some common issues users usually ask about when choosing between Zendesk and Intercom platforms.

Intercom has a smoother transition process, offering pre-filled forms of customer info and their conversation history. Intercom positions itself as a CRP, and it delivers excellent message-based communications. The good thing is that the packages have a 14-day free trial period, and teams can also request a demo. Zendesk has the edge over Intercom with its all-rounded help desk, CRM, and live chat. When it comes to Intercom, it reserves SSO and identity management for its higher-priced tier plan as an add-on.

This enables your operators to understand visitor intent faster and provide them with a personalized experience. When comparing the user interfaces (UI) of Zendesk and Intercom, both platforms exhibit distinct characteristics and strengths catering to different user preferences and needs. Unlike Intercom, Zendesk offers an enterprise package providing dedicated support teams along with custom services. Intercom supports over 30+ languages in the chat interface and in-app messenger. It allows agents to translate chats through Microsoft or Google Translate, enabling them to communicate with customers globally.

You can then add features like advanced AI agents, workforce management, and QA. This organization is important because it brings together customer interactions https://chat.openai.com/ from all channels in this one place. And, Zendesk is nothing if not geared for helping agents deal with large ticket volumes efficiently.