Intercom vs Zendesk: Comparing features, integrations, and pricing
Which means it’s rather a customer relationship management platform than anything else. The cheapest plan for small businesses – Essential – costs $39 monthly per seat. But that’s not it, if you want to resolve customer common questions with the help of the vendor’s new tool – Fin bot, you will have to pay https://chat.openai.com/ $0.99 per resolution per month. Intercom is more for improving sales cycle and customer relationships, while Zendesk has everything a customer support representative can dream about, but it does lack wide email functionality. On the other hand, it provides call center functionalities, unlike Intercom.
The Internet is full of different tools that aim to optimize performance and … Honestly, I was really pleasantly surprised by how responsive the company is. I was able to get responses to virtually every question each time I was asking within a few hours, even considering the time zones. I appreciated the constant follow-up that I received from the Account Managers at Help Desk Migration. The service was excellent, during all the steps of the transition we felt taken care of and monitored perfectly.
Zendesk TCO is lower than Intercom due to its ability to scale, which does not require additional cost to update the software for a growing business. It also has a transparent pricing model so businesses know the price they will incur. Lastly, the tool is easy to set up and implement, meaning no additional knowledge or expertise makes the businesses incur additional costs.
Explore alternative options like ThriveDesk if you’re looking for a more budget-conscious solution that aligns with your customer support needs. If money is limited for your business, a help desk that can be a Zendesk alternative or an Intercom alternative is ThriveDesk. They offer straightforward pricing plans designed to meet the diverse needs of businesses, with only 2 options to choose from; it makes it easier for business owners to make a decision regarding pricing. Choose the plan that suits your support requirements and budget, whether you’re a small team or a growing enterprise.
Zendesk receives positive feedback for its intuitive interface, wide range of integrations, and robust reporting tools. However, some users find customization challenging, and the platform is considered expensive, requiring careful cost evaluation. As you dive deeper into the world of customer support and engagement, you’ll discover that Zendesk and Intercom offer some distinctive features that set them apart. Let’s explore these unique offerings and see how they can benefit your business. Experience the comprehensive power of Intercom for effective customer communication, automation, support tools, integrations, and analytics.
- Their template triggers are fairly limited with only seven options, but they do enable users to create new custom triggers, which can be a game-changer for agents with more complex workflows.
- All plans come with a 7-day free trial, and no credit card is required to sign up for the trial.
- The Zendesk Marketplace offers over 1,500 no-code apps and integrations.
- Help Desk Migration’s Demo with custom data greenlights you pick 20 entities for a test transfer.
- Additionally, you can trigger incoming messages to automatically assign an agent and create dashboards to monitor the team’s performance on live chat.
Here are some of the business-critical workflows that people automate with Zapier. For standard reporting like response times, leads generated by source, bot performance, messages sent, and email deliverability, you’ll easily find all the metrics you need. Beyond that, you can create custom reports that combine all of the stats listed above (and many more) and present them as counts, columns, lines, or tables.
Intercom’s AI capabilities extend beyond the traditional chatbots; Fin is renowned for solving complex problems and providing safer, accurate answers. Fin’s advanced algorithm and machine learning enable the precision handling of queries. Fin enables businesses to set new standards for offering customer service. Intercom’s AI has the transformative power to enhance customer service by offering multilingual support and contextual responses. Fin uses seamless communication across customer bases, breaking language barriers and catering to global audiences. AI is integral to customer relationship management software and facilitates consumer interactions.
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It will allow you to leverage some Intercom capabilities while keeping your account at the time-tested platform. Say what you will, but Intercom’s design and overall user experience leave all its competitors far behind. You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. Besides, the prices differ depending on the company’s size and specific needs.
With Zendesk Sell, you can also customize how deals move through your pipeline by setting pipeline stages that reflect your sales cycle. Learn more about the differences between leading chat support solutions Intercom and Zendesk so that you can choose the right tool for your needs. Zendesk, less user-friendly and with higher costs for quality vendor support, might not suit budget-conscious or smaller businesses. When comparing the omnichannel support functionalities of Zendesk and Intercom, both platforms show distinct strengths and weaknesses.
In a nutshell, none of the customer support software companies provide decent assistance for users. Their chat widget looks and works great, and they invest a lot of effort to make it a modern, convenient customer communication tool. The Intercom versus Zendesk conundrum is probably the greatest problem in the customer service software world.
However, it is a great option for businesses seeking efficient customer interactions, as its focus on personalized messaging compensates for its lack of features. Zendesk is an all-in-one omnichannel platform offering various channel integrations in one place. The dashboard of Zendesk is sleek, simple, and highly responsive, offering a seamless experience for managing customer interactions. Some aspects give an edge or create differentiation in the operations of both software, which users may oversee while making a choice. We will discuss these differentiating factors to help you make the right choice for your business and help it excel in offering extraordinary customer service. Intercom stands out here due to its ability to tailor sales workflows.
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Zendesk also has an Answer Bot, which instantly takes your knowledge base game to the next level. It can automatically suggest relevant articles for agents during business hours to share with clients, reducing your support agents’ workload. If you create a new chat with the team, land on a page with no widget, and go back to the browser for some reason, your chat will go puff. You can carry out records import in a few simple moves, applying our automated migration tool. If you’re trying to organize a elaborate data structure, feel free to go with our customized way.
On the other hand, Intercom, starting at a lower price point, could be more attractive for very small teams or individual users. However, additional costs for advanced features can quickly increase the total expense. When comparing the reporting and analytics features of Zendesk and Intercom, both platforms offer robust tools, but with distinct focuses and functionalities.
- But that’s not it, if you want to resolve customer common questions with the help of the vendor’s new tool – Fin bot, you will have to pay $0.99 per resolution per month.
- You could technically consider Intercom a CRM, but it’s really more of a customer-focused communication product.
- In this context, Zendesk and Intercom emerge as key contenders, each offering distinct features tailored to dynamic customer service environments.
- When comparing Zendesk and Intercom, various factors come into play, each focusing on different aspects, strengths, and weaknesses of these customer support platforms.
- Intercom offers advanced customer service through its automated functions and is suitable for businesses looking for a sophisticated customer support solution.
AI helps businesses gain detailed insight into consumer data in real-time. It also helps promote automation in routine tasks by automating repetitive processes and helps agents save time and errors. In addition to all these features, Suite Growth Plan offers light agents, multilingual support, multiple ticket forms, and a self-service customer portal. Zendesk’s automation features are limited to offering basic automation to streamline repetitive tasks. While Zeendesk provides automation services for ticket support systems, notifications, chatbots, etc., it may not be an extensive feature compared to Intercom.
Broken down into custom, resolution, and task bots, these can go a long way in taking repetitive tasks off agents’ plates. Zendesk also packs some pretty potent tools into their platform, so you can empower your agents to do what they do with less repetition. Agents can use basic automation (like auto-closing tickets or setting auto-responses), apply list organization to stay on top of their tasks, or set up triggers to keep tickets moving automatically. But it’s designed so well that you really enjoy staying in their inbox and communicating with clients. So when it comes to chatting features, the choice is not really Intercom vs Zendesk. The latter offers a chat widget that is simple, outdated, and limited in customization options, while the former puts all of its resources into its messenger.
Zendesk boasts robust reporting and analytics tools, plus a dedicated workforce management system. With custom correlation and attribution, you can dive deep into the root cause behind your metrics. We also provide real-time and historical reporting dashboards so you can take action at the moment and learn from past trends. Meanwhile, our WFM software enables businesses to analyze employee metrics and performance, helping them identify improvements, implement strategies, and set long-term goals. Intercom offers just over 450 integrations, which can make it less cost-effective and more complex to customize the software and adapt to new use cases as you scale.
The customizable Zendesk Agent Workspace enables reps to work within a single browser tab with one-click navigation across any channel. Intercom, on the other hand, can be a complicated system, creating a steep learning curve for new users. Migration Wizard is a cloud-based SaaS that doesn’t require installation. Also, you can share the access to Demo or Full Data Migration with your team member or customer. This tool took the “painful” and “time-consuming” factors out of the data migration. With Help Desk Migration service, you can simply import and export large amount of different records entities to or from Intercom to Zendesk.
Its AI Chatbot, Fin, is particularly noted for handling complex queries efficiently. Both platforms have their unique strengths in multichannel support, with Zendesk offering a more comprehensive range of integrated channels and Intercom focusing on a dynamic, chat-centric experience. 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. Seamlessly integrate Intercom with popular third-party tools and platforms, centralizing customer data and improving workflow efficiency. You get a dashboard that makes creating, tracking, and organizing tickets easy.
To sum it all up, you need to consider various aspects of your business before choosing CRM software. While deciding between Zendesk and Intercom, you should ensure the customization, AI automation, and functionalities align with your business goals. Every CRM software comes with some limitations along with the features it offers. You can analyze if that weakness is something that concerns your business model.
From there, you can include FAQs, announcements, and article guides and then save them into pre-set lists for your customers to explore. You can even moderate user content to leverage your customer community. Intercom, on the other hand, was built for business messaging, so communication is one of their strong suits. Combine that with their prowess in automation and sales solutions, and you’ve got a really strong product that can handle myriad customer relationship needs.
You can also set up interactive product tours to highlight new features in-product and explain how they work. Intercom offers an easy way to nurture your qualified leads (prospects) into customers with Intercom Series. Because Intercom started as a live chat service, its messenger functionality is very robust. It feels very modern, and Intercom offers some advanced messenger features that Zendesk does not. Zendesk started in 2007 as a web-based SaaS product for managing incoming customer support requests. Since then, it has evolved into a full-fledged CRM that offers a suite of software applications to its over 160,000 customers like Uber, Siemens, and Tesco.
Our robust, no-code integrations enable you to adapt our software to new and growing use cases. Compared to Zendesk, Intercom offers few integrations, which may hinder its scalability. Zendesk offers its users consistently high ROI due to its comprehensive product features, firm support, and advanced customer support, automation, and reporting features. It allows businesses to streamline operations and workflows, improving customer satisfaction and eventually leading to increased revenues, which justifies the continuous high ROI. 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.
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You can choose from thousands of ready-made apps or use our universal HTTP connector to sync apps not yet in our library. Zendesk has over 1,300 integrations, compared to Intercom’s 300+ apps, making it the leader in this category. However, you can browse their respective sites to find which tools each platform supports. Using Zendesk, you can create community forums where customers can connect, comment, and collaborate, creating a way to harness customers’ expertise and promote feedback. Community managers can also escalate posts to support agents when one-on-one help is needed.
Both Zendesk and Intercom offer varying flavors when it comes to curating the whole customer support experience. Streamline support processes with Intercom’s ticketing system and knowledge base. Efficiently manage customer inquiries and empower customers to find answers independently. Experience targeted communication with Intercom’s automation and segmentation features. Create personalized messages for specific customer segments, driving engagement and satisfaction.
This exploration aims to provide a detailed comparison, aiding businesses in making an informed decision that aligns with their customer service goals. Both Zendesk and Intercom offer robust solutions, but the choice ultimately depends on specific business needs. While both platforms have a significant presence in the industry, they cater to varying business requirements. Zendesk, with its extensive toolkit, is often preferred by businesses seeking an all-encompassing customer support solution. When making your decision, consider factors such as your budget, the scale of your business, and your specific growth plans.
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With the bulk user import option, you can efficiently import users in bulk, ensuring a swift and accurate transfer of data. We even offer a bulk organization import feature for your convenience. The help center in Intercom is also user-friendly, enabling agents to access content creation easily. It does help you organize and create content using efficient tools, but Zendesk is more suitable if you want a fully branded customer-centric experience. Intercom helps you support your customers with chat, support and management tools.
So, you can get the best of both worlds without choosing between Intercom or Zendesk. Check out our chart that compares the capabilities of Zendesk vs. Intercom. If you see either of these warnings, wait 60 seconds for your Zendesk rate limit to be reset and try again. If this becomes a persistent issue for your team, we recommend contacting Zendesk. G2 ranks Intercom higher than Zendesk for ease of setup, and support quality—so you can expect a smooth transition, effortless onboarding, and continuous success.
To sum up this Intercom vs Zendesk battle, the latter is a great support-oriented tool that will be a good choice for big teams with various departments. Intercom feels more wholesome and is more client-success-oriented, but it can be too costly for smaller companies. Zendesk is designed with the agent in mind, delivering a modern, intuitive experience.
It is used by over 25k companies as it helps them convert more leads, and achieve the best service for their customers. Zendesk’s Help Center and Intercom’s Articles both offer features to easily embed help centers into your website or product using their web widgets, SDKs, and APIs. With help centers in place, it’s easier for your customers to reliably find answers, tips, and other important information in a self-service manner.
Some software only works best for startups, while others have offerings only for large enterprises. Let us look at the type and size of business for which Zednesk and Intercom are suitable. These weaknesses are not as significant as the features and functionalities Zendesk offers its users. Intercom also charges additional charges for specific features, such as charging $0.99 for every resolution. This eventually adds to overall business costs, so they carefully need to consider all plans and budgets before making a decision.
If delivering an outstanding customer experience and employee experience is your top priority, Zendesk should be your top pick over Intercom. Zendesk has the CX expertise to help intercom and zendesk businesses of all sizes scale their service experience without compromise. Help Desk Migration ensures you experience no downtime and continue serving your customers seamlessly.
Employing Help Desk Migration tool, don’t worry about safety of valuable data. We commit to the fresh requirements, run constant advancements, and consistently audit all facilities. It also offers a Proactive Support Plus as an Add-on with push notifications, a series campaign builder, news items, and more. All plans come with a 7-day free trial, and no credit card is required to sign up for the trial.
On the other hand, Intercom’s chatbots have more advanced features but do not sacrifice simplicity and ease of use. It helps businesses create highly personalized chatbots for interactive customer communication. Its Chat PG messaging also has real-time notifications and automated responses, enhancing customer communication. However, if you are looking for a robust messaging solution with customer support features, go for Intercom.
The Essential customer support plan for individuals, startups, and businsses costs $39. This plan includes a shared inbox, unlimited articles, proactive support, and basic automation. Intercom’s messaging platform is very similar to Zendesk’s dashboard, offering seamless integration of multiple channels in one place for managing customer interactions.
Help Desk Migration is your ultimate solution for a seamless Zendesk import and Zendesk data migration process. We specialize in importing data to Zendesk, utilizing our state-of-the-art Zendesk data importer. Zendesk is suitable for startups, mainly due to its transparent pricing. Startups usually have low budgets for such investments, making it easier for these small businesses to choose the right plan. The features in Zendesk can scale with growing companies, so Startups can easily customize their plan to changing needs. While some of these functionalities related to AI are included in the Zendesk suite, others are part of advanced AI add-ons.
Companies might assume that using Intercom increases costs, potentially impacting businesses’ ROI. The integration of apps plays a significant role in creating a seamless experience or a 360-degree view of customers across the company. Zendesk allows the integration of 1300 apps ranging from billing apps, marketing tools, and other software, adding overall to the value of the business. It also excels in the silo approach in a company and allows easy access to information to anyone in the company through this integration. Considering that Zendesk and Intercom are leading the market for customer service software, it becomes difficult for businesses to choose the right tool. Sometimes, businesses do not even realize the importance of various aspects you must consider while making this choice.
The platform has various customization options, allowing businesses personalized experiences according to their branding. Help Center in Zendesk also will enable businesses to organize their tutorials, articles, and FAQs, making it convenient for customer to find solutions to their queries. With industry-leading AI that infuses intelligence into every interaction, robust integrations, and exceptional data security and compliance, it’s no wonder why Zendesk is a trusted leader in CX. 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.
Run a Free Demo to test the Migration Wizard performance and figure out how much your migration will cost. Don’t worry about experiencing hardships whilst doing your Supported Platform data import and export. The best thing about this plan is that it is eligible for an advanced AI add-on, has integrated community forums, side conversations, skill-based routing, and is HIPAA-enabled. Zendesk offers various features, which may differ according to the plan. Intercom also provides fast time to value for smaller and mid-sized businesses with limitations for large-scale companies. It may have limited abilities regarding the scalability or support of an enterprise-level company.
You can set office hours, live chat with logged-in users via their user profiles, and set up a chatbot. Customization is more nuanced than Zendesk’s, but it’s still really straightforward to implement. You can opt for code via JavaScript or Rails or even integrate directly with the likes of Google Tag Manager, WordPress, or Shopify. Zendesk’s help center tools should also come in handy for helping customers help themselves—something Zendesk claims eight out of 10 customers would rather do than contact support. To that end, you can import themes or apply your own custom themes to brand your help center the way you want it.
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. With mParticle, you can connect your Zendesk and Intercom data with other marketing, analytics, and business intelligence platforms without any custom engineering effort. Both tools also allow you to connect your email account and manage it from within the application to track open and click-through rates. In addition, Zendesk and Intercom feature advanced sales reporting and analytics that make it easy for sales teams to understand their prospects and customers more deeply. Zendesk and Intercom also both offer analytics and reporting capabilities that allow businesses to analyze and monitor customer agents’ productivity.
Zendesk and Intercom offer basic features, including live chat, a help desk, and a pre-built knowledge base. They have great UX and a normal pricing range, making it difficult for businesses to choose one, as both software almost looks similar in their offerings. Whichever solution you choose, mParticle can help integrate your data.
In summary, choosing Zendesk and Intercom hinges on your business’s unique requirements and priorities. If you seek a comprehensive customer support solution with a strong emphasis on traditional ticketing, Zendesk is a solid choice, particularly for smaller to mid-sized businesses. If you are looking for a comprehensive customer support solution with a wide range of features, Zendesk is a good option.
A helpdesk solution’s user experience and interface are crucial in ensuring efficient and intuitive customer support. Let’s evaluate the user experience and interface of both Zendesk and Intercom, considering factors such as ease of navigation, customization options, and overall intuitiveness. We will also consider customer feedback and reviews to provide insights into the usability of each platform.
Both tools can be quite heavy on your budget since they mainly target big enterprises and don’t offer their full toolset at an affordable price. Use ticketing systems to manage the influx and provide your customers with timely responses. Intercom is an all-in-one solution, and compared to Zendesk, Intercom has a less intuitive design and can be complicated for new users to learn. It also offers a confusing pricing structure and fewer integrations, making it less scalable and cost-effective. You need a complete customer service platform that’s seamlessly integrated and AI-enhanced.
With its user-friendly interface and advanced functionalities, Intercom offers a comprehensive suite of tools designed to effectively communicate and engage with customers. Zendesk, unlike Intercom, is a more affordable and predictable customer service platform. You can always count on it if you need a reliable customer support platform to process tickets, support users, and get advanced reporting.
Why don’t you try something equally powerful yet more affordable, like HelpCrunch? Zendesk AI is the intelligence layer that infuses CX intelligence into every step of the customer journey. In addition to being pre-trained on billions of real support interactions, our AI powers bots, agent and admin assist, and intelligent workflows that lead to 83 percent lower administrative costs. Customers have also noted that they can implement Zendesk AI five times faster than other solutions. Zendesk provides comprehensive security and compliance features, ensuring customer data privacy.
We meet the demands and requirements of HIPAA, CCPA, PCI DSS Level 1, GDPR, and other essential data protection levels. Move your multilingual help center to your new help desk app effortlessly! Apply our “Migrate content translations” opportunity and import translated language versions of each article automatedly. We’d also recommend checking out this blog on suspended ticket management in ZenDesk. While both Zendesk and Intercom offer ways to track your sales pipeline, each platform handles the process a bit differently. Zendesk and Intercom both have an editor preview feature that makes it easier to add images, videos, call-to-action buttons, and interactive guides to your help articles.
As your business grows, so does the volume of customer inquiries and support tickets. Managing everything manually is becoming increasingly difficult, and you need a robust customer support platform to streamline your operations. Zendesk is billed more as a customer support and ticketing solution, while Intercom includes more native CRM functionality.
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