Freshdesk CRM is a cloud customer relationship management (CRM) service that offers email ticketing, live chat, and phone support for customers. Freshdesk CRM is the customer service platform in the Freshworks line of business productivity platforms.
Due to its focus on ease of use at the expense of some of the more comprehensive features of alternative CRMs on the market, Freshdesk CRM may be more helpful to smaller businesses just getting started with customer service CRM.
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Who uses Freshdesk CRM?
Due to its focus on ease of use at the expense of some of the more comprehensive features of alternative CRMs on the market, Freshdesk CRM may be more helpful to smaller businesses just getting started with customer service CRM.
Freshdesk CRM is used mostly by companies with 1–500 employees that generate up to $50M in revenue. Main industries include computer software and information technology and services. Other main user industries include retail, internet, financial services, education management, marketing and advertising, hospital and healthcare, telecommunications, and computer hardware.
What are the key features and benefits of Freshdesk CRM?
Freshdesk CRM offers a variety of services that help track and manage customer service cases, engage with customers, and facilitate collaboration within a service team. Freshdesk CRM comes in three modules: Support Center, Messaging, and Contact Center.
Support Center features customer support ticketing across multiple platforms. Tickets live in a shared inbox to facilitate collaboration. Tasks in support tickets can be divided among different teams and members to speed up the process of issue resolution.
Messaging, formerly known as Freshchat, is Freshdesk’s chatbot service. Chatbots can be deployed across platforms, including websites, mobile apps, Apple Messages, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, and WhatsApp. Messages are directed to the Support Center module’s shared inboxes, so contact history is readily available to all users.
Contact Center, formerly known as Freshcaller, is Freshdesk’s call center CRM software module. Freshcaller automatically records and transcribes calls. In addition, calls can be transferred over to live chat to free up phone center lines and allow customers to chat at their convenience. Contact Center supports agents in over 90 countries and companies can bring their own carrier.
Ticket, chat, and phone support are integrated across modules. Every point of customer engagement and action by team members is recorded in one contact record for easy display.
Not only can tasks be divided up, but teams can also share ownership of support tickets within their company or with third parties. Agent shifts can be scheduled and vacation time tracked. When agents are unavailable, Freshdesk CRM automatically reroutes tickets and messages to available agents. This ensures tickets get handled in a timely manner and with greater customer satisfaction.
Freshdesk CRM also provides analytics and performance management features. A quality coaching tool creates scorecards that are analyzed to determine top performing agents. This allows managers to better allocate resources.
Other useful features include automated conversion of emails to support tickets, a customer self-service portal, a community portal with idea management and voting, a knowledge base, social channel support for Twitter and Facebook, customer satisfaction surveys, the setting of service level agreements, gamification to increase motivation, a leaderboard to encourage collaboration toward team milestones and healthy competition, and support for multiple languages and locations globally.
Integrations
Integrations include popular mailers, CRM, and productivity software such as YouTube, Google Apps, Slideshare, SugarCRM, Capsule CRM, ZohoCRM, Nimble CRM, Salesforce, Freshbooks, Harvest, Facebook, Gmail Gadgets, HelpOnClick, MailChimp, Highrise, Snap Engage, Fetchflow, TwitterHarvest, JIRA, iContact, Constant Check, Userlike, Knowlarity, Olark, Campaign Monitor, Woo Themes, OneSky, Shopify, Magento, and more. Mobile apps are available for iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and Blackberry.
Plans and pricing
Freshdesk CRM comes in seven different service tiers. The four Support Desk plans don’t include the Messaging or Call Center Modules. The three Omnichannel plans include all three modules. A free basic plan is available, and a 21-day free trial is available for all other plans.
Compared to similar services, Freshdesk CRM is one of the more expensive support center platforms available, especially when additional costs like chatbots are taken into account. Freshdesk CRM also lacks some of the features of its competitors. On the other hand, what users get for the price is a more user-friendly, streamlined service.
Alternatives to Freshdesk CRM
Alternatives to Freshdesk CRM are other customer support platforms that manage and track leads and customer support cases and that offer call center and messaging functionality. Some of these include:
- Zendesk
- LiveAgent
- Zoho Desk
- HubSpot Service Hub
- Help Scout
Learn more about CRM
In a 2020 Survey, 84% of shoppers are willing to spend more to get better customer service. Customer support CRM tools have the potential to boost revenue and customer retention, but finding the right solution for a company’s business needs isn’t always easy.
For more background and tools to help with the research and selection of the ideal CRM for your organization’s needs, check out this comprehensive look at CRMs, including user reviews and comparisons of top systems.
