Customer service representatives always prefer to utilize user-friendly software that allows them to engage smoothly with consumers while providing fast and efficient support from anywhere.
Comparing Intercom vs Zendesk might be difficult because they are both equally popular with different features and capabilities.
However, it will depend on your company’s goals, size, budget, and business needs.
According to Softwarepath 29.46% of companies reported that their primary objective in implementing software is to enhance efficiency. This reason leads by nearly 10% compared to other objectives.
But how do you choose the ideal platform for your company?
Let’s look at these two online customer service systems and decide which one to use for your business needs.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Overall overview
Intercom is an AI-driven customer messaging platform that enables businesses connect with their clients in real-time, via personalized messages.
It offers live chat, email marketing, and customer engagement tracking features.
Businesses can use the Intercom platform that integrates with other tools, such as CRM, for better customer interaction and quick support.
Zendesk is a customer service software that assists businesses in managing customer interactions.
It offers a ticketing system to manage all customer requests from multiple communication channels within a centralized platform.
Zendesk also offers analytics and reporting tools that allow businesses to track customer inquiries, measure customer satisfaction, and identify trends or improvement areas.
Its integration with other business applications makes it an adaptable solution for customer service teams.
Comparison table of Zendesk against Intercom
Here is a comparative table of Intercom vs Zendesk, focusing on several critical aspects of each platform.
| Aspects | Intercom | Zendesk |
| Primary use case | Focuses on customer engagement, in-app messaging, and support | Focuses on customer support and ticketing system |
| User interface | It has a modern chat-based interface | Provide a traditional ticketing system layout |
| Automation | Workflow automation, macros, conditional triggers | Powerful automation with triggers, automation, and macros for ticket handling |
| Omnichannel | Phone support, email, social, and chat | In-app messaging, live chat, push notifications and email |
| Integration | Integrates well with modern tech stacks, particularly SaaS tools | Extensive integrations, including legacy systems and broad enterprise software suites |
| Live chat support | Strong live chat feature with modern proactive messages and real-time communication options | Offers a traditional user interface with live chat, chatbots, real-time responses, and seamless integration with their ticketing system for customer support |
| Ticketing system | Has limited ticketing functionality for managing conversations and chats | Has a strong ticketing system designed for managing customer inquiries, including multi-channel support and automation features |
| Knowledge base | Available via the article’s module, offering customizable help centers with search functionality and article recommendations | It has a comprehensive knowledge base with a dedicated help center, which allows for FAQs, articles, and community features |
| Report and analytics | Analytics on user behavior and conversation monitoring | Clear customer service KPI and tailored reporting |
| Pricing | Categorized pricing based on features, with additional costs for add-ons | More expensive with a per-agent pricing model but offers a broad suite of tools in higher tiers |
| Free plan | Not available | Available (Startups get Zendesk free for 6 months) |
| Free trial | 14 Days | 14 Days |
Intercom vs Zendesk: Interface
Although they have different user interfaces, both software offer excellent customer service. Let’s examine the differences of Intercom vs Zendesk.
Intercom interface is easy to navigate because of its clean layout and clear labels in a centralized platform. Businesses can make progress when their support teams actively respond to customers issues in real time.
Additionally, companies can also customize Intercom’s interface to fit their specific needs and branding.
Zendesk user interface prioritizes productivity on ticket management while offering practical and effective solutions. The software allows businesses to smoothly change between conversations helping them handle various interactions at once.
While Zendesk’s UI may not have the same visual appeal as Intercom’s, it is generally organized and user-friendly.
Users can also prioritize tasks and customize their workspace using a personalized dashboard that provides an overview of the number of tickets handled.
Final verdict: Intercom > Zendesk.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Feature analysis
Regarding the overall features of Intercom versus Zendesk, there are some differences.
Intercom focuses more on functionalities related to customer messaging and engagement. It includes features like live chat, ticket, a help center, report and analytics, and automation.
Their chatbot driven by AI can analyze previous exchanges and spot trends that it might utilize to enhance communication in the future.
Conversely, Zendesk offers a wider range of tools for managing customer support operations. It includes ticketing systems, live chat, and report and analytics.
Its chatbot may forward conversations to agents or answer simpler inquiries since no coding knowledge is needed to use this chatbot.
Final verdict: Zendesk = Intercom.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Knowledge base
For Intercom vs Zendesk, both customer service platforms offer varying features in their knowledge base software.
Intercom offers basic help center articles with features like multilingual support, search engine indexing, customization options, and analytics. These features are suitable for businesses that require simple, faster responses using self-service support.
Additionally, with Messenger on every page, your client may initiate a chat when they need additional support.
Zendesk offers a comprehensive knowledge base solution that is easily accessible. It includes features like advanced search, article management, and integration with other tools.
Its generative search AI offers users instant answers to search queries in your help center.
For worldwide companies with customers speaking their native language, Zendesk has the options to provide support content in multiple languages ensuring accessibility for users.
Final verdict: Zendesk > Intercom.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Automation
Zendesk vs Intercom both offer automated help desk features, but their approaches differ.
Intercom uses bots to automatically respond to customer inquiries, suggest relevant help articles, route issues to the respective support teams, and trigger follow-up actions.
Zendesk provides automation capabilities, including workflow automation, assigning tickets, rule-based triggers, and chatbot integration.
Final verdict: Intercom = Zendesk.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Omnichannel support
Intercom offers a strong omnichannel support experience. It allows integration of multiple communication channels like live chat, email, and social media platforms within a single inbox.
Businesses can manage all customer interactions seamlessly ensuring consistent and efficient communication.
Zendesk provides a strong multichannel with features like live chat, social channels, email, SMS, and business channels.
It improves customer experience by enabling faster responses and personalized service regardless of the channel they use to reach out.
Final verdict: Intercom > Zendesk.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Live chat support
Intercom offers an intuitive and user-friendly live chat software with few features that allows real-time interactions with clients.
Zendesk provides a more robust live chat solution with features like advanced routing, customization options, and integrations with other tools.
Final verdict: Zendesk > Intercom.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Ticketing system
Intercom offers a simple ticketing system with basic features like ticket creation and assignment.
Zendesk offers a more robust help desk ticketing system with features like advanced routing, customization options, and integrations with other tools. It’s well-suited for businesses with complex support workflows and large support teams.
Final verdict: Zendesk > Intercom.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Reports and analytics
Intercom offers a basic reporting and analytics suite with features like customer engagement metrics and conversation history.
It is only suitable for businesses needing a simple support performance overview and report on support agents’ performance.
Zendesk provides a more robust reporting and analytics suite with features like advanced reporting, customization options, and integrations with other tools.
It’s well-suited for businesses that need detailed reports on their support performance. Companies can monitor their performance on a pre-built dashboard or customize and design one themselves.
Final verdict: Zendesk > intercom.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Integration
When comparing Zendesk against Intercom, both offer integrations with other tools and software.
Intercom provides a variety of integrations with popular tools and platforms, including CRM systems, marketing automation tools, and e-commerce platforms.
These integrations can help to simplify workflows, improve customer data management, and provide a more unified customer experience.
Zendesk has a larger ecosystem of integrations. This can make it easier for businesses to connect their customer support platform with other tools in their day-to-day operations.
These integrations can help to streamline workflows, improve customer data management, and provide a more unified customer experience.
Final verdict: Zendesk > Intercom.
Zendesk vs Intercom: Pricing
Both customer service tools have a 14-day free trial, but you can choose between Intercom vs Zendesk subscriptions according to your business requirements.
Intercom pricing plans
Intercom offers various pricing plans, from essential customer support to advanced automation and analytics.
Pricing varies depending on user count, add-ons, and customizations. Intercom’s pricing starts at $29 per seat /month, with additional and hidden charges on it.
Starter plans suit small businesses, while professional offers advanced features for growing teams.
Enterprise plans cater to increasingly large and complex organizations with unique business needs.
It is difficult to predict the final costs of subscribing to Intercom. This is because, in addition to charging for the support team seats, they also charge for feature usage and provide many other functions as customized add-ons.
Here is a summary of the starting prices for each plan:
- Essential: $29 per seat/month
- Advanced: $85 per seat/month
- Expert: $132 per seat/month
Zendesk pricing plans
Zendesk has various pricing plans to suit different business needs. Its Starter plan is ideal for small businesses, while the Team plan provides more advanced features for growing teams.
The Enterprise plan offers comprehensive solutions for large organizations with complex requirements. Zendesk also offers custom pricing for businesses with unique needs.
The Zendesk pricing starts at $55 per month. This may not be affordable for startups as these plans do not include add-ons or access to all integrations.
Once you add these features, their existing plans can become quite expensive.
- Suite Team: Starts at $55 per agent per month (billed annually)
- Suite Growth: Starts at $89 per agent per month (billed annually)
- Suite Professional: Starts at $115 per agent per month (billed annually)
- Suite Enterprise: Contact Zendesk for pricing
Final verdict: Intercom = Zendesk (Both are quite expensive for small businesses with additional costs).
Intercom versus Zendesk: Support quality
For Zendesk against Intercom, both offer excellent customer support in their own way.
Intercom has a reputation for excellent customer service. Its dedicated team providing timely and accurate solutions in a professional way, through features such as an extensive knowledge base, live chat, and automated canned responses.
Zendesk is known for its 24/7 support team, which is always available to help with any issues that may arise.
Its robust ticketing system and extensive integration allow for efficient management of customer inquiries, even in larger enterprises.
While it may not have the same emphasis on building customer relations as Intercom, Zendesk’s focus on efficiency and scalability can be a major advantage for businesses with complex needs.
Final verdict: Intercom = Zendesk.
Intercom vs. Zendesk: User review
User reviews for Zendesk vs Intercom are generally positive, with users praising both platforms’ ease of use and effectiveness.
Intercom
Capterra: Intercom has an overall rating of 4.5 out of 5.
Users commended the system as a great product. It constantly releases new features, provides excellent training materials, and offers great support.
However, it once had terrible customer service for a week and no fast reply. They don’t have many features, and the ones available are very expensive.
G2: The software has a rating of 4.5 out of 5.
Its user-friendly and straightforward design is simple to explore and manage several discussions simultaneously.
In addition, the instrument is dependable and effective, almost never experiencing problems or downtime.
The reliable search feature helps users locate past chats quickly.
However, its chatbot usually fails to assign conversations to any of the available team members, leaving the conversation unassigned and unnoticed.
Zendesk
Capterra: Zendesk has an overall rating of 4.4 out of 5.
Users praised its excellent method of centralizing all customer support interactions in one space.
It also has strong ability to integrate with other apps and tools.
However, there are sometimes issues with exporting and uploading data. Occasionally, data disappears or is erased without explanation.
G2: It has a rating of 4.3 out of 5.
In its Support Suites, you can handle email-based customer inquiries, guaranteeing that each client receives a response and maintaining a standard of service.
Additionally, monitoring the support team’s performance and identifying improvement areas is simple.
However, the timing of the breached tickets is sometimes displayed incorrectly. The email “Not sent; please try again” occasionally appears after sending.
Final verdict: Zendesk = Intercom.
Final verdict: Between Intercom vs Zendesk, which live chat is compatible for your business?
In the end, the choice between Intercom versus Zendesk depends on your business’s specific needs.
Intercom is a modern customer messaging platform that provides live chat support for companies to communicate with customers in real-time through their website or app.
For businesses looking for a traditional customer support platform that focuses on ticketing systems and analytics, Zendesk may be the better option.
However, if you are looking for a high-quality, modern, chat-based system that focuses on customer engagement, BoldDesk is the right choice for you.
Why BoldDesk is the better alternative to Zendesk vs Intercom
Looking for an alternative to Intercom vs. Zendesk? BoldDesk provides a user-friendly customer support platform with various features to streamline communication.
- Powerful help desk ticketing system: BoldDesk allows businesses to create, categorize, prioritize, assign, and track tickets to efficiently manage support requests.
- Omnichannel inbox: Helps businesses to easily handle and manage all customer interactions, from social media messages to email inquiries, in one centralized location.
- Robust automated help desk: Customizes your workflow by automating repetitive tasks such as ticket tagging, routing and sending SLA notifications.
- Live chat: Offers real-time customer engagement, instant responses, streamlined workflows, and support through your website or apps.
- Comprehensive knowledge base software: Enables teams to create effective self-service resources for proactive customer service to empower users to solve their issues independently. This enables support teams to focus on other complex issues, thus reducing the volume of support requests.
- Efficient task management: Break down customer service procedures into smaller tasks to resolve tickets easily and increase overall agent productivity.
- Insightful reporting and analytics tools: Helps businesses track critical metrics, like team performance and response rate, to continuously improve their support.
- Seamless integrations: BoldDesk allows smooth integration with other business tools and your favorite third-party apps to provide a full view of customer interactions across multiple channels.
- User-friendly interface: It is simple, modern, and easy to navigate for all users.
- Affordable pricing plans: BoldDesk offers different plans to accommodate various business sizes, from SMBs to enterprises. It also provides a free startup plan and a free trial plan.
BoldDesk advantages
- Its ticketing system enables support agents to seamlessly handle all customer issues from across various channels in a single omnichannel inbox.
- It also has automation to perform manual and recurring tasks, allowing agents to concentrate on more complex issues.
- Its simple interface allows users to navigate and use it with ease.
- Features like live chat, knowledge base, email templates, and AI improve support agents, improving their productivity.
BoldDesk reviews
BoldDesk has an overall rating of 4.5/5.
Its users are praising it for its comprehensive ticket management features and affordable pricing plans.
Users can customize the BoldDesk interface. It also has outstanding rule management, which delights customers with great support experiences.
BoldDesk pricing plans
- Scale: $12 agents /month
- Momentum: $25 agents/month
- Enterprise: $39 agents/month
This involves various price choices for teams of 10, 25, 50, or 100 agents.
- Scale:$49/month for 10 agents
- Momentum:$129/month for 10 agents
- Enterprise:$199/month for 10 agents
- Essential: $799/month
- Pro: $1499 per month ($1999 with Live chat included)
- Business: Talk to us
Free trial duration: 15 days
Book a live demo to discover why you should choose BoldDesk as your customer communication software. Start a free 15-day trial to experience BoldDesk’s powerful functionalities. If you have any questions, please contact the BoldDesk support team.
Intercom vs Zendesk: Frequently asked questions (FAQs)
1. What are the main differences between Intercom vs Zendesk?
Intercom is a customer communication tool, well known for its user-friendly interface and focuses on cultivating customer relationships. It has automated bots to engage customers and help deliver proactive customer service.
Zendesk is an online customer support software that primarily focuses on improving customer interactions efficiency.
2. Can you integrate both Zendesk and Intercom?
Yes, it is possible to integrate Zendesk and Intercom through third-party apps to utilize the strengths of both platforms while addressing potential functional connections.
3. Can you replace Zendesk with Intercom?
Yes, it is possible to replace Zendesk with Intercom, but it depends on your specific needs and priorities. Intercom is a user-friendly software with outstanding customer engagement strategies for building relationships.
However, it might not be as comprehensive as Zendesk, especially for businesses with complex support workflows and large support teams.
Choose the best Intercom vs Zendesk alternative for your business
When comparing Intercom vs. Zendesk for building customer engagement, you must base your selection on your needs and requirements. Both Zendesk and Intercom are very effective customer support solutions, each with benefits and drawbacks of its own.
If you’re looking for the best alternative support platform to Intercom versus Zendesk, BoldDesk has everything you need in one platform.
The system offers the best user-friendly interface, which is modern and easy to navigate. As a result, it reduces the learning curve for new users and ensures a smoother onboarding process.
With affordable pricing plans, try BoldDesk’s 15-day free trial now and experience the best customer experience like never before!
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