Alternative customer support and help desk solutions similar to Zendesk comprise platforms like Freshdesk, Intercom, and Help Scout for managing customer support operations. For live chat capabilities, consider Drift, LiveChat, and Tawk.to. These tools offer features like ticketing, collaboration, and chatbot functionality to enhance your customer support experience.
Alternative
Key Features
Core Strengths
Weaknesses
Freshdesk
1. Multi-Channel Support: Provides omnichannel support for email, chat, phone, and social media. 2. AI-Powered Features: Offers AI-driven automation and self-service options. 3. Ticketing System: Streamlines ticket management and workflow.
– Comprehensive multi-channel support enables customer interactions across various platforms. – AI-powered features improve efficiency and self-service. – User-friendly ticketing system simplifies issue tracking and resolution.
– Pricing may vary based on feature requirements and the number of agents. – Advanced AI features may be part of higher-tier plans. – Limited flexibility in customization compared to some alternatives.
Freshservice
1. IT Service Management: Specializes in IT service and asset management. 2. Self-Service Portal: Provides a self-service portal for end-users. 3. Automation: Offers automation for IT tasks and workflows.
– Tailored for IT service management, making it ideal for IT departments. – Self-service portal empowers end-users to resolve issues independently. – Automation streamlines IT tasks and improves efficiency.
– May not cover the full range of customer support needs beyond IT services. – Pricing may vary based on the number of agents and features required. – User interface may require some adaptation for non-IT users.
Help Scout
1. Email-Based Support: Focuses on email-based customer support. 2. Shared Inbox: Provides a shared inbox for team collaboration. 3. Knowledge Base: Supports knowledge base creation for self-service.
– Specialized in email-based support, ensuring efficient email management. – Shared inbox promotes team collaboration and response consistency. – Knowledge base capabilities facilitate self-service and information sharing.
– Limited to email-based support and may not cover other communication channels. – Pricing may vary based on the number of mailboxes and users. – Advanced features may require integration with third-party tools.
Zoho Desk
1. Multi-Channel Support: Offers multi-channel support for email, chat, phone, and social media. 2. AI-Powered Automation: Utilizes AI for automation and predictive analytics. 3. Self-Service: Provides self-service options and a knowledge base.
– Comprehensive multi-channel support allows customer interactions on various platforms. – AI-powered automation enhances productivity and customer insights. – Self-service options and knowledge base promote efficient issue resolution and customer education.
– Pricing may vary based on the number of agents and features required. – Advanced AI features may be part of higher-tier plans. – Integration with certain platforms may require additional development effort.
Kayako
1. Multi-Channel Support: Offers multi-channel support for email, chat, and social media. 2. Help Center: Provides a help center for self-service support. 3. Automation: Includes automation for ticket management and workflows.
– Multi-channel support enables customer interactions across email, chat, and social media. – Help center facilitates self-service and knowledge sharing. – Automation streamlines ticket management and workflow for improved efficiency.
– Pricing may vary based on feature requirements and the number of agents. – Advanced features may be part of higher-tier plans. – User interface and customization options may require some adaptation.
Marc Benioff, Co-CEO of Salesforce is the main individual shareholder, with 3% of the company’s stock. Other major individual shareholders comprise Parker Harris, Co-Founder, and Chief Technology Officer, and Bret Taylor, who is the company’s CEO. Major institutional shareholders comprise The Vanguard Group, Fidelity, and BlackRock.
Salesforce follows a SaaS businessmodel, offering four main categories of cloud CRM (Customer Relationship Management) services spanning the sales cloud to the marketing cloud. Where subscriptions drive the primary revenuemodel. However, the company leverages professional assistance to push the adoption of the software and retention of paying subscribers. Indeed, in 2023 Salesforce generated $29 billion from subscriptions and $2.33 billion from professional services.
In 2023 Salesforce generated $29 billion from subscriptions and $2.33 in professional services, compared to $24.66 billion in subscriptions in 2022 and $1.83 in professional services.
Professional services are run at negative gross margins. In short, in 2022, on $2.33 billion in revenue from professional services, Salesforce reported a $208 million gross loss. In short, Salesforce runs professional services at a loss to boost its subscriptionrevenue over time since professional services are used to enhance the use and retention of the software. The subscriptionrevenue cost structure is quite effective. In 2022 on a $29 billion in subscriptionrevenue, the company reported $5.82B in cost of revenue (expenses related to delivering the service and providing support, including the costs of data center capacity), thus generating a $23.2 billion in gross profits, in 2023.
Salesforce is a cloud-based customer relationshipmanagement (CRM) provider, allowing businesses to build meaningful and sustained relationships with their customers. With robust, customizable software that integrates with social media, Gmail, and Microsoft Outlook, the Salesforce CRM platform is rated highly among businesses of all shapes and sizes. Recent data has shown that the company has captured 19.5% of the global CRM market.
Salesforce’s mission is to build bridges between companies and customers. Salesforce does that via a SaaS platform, which is enhanced via professional services offered on top of it.
Salesforce was founded in 1999 by Marc Benioff, Frank Dominguez, Dave Moellenhoff, and Parker Harris. In a relatively short time, the corporate powerhouse of enterprise software has made numerous acquisitions as part of its broader growthstrategy to become a SaaS giant!
Hubspot generated $1.73 billion in revenue in 2022, compared to $1.3 billion in revenue in 2021 and $883 million in 2020. In 2022, over 97% of Hubspot’s revenue came from subscriptions, which generated $1.69 billion in revenue.
Hubspot generates most of its revenue from subscriptions. Indeed, in 2022 over 97% of its revenue came from subscriptions. In 2022, Hubspot generated $1.69 billion in revenue from subscriptions vs. $40 million from professional services. In 2021, Hubspot generated over $1.25 billion in revenue from subscriptions vs. $42 million from professional services. And in 2020, Hubspot generated $853 million in subscriptions and $30 million from professional services.
The subscriptionrevenue cost structure is quite effective. In 2022 on a $1.69 billion in subscriptionrevenue, the company reported $257 million in cost of revenue (expenses related to delivering the service and providing support, including the costs of data center capacity), thus generating a $1.43 billion in gross profits, in 2022.
The professional service business is run to sustain the subscriptionbusiness. Indeed, in 2022 on $40.4 million in subscription revenue, the company reported over $56 million in cost of revenue (expenses related to delivering the service and providing support, including the costs of data center capacity), thus generating a gross loss of over $16 million, in 2022.
Hubspot generated over $232K per employee in 2022, compared to over $220K in 2021 and $209K in 2020. Hubspot’s revenue per employee grew from over $194K in 2018 to $232K by 2022.
Hubspot had over 167K customers in 2022, compared to over 135K customers in 2021 and nearly 104K customers in 2020. The company grew from over 56K customers in 2018, to over 167K customers by 2022.
In 2022, Hubspot spent 51% of its revenues in sales and marketing efforts, and 26% in R&D efforts, compared to 50% in sales and marketing efforts and 23% in R&D efforts in 2021.
Gennaro is the creator of FourWeekMBA, which reached about four million business people, comprising C-level executives, investors, analysts, product managers, and aspiring digital entrepreneurs in 2022 alone | He is also Director of Sales for a high-tech scaleup in the AI Industry | In 2012, Gennaro earned an International MBA with emphasis on Corporate Finance and Business Strategy.
