Intercom vs Zendesk: Comparing features, integrations, and pricing

Both options are well designed, easy to use, and share some pretty key functionality like behavioral triggers and omnichannel-ality (omnichannel-centricity?). But with perks like more advanced chatbots, automation, and lead management capabilities, Intercom could have an edge for many users. However, HubSpot’s customer portal is open only on HubSpot’s Professional and Enterprise plans. HubSpot’s reporting and analytics tools are basic, with only five service analytics reports and dashboards available. However, they are available even to free users, with HubSpot’s free plan offering three dashboards and 10 reports per dashboard.

In fact, the Zendesk Marketplace has 1,300+ apps and integrations, from billing software to marketing automation tools. Apps and integrations are critical to creating a 360 view of the customer across the company and ensuring agents have easy access to key customer context. When agents don’t have to waste time toggling between different systems and tools to access the customer details they need, they can deliver faster, more personalized customer service. Today, both companies offer a broad range of customer support features, making them both strong contenders in the market. Zendesk offers more advanced automation capabilities than Intercom, which may be a deciding factor for businesses that require complex workflows.

Popular Features

Also, if you’re looking for a CRM that focuses more on customer service and support, Zendesk is the better option. Businesses engaging in direct sales through multiple channels will benefit from Zendesk Sell’s offerings, too. We’ve prepared this Zendesk vs. HubSpot guide to show you which CRM is best for your business needs. You’ll see how they compare regarding features such as lead and contact management, marketing and sales automation and reporting and analytics. Also, you’ll learn about their pricing and how easy it is to use or customize them. Intercom and Zendesk are excellent customer support tools offering unique features and benefits.

These integrations allow businesses to streamline workflow and provide a seamless customer experience across multiple channels. Intercom and Zendesk offer a range of features to help businesses manage their customer interactions. While Intercom focuses more on customer messaging and personalization, Zendesk focuses more on traditional customer support ticket management.

What Intercom Offers:

Starting at $19 per user per month, it’s also on the cheaper end of the spectrum compared to high-end CRMs like ActiveCampaign and HubSpot. You can create articles, share them internally, group them for users, and assign them as responses for bots—all pretty standard fare. Intercom can even integrate with Zendesk and other sources to import past help center content. I just found Zendesk’s help center to be slightly better integrated into their workflows and more customizable.

Zendesk for Sales, or Zendesk Sell, is Zendesk’s sales pipeline and CRM tool with its own dashboard for lead generation and conversion. With so many solutions to choose from, finding the right option for your business can feel like an uphill battle. It will allow you to leverage some Intercom capabilities while keeping your account at the time-tested platform. What can be really inconvenient about Zendesk is how their tools integrate with each other when you need to use them simultaneously. Well, I must admit, the tool is gradually transforming from a platform for communicating with users to a tool that helps you automate every aspect of your routine. They’ve been marketing themselves as a messaging platform right from the beginning.

See which Zendesk plan works best for you.

In general, Zendesk offers a wide range of live chat features such as customizable chat widgets, automatic greetings, offline messaging, and chat triggers. In addition to these features, Intercom offers messaging automation and real-time visitor insights. Messagely’s chatbots are powerful tools for qualifying and converting leads while your team is otherwise occupied or away. With chatbots, you can generate leads to hand over to your sales team and solve common customer queries without the need of a customer service representative behind a keyboard.

You need a complete customer service platform that’s seamlessly integrated and AI-enhanced. 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 intercom vs. zendesk of its resources into its messenger. All customer questions, be it via phone, chat, email, social media, or any other channel, are landing in one dashboard, where your agents can solve them quickly and efficiently. It guarantees continuous omnichannel support that meets customer expectations.

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. Triggers should prove especially useful for agents, allowing them to do things like automate notifications for actions like ticket assignments, ticket closing/reopening, or new ticket creation.

You’d probably want to know how much it costs to get each of the platforms for your business, so let’s talk money now. If I had to describe Intercom’s helpdesk, I would say it’s rather a complementary tool to their chat tools. So you see, it’s okay to feel dizzy when comparing Zendesk vs Intercom platforms.