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Intercom vs Kustomer Comparison: Which One Is the Best for You?

Intercom vs Kustomer

Last Updated: March 2024

If you’re looking for the right customer service solution for your company, choosing between Intercom vs. Kustomer can be difficult.

Well, we’ve made the decision a whole lot easier for you. In this guide, let us compare two of the most popular customer service solutions available in the market and see which one is better for your business: Intercom or Kustomer.

We’ll compare them overall while also focusing on their specific features to determine which one is a better fit for your company.

What is Kustomer?

Intercom vs Kustomer

As the name suggests, Kustomer is a toolset designed for your customer service team to manage customer relations and provide an excellent customer experience.

The platform brings together conversations from email, phone, web, chat, and social media; consequently, you can easily resolve issues across multiple channels.

Kustomer can also be used to automate workflows; moreover, it provides self-service options, manages SLAs, and generates reports. We discovered that Kustomer is simple and easy to use, allowing you to focus on the customer experience rather than the software.

Kustomers’ paid plans begin at $89 per month.

What is Intercom?

Intercom vs Kustomer

Intercom is clearly a popular helpdesk system, with customers including Amazon, Shopify, IBM, and others. The platform helps you, moreover, to engage your customers from the discovery stages all the way through to post-purchase product support.

One key feature we liked is that Intercom is easy to navigate, resulting in a very user-friendly experience for both the support team and the customers.

The email marketing feature is also quite advanced, allowing you to create automated sequences and A/B test them in action. Other notable features include a team inbox system that allows agents to track incoming requests and messages, chatbot automation, integration with various third-party tools, and so on.

Intercom’s paid plans begin at $74 per month. They also provide a 14-day free trial period.

Intercom vs Kustomer: A Quick Comparison

Here’s a quick rundown of the platforms:

 

Kustomer

Intercom

Pricing Starts At$89 per user, per month$74 per user, per month
FeaturesEmail, Chat, SMS, Social, WhatsApp, Self-serviceEmail, Chat, SMS, Social, WhatsApp, Self-service
 Standard and Custom ReportingStandard and Custom Reporting
 Real-time Dashboards/Workflow RoutingReal-time Dashboards/Workflow Routing
 Process Automation/ Conversational ChatbotsProcess Automation/ Conversational Chatbots
 Service Level Agreement RulesService Level Agreement Rules
 Proactive ServiceProactive Service
 Sentiment AnalysisWorkload Management
  Product Tours
  Smart Lead Qualification
  A/B Testing & Control Groups
Free trial– (You can request demo)14-day free trial
Rating4.4/54.4/5

Intercom vs Kustomer: Livechat Features

Live chat allows your agents to carry out real-time and asynchronous conversations with prospects and customers across various channels.

FeaturesKustomerIntercom
Livechat Customization
Response Templates
Social Media Channels
Chat notifications
Chatbots
Proactive Messages
Sentiment Analysis
Transactional Messaging
Automatic Translation/ Language Detection
Conversation Rating
IVR trees
Web Widget
Transfers Between Agents and Departments
Conversation Notes
  • Livechat Customization

Allows you to customize the chat widget’s design, appearance, and default messaging options to provide a consistent chat experience for your customers across platforms while also matching the look and tone of your brand.

  • Response Templates

Create pre-defined text templates that can be used when responding to customers during a conversation. You can even categorize your response templates based on common themes.

  • Social Media Channels

Connect your social media account pages with the helpdesk to send and receive messages with your contacts directly. You can use this feature to import social media direct messages, tweets, post comments, account mentions, etc.

  • Chat notifications

Notifications provide a way for your agents to get alerted when a message comes in. You can also customize notifications by specific channel, ensuring that your agents never miss a message from an important channel

  • Chatbots

The helpdesks allow you to deploy custom chatbots. With conversational assistants, you can collect relevant customer information; additionally, you can increase agent productivity and streamline the support experience. The best part is that they require no programming, training, or additional development work on your part.

  • Proactive Messages

Allows you to send messages/prompts/notifications to online customers proactively. You can also assign custom chatbots to each function.

  • Sentiment Analysis

A sentiment engine is a collection of natural language processing APIs that, in addition, analyze text messages sent to the helpdesk by customers via Chat, Email, SMS, and Social Channels.

  • Transactional Messaging

Send messages when specific events occur, such as a customer’s renewal date approaching, shipping and delivery confirmations, and so on.

  • Automatic Translation/ Language Detection

Live chat conversations are automatically translated within the dashboard. The Web Widget embedded in a website also displays text in the end user’s language, based on the language of their browser.

  • Conversation Rating

This allows customers/visitors to rate and provide feedback about their chat experience.

  • IVR trees

You can set up custom IVR trees using all of your customer data to deliver support even before connecting with your agent.

  • Web Widget

This is an application that you embed in a web page; moreover, it gives customers access to your help center and the agents in your support channels.

  • Transfers Between Agents and Departments 

You can transfer a session to a group, another agent, or an external number. When you transfer the session directly to an agent, you can consult with the other agent before handing off the chat.

  • Conversation Notes

You can use notes to collaborate with other members of your organization and share updates about a support request.

Intercom vs Kustomer: Helpdesk Features

FeaturesKustomerIntercom
Voice Channels✅(Integration)
Conversation Analysis
Ticketing System
Multilingual Knowledge Base
Workload Management
Service Level Agreement Rules
Role-based Permissions
Intent Detection
Custom Objects
Workflows
Custom Reports
Live Dashboard
Search Queries
3rd Pary Integration Options
Internal FAQ
Customer Satisfaction Surveys
  • Voice Channels

Allows your agents to talk to your customers and solve requests right from your help desk.

  • Conversation Analysis

Identify and track trends and common issues in your customer conversations.

  • Ticketing System

An integrated system to engage customers through different channels and quickly convert them into tickets.

  • Multilingual Knowledge Base

Create knowledge base articles in multiple languages with tracking for out-of-date versions.

  • Workload Management 

This feature lets you choose how conversations are assigned to a team inbox and how many conversations a teammate can be assigned to at the same time.

  • Service Level Agreement Rules 

You can provide consistent support to each customer by establishing SLA (service-level agreements) rules. For example, set internal performance goals for your support team.

  • Role-based Permissions

Custom roles are permission sets that can be assigned to agents in your workspace. This allows administrators to easily update permissions for a large group of people at once.

  • Intent Detection

Automatically detect and route bot conversations based on customer input. With this feature, you can now create automated workflows to handle specific customer intents.

  • Custom Objects

Improve context by relating your customer data to service conversations.

  • Workflows

You can use workflow automation to create a set of rules that are executed when certain conditions are met.

  • Custom Reports

You can quickly create custom reports from scratch or by using predefined templates prepopulated with common metrics.

  • Live Dashboard

This feature allows you to see what are your agents doing in real-time. This will not only prevent a collision but will make sure that the appropriate agent handles the specific case

  • Search Queries

You can build customized searches to help you organize everything from customers to companies.

  • Integration Options

This enables you to integrate the helpdesk into your website as well as a wide range of third-party pages and apps.

  • Internal FAQ

You can use this feature to create FAQs that can be distributed in a variety of formats. Another option is to create a separate website to which your customers/agents can be directed.

  • Customer Satisfaction Surveys

Allows you to send automated customer satisfaction surveys. Satisfaction surveys can be tailored by channel, allowing you to provide a different experience in chat than in email. Reports can be used to analyze the results later.

Intercom vs Kustomer: Marketing and Sales Features

FeaturesKustomerIntercom
Segmentation by Sentiment
A/B Testing & Control Groups
Tracking Events
Banner messages
Mobile Carousels
Product Tours
Campaign Builder✅(Series)
In-Chat Video Calls✅(Integrations)
Advanced Routing
Smart Lead Qualification
Automatic Meeting Booking✅(Integrations)
Revenue and Performance Reporting
Account-based Assignments
Conversational assistants
  • Segmentation by Sentiment

Ability to segment by sentiment changes of a specific product, geo, and data range to drive actions for a group of customers.

  • A/B Testing & Control Groups

Set goals and A/B test your messages so that you can fine-tune them to be as effective as possible.

  • Tracking Events 

This feature allows you to record customer actions in your app or on your website, as well as the details of those actions. You can use this information to filter your customers and send them messages based on their actions.

  • Banner messages

You get to place a message at the top or bottom of your website, on desktop or mobile, for announcements, promotions, proactive support, and more.

  • Mobile Carousels

Lets you connect with your mobile app users at every touchpoint—show them around, provide support, and highlight new features.

  • Product Tours

You get to show customers around your product, highlight new features, and support them when they need help. You can also create interactive guides to help new customers get started.

  • Campaign Builder

Create customer engagement campaigns to target your audience based on previous interactions across multiple platforms. You can even gather insights into how customers are engaging with your campaigns.

  • In-Chat Video Calls

While chatting with potential customers, your agents can also initiate an instant video call. This enables live guidance, informational sessions, personalized shopping experiences, etc.

  • Advanced Routing

Reduce response times by automatically escalating urgent requests and routing conversations to specific teams.

  • Smart Lead Qualification

This allows you to determine, in essence, which leads are strong enough to convert potential customers into purchasing customers automatically. You can configure a task bot to ask your leads qualifying questions and then take the desired follow-up action, such as assigning your lead to a team.

  • Automatic Meeting Booking

Reduce your team’s workload by using chatbots to qualify leads and schedule meetings.

  • Revenue and Performance Reporting

With reporting, you can monitor the performance of your sales team as well as the impact of the helpdesk on your revenue. You also get to instantly filter by date range to see how much revenue your team has in the pipeline, the value of the deals they’ve closed, the time it takes to close a deal, and other information.

  • Account-based Assignments

Helps you to set tasks for agents based on the customers’ account type.

  • Conversational assistants

This feature can help you collect information from customers before they connect with your sales team, allowing them to respond faster and close conversations more quickly.

Intercom vs Kustomer: Pricing

Kustomer Pricing Structure

The platform currently offers two different pricing plans: Enterprise, and Ultimate. Their pricing applies the pay-per-agent subscription model.

  • The Enterprise plan is Kustomer’s entry-level pricing plan. This plan costs $89 per user, per month.
  • The Ultimate plan costs $139 per user, per month. This plan includes all of the Basic plan features.

Both of these plans include essential features like live chat, social media, SMS and voice channels, chatbots, performance reports, etc. Kustomer also provides Enhanced CRM, API Limit Increase, SAML Single Sign-On, Conversation Classification, Flexible Seating, KIQ for Agents and Self Service, and other add-ons/integrations.

Want to know more about the detailed pricing breakdown of Kustomer? Then, go through our post on Kustomer Pricing: Know Its Prices to Make a Smarter Decision

Intercom Pricing Structure

The platform comes with three main pricing plans; namely, Starter, Pro, and Premium plans.

Their Starter Plan for small businesses, which starts at $74 per month, is the only straightforward plan available. For the remaining plans, the pricing is completely custom

There are, however, opportunities to test any of their pricing plans. As a result, we recommend identifying the plan with the features you require and requesting a demo to determine how much it will cost you.

Want to know more about the detailed pricing breakdown of Intercom? Then, go through our post on Intercom Pricing – Which Plan Is Best For You? [Complete Breakdown]

Intercom vs Kustomer: Is There a Clear Winner?

As you can see, there is no obvious answer to this question. 

Both these platforms hold up on their own, and the decision between the two is entirely dependent on your company’s needs.

To summarise this comparison, here are a few points:

  • Intercom is clearly a popular solution to opt for, especially as it’s great for cross-functional teams to have visibility into customer interactions. If you are looking for a scalable solution and, moreover, budget is not an issue, Intercom is the way to go.
  • Kustomer, on the other hand, is a broader CRM system that includes all of the basic help desk functionalities among its many other applications. Their user-friendly interface and a 360-degree view of the customer , additionally, allow agents to provide faster, more personalized support for a better customer experience. However, you should keep in mind that Kustomer isn’t exactly cheap.

Both platforms are well-designed helpdesk systems that offer a wide range of additional integrations and features to help your team better navigate its communication strategy.

Bottom Line:

So, Kustomer and Intercom. With the above factors compared, which tool do you think is the right one for your company?

We hope this guide cleared up some questions and made it easier to choose a platform.

If you want to make it easier for customers to contact your service team while also empowering your support reps to provide the best service possible, the Saufter.io could be the platform for you. It is a multi-channel customer service help desk, consequently, designed for small businesses and enterprise teams. The platform is designed to be cost-effective; however, easy to set up; additionally, most agents can get started on Saufter with little to no training.

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