The Best Helpdesk Software of 2018

What Is Helpdesk Software?

Helpdesk software helps your brand turn negative customer feedback into a means by which you can quickly and intuitively empower agents and customer service representatives to resolve issues. Your helpdesk is your first defense against poor customer experiences and choosing the right platform may help to ensure a positive brand reputation. Keeping customers and employees happy is a vital consideration for business owners. In fact, it's one of a company's top priorities whether it's a small to midsize business (SMB) or a large organization. Fortunately, you are not short of options as there is a wide range of helpdesk software available. Some solutions are better suited for SMBs, others are more suited for larger organizations, and still others are more suitable for internal IT operations rather than organizations dealing with customer requests. Also, not all helpdesk software is created equal. For example, helpdesk software such as Cayzu, Freshdesk, HappyFox, Vivantio Pro, and Zendesk Support include social tie-ins that let tickets be raised from social media websites such as Twitter. This could be an important feature to a company that deals with a large customer base but one not nearly as important or even relevant for one using the system simply as an internal IT service platform. Other helpdesk software, such as Jira Service Desk, provides additional security measures and identity management (primarily Single Sign-On or SSO) features, which may be key differentiators to some companies but not to others.

In this review roundup, we tested the top helpdesk software offerings, including Agiloft Service Desk, Cayzu, Freshdesk, Freshservice, HappyFox, Jira Service Desk, ServiceDesk Plus (SDP) 9.3, Vivantio Pro, Zendesk Support, and Zoho Desk. All of these helpdesk solutions are available as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions. This means you don't have to install any of the helpdesk software onto a local machine. As SaaS solutions, all of the helpdesk software tested can be run on someone else's servers—a fact that could appeal to many owners of SMBs.

ITIL Adherence

During testing, we discovered that some helpdesk software stood out from the others in one important way: adherence to the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). ITIL is an established service framework used mainly by IT management companies. It is a set of best practices that include many checklists, procedures, processes, and tasks. Having ITIL effectively govern how your company does things can be both constraining yet beneficial depending upon your particular industry. We believe that ITIL should be followed whenever possible, even if it does seem to be a bit overbearing for smaller enterprises.

The helpdesk software tested falls into one of two camps: those that follow ITIL's guidelines and those that don't follow them. The more advanced services tested follow ITIL, including Freshservice, Jira Service Desk, and ServiceDesk Plus (SDP) 9.3. They would make more sense to larger businesses working in the service management industry, perhaps overseeing data centers or large corporations in which service-level agreements (SLAs) and penalties are more than simple buzzwords. If your business follows ITIL, then you should opt for a helpdesk software offering that adheres to ITIL's framework.

But not all businesses that need helpdesk software follow ITIL or even need to. For example, if you are a software developer looking for something to handle incoming support requests from customers, then strong change management (something ITIL governs) probably isn't something you need. And Freshdesk, one of the helpdesk software offerings tested, is not likely to be useful to a company that's in charge of maintaining a large data center. Some businesses that don't adhere to ITIL may focus more on customer service where tickets generated from social media are offered. These businesses would benefit from helpdesk solutions such as Cayzu, HappyFox, and Zendesk Support. So, first determine whether or not ITIL is something your business needs to follow, and then shop accordingly.

Key Capabilities

All of the helpdesk software tested contains key features required to make the grade as even the most rudimentary of helpdesk apps. Some of those common features include giving agents the ability to create support tickets, edit the tickets, and then close the tickets when the issue or question has been resolved. This ticket handling, and whether or not they do it well, was one of the basic standards we had in mind while testing the helpdesk software. Another feature common to all of the helpdesk software tested includes the ability to receive tickets by email. And finally, most of the helpdesk software offers a knowledge base, which provides different content for agents and customers. Freshdesk, for example, lets you create separate sections of the knowledge base that are accessible only to some of your customers or you can create private documentation for your agents with in-depth technical information.

Another key feature any good helpdesk app should have is the ability to communicate with other apps. The data gathered by service desk consoles can be invaluable to several other areas of the average business. For example, if you're using your helpdesk app to handle customer service calls regarding a product or service the company is selling, then the data the system generates can give a serious boost to your customer relationship management (CRM) database, thus empowering your sales staff. If you're using social media as a service desk channel, then making sure your social media management tools are tracking customer interactions is another great data source.

These are all examples of very basic capabilities that any helpdesk software offering should provide. Most of the helpdesk software tested met these requirements so keep those basic requirements in mind as you read the reviews. HappyFox, Vivantio Pro, and Zoho Desk were among the four helpdesk software solutions that won our Editors' Choice award. HappyFox will satisfy the customer service needs of SMBs while Vivantio Pro and Zoho Desk are more suited to large businesses with their focus on ITIL and asset management.

We have added Freshdesk to our list of Editors' Choice winners in this category. The tool, and its sister solution Freshservice, recently underwent a major facelift, complete with added features that improve ease of use and continued functionality. As a result, Freshdesk has also been dubbed an Editors' Choice tool. Freshservice, while certainly a top performer among internal helpdesk tools, was given a higher mark but still ranks a notch below Vivantio Pro, our leader for internal support.