10 HelpScout Alternatives That Will Save You Time and Money

With so many different help desk software options available, it’s difficult to determine the best fit for your organization. While Help Scout offers some impressive features and is one of the popular solutions out there, it is not free of faults.

Fortunately, numerous interesting HelpScout alternatives can prove to be the best solution for you. We prepared this guide to give you an overview of Help Scout competitors and help you choose the best help desk software.

The cool thing is that a good help desk tool will not only help you streamline communication with your customers but also will support the lead acquisition, feedback collection, and marketing. 

Sounds good? Try Customerly, our all-in-one platform that helps you convert customers, engage them and make them stick with you. Get started with it by signing up for a free trial.

Now, let’s get into the topic and discuss the best Help Scout alternatives.

Help Scout has some interesting features that make the tool popular. Many customers value its simple user interface that allows using the platform without additional training.

The significant advantage of HelpScout is that it refuses to treat customers like a “ticket number.” Instead of the robotic feel of many help desk communications, they offer an individual approach that feels more like email communication.

Having said this, no tool is ideal, and there are some features of Help Scout that people complain about.

Help Scout’s collaboration options are not as extensive as in other tools. For example, it is not possible to CC another user in email conversations. It could be a sticking point for teams that frequently bring in outside individuals to aid with issues.

Beyond that, there is no option to organize tickets into folders. For example, you cannot categorize incoming requests using tags which is a huge time saver for support teams.

Also, in Help Scout, every mailbox is independent, so bringing conversations together is more complicated. It can be a problem when attempting to create a seamless client experience.

Since the pricing of Helpscout has risen considerably recently, it’s worth knowing that there are other options.

Let’s take a look at the 10 best HelpScout alternatives:

Customerly is a messaging service for SaaS businesses. It lets you stay connected with your consumers, improve customer satisfaction and conversions, and gather feedback.

The platform empowers you with the right tools to support customers in whatever need they have. Your clients may choose multiple channels to contact you, but you will have everything in one place.

Customerly helps boost customer relationships through live chat features supporting video calls and a knowledge base and surveys.

It will also collect data about customer activities and, based on that information, automate chat and email messages.

But that’s not all. One of our aims is to deliver support for your marketing campaigns. Customerly has important features that allow you to design newsletters and create email templates. It will also analyze your campaigns and show you click and open rates. All the features in a single, straightforward tool.

User Rating

G2 rated Customerly 4.3 out of 5 based on 17 user reviews

Features list

• Standalone help center
• Unified support dashboard
• Super-powered live chat
• Lightweight, ultra-fast video chat
• Activity dashboard
• Customer Segmentation
• Lead generation
• Marketing automation
• Social media integration

Customer support

Customerly offers customer support via the help desk and live chat. You can also browse our knowledge base and FAQs.

Pricing

Customerly offers four pricing plans:

• Essential, including 3 teammates and 1,000 interactions $7 a month
• Startup, including 6 teammates and 10,000 interactions for $39 a month
• Pro, including 10 teammates and 20,000 interactions for $82 a month
• Enterprise, including 15 teammates and 50,000 interactions for $249 a month

Pros

• Customerly offers excellent value for money
• The essential plan is an excellent way to begin with customer service, especially for businesses that don’t generate any revenue yet
• Easy-to-use interface
• Affordable pricing
• Advanced email customization options allow creating of beautiful messages for customers in no time.
• Automation is driven by customer data and behavior

Cons

• Sometimes it’s challenging to manage multiple chats
• Conversations Tags are not customizable yet

Intercom is a customer support software that allows businesses to communicate with their customers in real time. The platform uses custom bots, targeted emails, and push notifications to solve customer issues. 

Intercom can also help you manage your SMS marketing campaigns. You can use Intercom plugins to send notifications, import contacts, and market services.

User Rating

G2 rated Ingercom 4.4 out of 5 based on 2468 customer reviews

Features list

• Ticketing system
• Unified inbox
• Messenger
• Surveys

Customer support

You can reach the Intercom support team via the help desk or chat. It also offers a knowledge base and community forums.

Pricing

Intercom offers multiple pricing plans.

For very small businesses it has a Starter plan with chat and email support and in-product messages for $74 a month.

Plans suitable for most businesses include

• Support plan with live chat tool and inboxes
• Engage plan with outbound email and push messages
• Convert plan with conversational chatbots and smart lead qualification

Pricing for the plans mentioned above is available upon request.

Pros

• Intuitive user interface
• Chatbots are easy to implement
• You can smoothly install it on any website

Cons

• Long response time when trying to contact their support team
• As a product designed for medium and large companies, it turns out too expensive for small businesses
• Unclear pricing structure
• The data analysis feature needs to be improved

See also Intercom Alternatives.

Front brings different communication channels into a single platform. It combines a ticketing system with a more personal feel of the email.

Front enables support teams to create personalized replies quickly and efficiently thanks to workflow automation and integrations.

User Rating

G2 rated front 4.7 out of 5 based on 1,559 user reviews

Features list

• Workflow configuration
• Customer database
• Multi-channel support
• Ticket management
• Real-time chat

Customer support

Customer support is available via email or chat. You can also browse their FAQ and knowledge base.

Pricing

Front offers three pricing levels

• Starter $19 per month
• Growth $49 per month
• Scale $99 per month

Pros

• Multiple integrations
• Communication between customers and sales representatives is well-documented and easy to access

Cons

• The interface is available only in English
• In some situations, the keyword search doesn’t work well, and it’s hard to find archived emails
• The mobile version is not satisfactory

TeamSupport is another Help Scout alternative that enables proactive customer service. 

With comprehensive customer management tools, such as account trend analytics, satisfaction scoring, and more, the TeamSupport platform allows you to learn more about your clients than just ticket management. 

It enables you to improve your customer relations, boosting your revenue, increasing client satisfaction, and decreasing client turnover.

User Rating

G2 rated TeamSupport 4.4 out of 5 based on 825 user reviews

Features list

• Prioritization
• Case Management
• Collaboration feature
• Issue Tracking

Customer support

The support is available via chat, email, or phone. A knowledge base is also on tap.

Pricing

TeamSupport offers three pricing levels:

• Essential support – $49 per agent per month
• Enterprise support – $69 per agent per month
• Complete customer support suite – $119 per agent per month

Pros

• Allows to track conversations and responses in a single location
• It’s easy to prioritize the tickets
• Beneficial email forwarding feature

Cons

• Sometimes chat sessions get interrupted or cut
• A non-intuitive configuration process
• Message threads on tickets load slowly

Thrive Desk is one of the most affordable Help Scout alternatives. It helps improve customer support operations through multiple channels like live chat, email, and other communication tools.

A shared inbox on this helpdesk solution allows representatives to view, manage, and respond to customers’ requests, chat exchanges, and phone calls on a single dashboard.

Businesses can automatically forward emails to a unified inbox, keep track of recurring questions, perform bulk changes to conversations, set up team signatures, and more. In addition, the tool provides collaboration features that allow teams to search, create, delete, merge, or assign conversations to other team members.

User Rating

G2 rated Thrive Desk 4.9 out of 5 based on 11 user reviews.

Features list

• Multichannel support
• Ticket management
• Customer database
• Third-party integrations
• Email management

Customer support

Customer support is available via help desk or chat. ThriveDesk also has a knowledge base and FAQ section, and a blog.

Pricing

ThriveDesk offers two pricing levels

• Basic – $6,67per user per month
• Pro – $12 per user per month

Pros

• Clean and easy design
• Effective customer support team
• Responsive and feature-rich chat widget
• Robust knowledge base
• Customizable live chat

Cons

• Since the product is still developing, some features, like the search function within tickets, are missing
• Lack of native mobile notifications

Groove is another help scout alternative that is designed to help you keep track of all the conversations with your customers in one place, no matter what channel you use to communicate with your customers, be it social media, chat, phone, or email.

Using Groove, you can assign tickets to other employees or ask for assistance from other workers. Using the app, you can also track what items to work on next.

User Rating

G2 rated Groove 4.5 out of 5 based on 86 customer reviews

Features list

• Interaction Tracking
• Email management
• Reporting/Analytics
• Knowledge base management

Customer support

You can reach Groove’s support staff via help desk or phone.

Pricing

Groove offers four pricing plans:

• Starter, with one mailbox and live chat for $12 per user per month
• Plus, with 5 inboxes and complete history of reports for $20 per user per month
• Pro, with 25 inboxes and teams feature for $35 per user per month
• Custom, with unlimited mailboxes and dedicated success manager – Custom pricing

Pros

• The canned replies feature allows you to create answers to frequently reoccurring questions
• The knowledge base and ticketing system are easy to manage
• Allows to keep all the inboxes in one place

Cons

• Mobile app doesn’t compare to the desktop version
• Sometimes features are hard to find because frequent updates move them around

AzureDesk is a cloud-based help desk and ticketing management solution for businesses of all sizes. It provides customer support centers, knowledge base management, and reporting. Users can manage customer service operations, including private notes and inline image insertion. Data reporting, customer self-service, and email integrations are also available. 

AzureDesk handles ticket assignments, private notes, and inline image addition. Users can run reports for a specified duration and view them in a dashboard. Azure Desk offers multiple third-party integrations.

User Rating

G2 rated AzureDesk 4.5 out of 5 based on 27 user reviews.

Features list

• Knowledge base management
• Customer database
• Email management
• Automated Routing

Customer support

AzureDesk has a rich knowledge base. They also offer live chat support, as well as phone and email support.

Pricing

AzureDesk has one pricing plan named Plus, offering ticket management, a self-service portal, and more. The price is $33 a month.

Pros

• Helps to smoothen communication between various departments and improves task management
• Simple user interface
• Robust reporting system

Cons

• It doesn’t allow for prioritizing or categorizing tickets that need further investigation or approval
• Lack of workflow management
• Doesn’t allow customizable branding

User Rating

G2 rated crisp 4.5 out of 5 based on 97 user reviews.

Features list

• Interaction tracking
• Real-time chat
• Self-service portal
• Automated routing

Customer support

You can reach the help team via email, phone, and live chat. They also have a knowledge base and community forum to browse.

Pricing

Crisp offers three pricing plans

• Basic, including 2 seats and a basic chat – this plan is free
• Pro, including 4 seats and unlimited history for €25 a month
• Unlimited, including 20 seats, chat reminders and automated campaigns for €95 a month

Pros

• Many customization options
• Variety of plug-ins
• Auto-translate feature to enable communication between people who use different languages

Cons

• A limited number of analytics
• Lack of team chat

Hiver is a helpdesk platform built for Google Workspace that enables users to provide fast customer service right from the tool they already know, Gmail.

With Hiver, teams can handle, track, and collaborate on customer queries from the Gmail interface without wasting time learning a new piece of software or switching tabs.

Hiver has all the capabilities of a helpdesk, such as email tags for shared inboxes, round-robin email distribution, email templates, and detailed analytics for tracking customer support metrics. It also has collision alerts to prevent duplicate and conflicting responses.

User Rating

G2 rated Hiver 4.6 out of 5 based on 741 user reviews

Features list

• Remote support
• Email monitoring
• Workflow management
• canned responses
• Shared inbox

Customer support

You can contact Hiver’s support team via the help desk or live chat. They also offer phone support and a rich knowledge base.

Pricing

Hiver offers three pricing plans:

• Lite, with unlimited shared inboxes and chat for $ 15 per user per month
• Pro, with rich visual analytics and CSAT for $ 39 per user per month
• Elite, with round-robin assignment and custom address control for $59 a month

Pros

• Allows to assign emails internally
• Seamless integration with G Suite
• Allows to leave notes to yourself or colleagues in an email

Cons

• They change their plans often which results in significant price changes
• The mobile app doesn’t allow sending an email from a shared address

Helpwise is a team inbox that answers customer concerns across different platforms. It offers email, SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, and Live chat team inboxes.

In addition to shared inboxes, Helpwise offers website chat widgets and knowledgebases.

You can integrate Helpwise with other business systems to get broad context and information about your customers based on the conversation. You may chat with your coworkers, snooze messages, assign tasks to other team members (either manually or based on rules), and more.

User Rating

G2 rated Helpwise 4.6 out of 5 based on 153 user reviews

Features list

• Social media integration
• Email management
• Knowledge base management
• Self-service portal

Customer support

Helpwise offers customer support via chat or email. You can also search their help guides and articles.

Pricing

Helpwise offers three pricing plans:

• Premium, with 10 shared inboxes and 25 automation rules for $20 per user per month
• Advanced, with unlimited shared inboxes and unlimited automation rules for $40 per user per month
• Enterprise, with custom integrations and dedicated account manager – pricing available upon request

Pros

• Allows help center creation
• Lets you schedule emails to send later
• Enables teams to create internal notes concerning request handling

Cons

• The iOS app is glitchy to use
• Storage issues sometimes occur
• Sometimes notifications don’t go away after clicking

We created a bird’s eye view of all the HelpScout alternatives discussed in this article to help you decide. 

	G2 Rating	Live Chat	Marketing automation	Surveys	Pricing starting at	Free trial
Customerly	4.3	Yes	Yes	Yes	$7	Yes
Intercom	4.4	Yes	No	Yes	$74	Yes
Front	4.7	Yes	No	No	$19	Yes
TeamSupport	4.4	Yes	No	No	$49	No
ThriveDesk	4.9	Yes	No	Yes	$6,67	Yes
Groove	4.5	No	No	No	$12	Yes
AzureDesk	4.5	Yes	No	No	$33	Yes
Crisp	4.5	Yes	No	No	$0	Yes
Hiver	4.6	Yes	No	No	$15	Yes
Helpwise	4.6	Yes	No	Yes	$20	Yes

When looking for HelpScout alternatives, it is essential to focus on help desk features that enable excellent customer support while improving your team’s performance at the same time. The tool should have a shared inbox and unified support dashboard to let your team enjoy collaboration features and share relevant information. It should also be user-friendly and cost-effective.

We proudly announce that Customerly has all these features and many more. It will also help you run effective marketing campaigns, generate leads, survey, and collect feedback. Ant the best part? The basic plan is free, so you can check whether or not it works for you before you invest anything. Try it now.