Chris Leeds
asked on
iPhone for small business owner - Suggestions for Zendesk (or alternate) workflow
Help needed with a help desk so I can get back to helping my clients. I’m in over my head and need help from those who have survived through the process of selecting an automated help desk / ticketing system that is ideal for a one-man-show, his iPhone and dozens of support requests and inquiries each day.
In the eighth year of running a small Apple computers repair and service shop, I'm growing overwhelmed by the volume of SMS texts, phone calls, voicemails and emails from prospective and current customers. It's come to a breaking point, and it's compromising the quality of service. My needs are:
So I started shopping for a help desk solution, the first dilemma with all those choices. There are so many options in that field alone, that I just settled with ZenDesk, which I'm in no way married. If there's a better help desk / ticketing option that lends itself to my situation, I'm all ears. It’d be nice if it lent itself to an IT shop, such as mine, but that’s no deal breaker. The help desk part needs to be under $40 a month and compatible with processing SMS, phone calls, Youmail (the answering service I used for seven years) and email.
So, I couldn't debate any longer and picked Zendesk due to testimonials and their price and support offerings.
Google Apps for Work handles my email accounts, one of which is help@mydomain.com. I have those emails running through Zendesk successfully. That was relatively straight forward. For the record, I also have a Google Voice account with a decent, boarder-line vanity phone number that I’m not opposed to incorporating, if necessary.
AT&T is my wireless provider, and keeping my unlimited data plan is a non-negotiable. That precludes me from making any changes in that regard. So, no signing up with their business offerings, etc.
Premium YouMail handles my voicemail (literally thousands in the last five years). It transcribes my calls and alerts me via text and/or email with a copy of the transcription. I wish it had a virtual call box option, so callers could choose to leave a general message/help request or to leave a personal message for me. I'm totally open to dropping this service. I almost went with RingCentral, but I read they're really for bigger operations with multiple extensions and locations, etc. Plus, they're a little expensive. Grasshopper didn't do sms, and LIne2 ... I forgot why I passed on them.
I settled with BusinessCall 2nd Line app for iPhone and got it set up. I think it's working, but I'm really apprehensive due to a couple of negative reviews out there. I also see that their last upgrade was last year, so I don't think I'll stick with BusinessCall, even though the app does most everything on the front end that I need. On the backend, I'm not finding any Zendesk integration.
Ok. Enough about me and my problem. You're the experts, and I hope you can deliver. Remember:
Thank you.
Chris L
Well Connected Life, owner
In the eighth year of running a small Apple computers repair and service shop, I'm growing overwhelmed by the volume of SMS texts, phone calls, voicemails and emails from prospective and current customers. It's come to a breaking point, and it's compromising the quality of service. My needs are:
way to separate business calls AND texts from my personal communications on my iPhone ... my guess is There's an app for that.
help desk that can integrate with said app
max monthly budget $50, if it handles a good volume of calls and texts (minimum of 500 talk and 2000 texts
So I started shopping for a help desk solution, the first dilemma with all those choices. There are so many options in that field alone, that I just settled with ZenDesk, which I'm in no way married. If there's a better help desk / ticketing option that lends itself to my situation, I'm all ears. It’d be nice if it lent itself to an IT shop, such as mine, but that’s no deal breaker. The help desk part needs to be under $40 a month and compatible with processing SMS, phone calls, Youmail (the answering service I used for seven years) and email.
So, I couldn't debate any longer and picked Zendesk due to testimonials and their price and support offerings.
Google Apps for Work handles my email accounts, one of which is help@mydomain.com. I have those emails running through Zendesk successfully. That was relatively straight forward. For the record, I also have a Google Voice account with a decent, boarder-line vanity phone number that I’m not opposed to incorporating, if necessary.
AT&T is my wireless provider, and keeping my unlimited data plan is a non-negotiable. That precludes me from making any changes in that regard. So, no signing up with their business offerings, etc.
Premium YouMail handles my voicemail (literally thousands in the last five years). It transcribes my calls and alerts me via text and/or email with a copy of the transcription. I wish it had a virtual call box option, so callers could choose to leave a general message/help request or to leave a personal message for me. I'm totally open to dropping this service. I almost went with RingCentral, but I read they're really for bigger operations with multiple extensions and locations, etc. Plus, they're a little expensive. Grasshopper didn't do sms, and LIne2 ... I forgot why I passed on them.
I settled with BusinessCall 2nd Line app for iPhone and got it set up. I think it's working, but I'm really apprehensive due to a couple of negative reviews out there. I also see that their last upgrade was last year, so I don't think I'll stick with BusinessCall, even though the app does most everything on the front end that I need. On the backend, I'm not finding any Zendesk integration.
Ok. Enough about me and my problem. You're the experts, and I hope you can deliver. Remember:
one-man / one-iPhone operation
interception of calls, voicemails, texts and emails by affordable help desk that issues a ticket
preferably that segregates / separates my business from personal texts and calls
max $50 a month . . . $75 monthly if it can actually do all this
responses from users that have had success with this kind of operation
Thank you.
Chris L
Well Connected Life, owner
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Hmmmm. Anyone else?
Ringcentral has all the features I want, except transcribed voicemail, which would set me back an additional $10 for a total of $69 a month. That's too high.
I'm going to stick with BusinessCall 2nd Line this week while testing out others y'all suggest.
Thank you.