Help Scout Reviews

Pros

Help Scout does what it's supposed to do and it's very good at it. No doubt about that. It's the very main reason why many companies trust Help Scout for their customer support management. You can create automations, saved replies, a knowledgebase, and a chat widget (they call it Beacon). Everything works as it's supposed to and we never had any issues so far. It's really easy to set up automations and saved replies, no need to look into their help docs. You just need to use your common sense to navigate through the dashboard. I am using it daily for my client's e-commerce business for the past 6 years and I can say that it's a really solid product.

I also like their mobile app because it works really well. This is very important so you can attend to your customers even when you're not at your desk. Most customers want very quick responses and so the mobile app will be very handy when you don't have access to a computer.

There's no issue with deliverability as all our emails and replies went straight to customers' inboxes, which is very critical for this kind of app.

Cons

I found another software that has more features than this app and the pricing is also good. I wish Help Scout will have a feature where you can snooze or schedule an email or reply, and the ability to create embeddable forms. Also, I wish you can connect your social media accounts so you will be able to easily monitor your social media audiences when they message you or when they comment on your posts. These are available on the other software I found and it is a great alternative to this software.

Pros

It makes managing incoming cases feel good - I've tried and seen other tools used primarily for customer support, and none of them were comparable to Help Scout for me.

In Help Scout the entire UI puts the focus on serving the customer right, being light on unnecessary noise. Might sound cheesy, but somehow lets you connect better with the person on the other side of the screen.

Cons

That I had to stop using it recently :( Other than that I didn't really find anything that I disliked there.

Alternatives Considered

Intercom

Reasons for Switching to Help Scout

The entire experience was 10x better in Help Scout :)

Pros

It's reliable, and has most of the functions we need.

Cons

It feels like the ticketing system has now been abandoned as far as new development is concerned. There have been some minor improvements listed for their beacon /messaging widget but little of consequence. As far as I can only the email address passed to their widget is hashed, custom variables are not so bad actors can pass fake or malicious data to support agents. No UK or EU servers.

Pros

Help Scout is purpose-built for Support teams which is fantastic. The features, UI, and reporting align closely with how we run our support team which makes things a lot easier.

We're big on automation and building on top of our tools and have been very impressed both with the workflow capabilities as well as the API endpoints and integrations that are possible.

The team behind Help Scout does a terrific job of supporting us, they have been extremely responsive, down to earth, and accurate in their replies.

Cons

To deliver a really good and consistent experience, the support channels of email, chat, and phone are very discrete and can't be blended as easily together as say a tool like Intercom (where we were coming from).

While a short-term pain for us, I think delivering better in each of the channels ultimately made us a more mature team in the end.

Pros

It was easy to get going and was the first app we used for customer service. It had integration with multiple other apps such as Mailchimp. Supports multiple users.

Cons

It was ticket-oriented, got us into working more with tickets than customers pretty quickly, not because HelpScout but because using tickets and emails for support.

There was no integration with our website, so this was a bummer.

Pros

Super easy to pick up and use and their support was great. They always responded promptly and did their best.

Cons

Compared to other products, it lacks a lot of features and some of what it does have is too simplified.

Pros

HelpScout is really simple to use & has a really clean interface and their customer service is A+++. I am someone who will stay with the company even if they don't have all the bells and whistles if they have excellent customer service, especially something like an email provider because it's hard to find really great customer service in email. I have been using it for over 10 years, & it also is like a database of all of my customer interactions. So I can type in the customers name at the top of the screen and it will pull up every email that they've ever sent in and every email that we've ever sent to them so it becomes this really powerful documentation tool.

Cons

It doesn't have a ticketing system. So it's not so it sometimes it can be easy to miss emails or to have customer service emails go unanswered if a lot of emails come in at once. And a ticketing system and a lot of other email platforms it will bump it up to the top for you if you haven't answered it in a set amount of days but help scout doesn't have a easy way to do that. Even though it does have a knowledge base it's just not as strong in terms of customer service portal as some of the other tools I've explored like fresh desk.

Pros

A robust feature set provided by Help Scout is revolutionizing customer support administration. Its user-friendly interface enables seamless ticket administration, providing effective and well-organized customer contact. Teams can work together on client queries using the software's collaborative inbox, which leads to quicker responses and more customer satisfaction. Help Scout's automation features automate monotonous operations to give support workers more time. Additionally, it offers meaningful insights into customer service effectiveness through its extensive reporting and analytics. Businesses may quickly link their preferred products to Help Scout's vast integration possibilities and design a unique support environment. Overall, Help Scout improves efficiency, streamlines customer support processes, and improves the client experience.

Cons

There are some restrictions to take into account, despite the fact that Help Scout has several advantages. The absence of native phone and chat support tools, which may be essential for enterprises needing real-time client communication, is one downside. Furthermore, learning the sophisticated functions of Help Scout might have a steep learning curve for new users, demanding rigorous onboarding and training. Periodic bugs and poor system performance have been reported by certain users, which can reduce productivity. Last but not least, the pricing structure can be a problem for startups or small firms with tight funds. Help Scout is a top option for customer support management in spite of these shortcomings thanks to its total value and robust feature set.

Pros

The most important feature about helpscout is the tags feature which allow you track tickets better. As well as saved replies and the super friendly user interface

Cons

Helpscout does know allow to add multiple email signatures within the same user and it forces the addition of multiple users.

Pros

It has beautiful and easy-to-use UI and UX. It has been made by amazing professionals already in the customer care space. Help Scout can be brought on to any company scale and proves itself with metric improvements rapidly.

Cons

Help Scout's pricing plans are a little expensive, especially for small businesses or startups.

Pros

They refer to support tickets as conversations, which might not seem like much at first but if you really think about how much you value your customers you will appreciate this verbiage.

They have offline/live chat support pop ups that they call "beacons" and you can have different ones depending on where a customer is at on the page. This was extremely helpful for me as I am selling software so having a beacon on the general website for pre-sales was a must but I also wanted a secondary beacon behind a paywall for premium support and their platform allows for this type of setup.

Lastly, most live chat companies only cater towards just that --- live chat. However, I wanted an all in one solution of live chat + a knowledge base. Help Scout has both available within their platform and it's super simple to setup.

Cons

The only thing I feel they could improve on is more features as far as layout and styling for the knowledge base. It was lacking in that sense but other than that I didn't see anything that I personally needed to be different.

Alternatives Considered

Freshdesk, Crisp, Intercom and Zendesk Suite

Pros

Super easy UI. I don't have to train newbies on using Help Scout for more than 10-15 minutes. It's that simple to use.

VERY customer focused. It's not about a bunch of bells and whistles that are flashy fish hooks only intended to get bought by fishermen but not actually catch fish. Their product signs for the customer and the Support rep in it 8+ hours a day.

Cons

The lack of integrations. They just rolled out with a Salesforce integration, but lack integrations in other areas. Also, they're primarily focused on email so tracking chats and calls aren't that helpful...you would need to drop that data into Redshift, Gooddata, Domo, etc. to get much functionality in it. So unless you do that, you're stuck compiling a bunch in Google Sheets.

Caveat: if all you do is email and maybe chat, then this product is everything you need and more.

Pros

They are super responsive. They are pretty rad and transparent: if something goes wrong on their end they are not afraid of admitting fault. Which leads me to trusting them because I can believe them. I know that tells you very little of the product, but as leadership that's something that I really need. Other environments—blameshifting—I cannot stand and can't trust, believe, or hope that they'll hold true to their promise. We're leaving another vendor for that reason.

Their system is very responsive, quick, simple, and easy to learn. There aren't too many bells and whistles which simplifies my life when onboarding new teammates. Their docs are well written and engaging.

Cons

The vendor is great!

I'd say a better or more thorough live chat & phone integration would be great. We communicate with customers via email, phone, live chat, and Twitter. It's hard when all these are fairly decentralized. Help Scout *does* have a live chat integration (which we use) and we can forward VMs to Help Scout (which is great). But if you're looking for tracking call length, live chat length, or some of the other nifty metrics in one central place, you'll need to use Excel or a Google Sheet. Or use everyone's API to feed into your own system.

Pros

Initial setup is straightforward. We currently only use the ticketing/email feature in HelpScout, so setup and email configuration were complete in less than 10 minutes.

The interface is clean, direct, and getting used to the layout is quick.

We have synced our main Mailbox queue to a private channel in Slack, so each time there's a new ticket is sent there, which is beneficial to keep track of incoming tickets.

Working with HelpScout is simple and straightforward. Currently, we only use the ticketing feature, and it's been a gratifying experience. All the essentials like adding internal notes, tags, tagging other agents, and replying to customers are there.

My favourite feature is the search function, which helps you find that four-week-old ticket you closed a while ago easily just by searching a few keywords that were included in it.

Cons

So far, the only complaint we had was the "next" feature, once you reply to a ticket, the next open ticket assigned to you would pop up immediately, and if you're not careful, you might respond the wrong thing to the customer!

Pros

The software is pretty easy to get setup and using, even if you need to transfer info from another system. It is a very streamlined ticketing system.

Cons

It likes to stop functioning from time to time. You will go to reassign a ticket to someone and it'll take 10 minutes. It usually clears up after a bit, but for them to have just done a price increase for this product with no real enhancements (at least none I've noticed) its odd that this is happening so frequently now. They also made some changes to the reporting which at least made our lives a little more difficult for the type of reporting we were doing.

Pros

Easy to manage accounts, great for keeping records of a clients request, real-time request, great reports, easy to use and adapt. Honestly, I would recommend Help Scout, is a great ticking tool that has helped me reach-out to clients and keep communication rolling with them efficiently.

Cons

I like the software when used on a computer, but the app for a mobile device does lack functionality. I would like to have the same options as I have on the computer. I don't want to be completely demanding so I won't request the high-end gadgets, but the option to see whos working on a ticket on the app will help a lot.

Pros

The customer support is phenomenal! The Help Scout team is personal, friendly, and fun- a pleasure to interact with any time I get the chance. But because the software is so seamless on its own, a rarely have to reach out for support. I most appreciate the reporting features that show conversation rates and customer happiness.

Cons

I would like to be able to export a list of customers I have spoke with over a set time period, so I would be able to automate outreach and followup. As of now, there is no established way to export lists or data.

Pros

The email newsletter.

Cons

How sometimes emails end up being responded to by multiple agents because they aren't automatically closed out.

Pros

A clean UI that has obviously been well thought through. They iterate and add features routinely and are very proactive in communicating with their customers. For example, I had discovered a bug, which they confirmed and rolled out a fix within 48 hours.

There are small reminders and tips presented within the context of the app, which are very helpful (eg. helping the user in distinguishing between an internal comment and a customer reply - this is very useful).

Overall, there is great value for the money, I would strongly recommend Help Scout as a help desk/customer facing communication tool.

Cons

IMAP integration for outgoing e-mail archiving would be highly valued. Only Gmail is supported at this time.

Pros

Help Scout is so user friendly! In the past, we tried several ticketing systems but they didn't seem to fit in with our flow and organization. We heard about Help Scout, tried it, and simply fell in love! Help Scout is so easy to use and work together as a team.

Cons

The one thing I would really like to see in Help Scout is a Round Robin auto-assignment feature. You can do quite a bit with workflows but I wish there was a simple way to Round Robin auto-assign our incoming tickets.

Pros

It's very easy to utilize with multiple members using at the same time. You can always see where other users are and leave comments to each other on specific messages.

Cons

When copying in a new email to an existing chain (or when the HelpScout email is adding to an existing chain), attachments are usually lost and have to be reattached.

Pros

Help Scout allows my team to handle client requests collaboratively and efficiently. The UI makes it easy to view my pending cases, as well as my teammate's cases making it easy to take it over if someone is out of the office.

Cons

I have no cons for Help Scout. All the features and functionality was incredibly well thought out, and it is amazing how helpful it has been for my team.

Pros

I liked the ability to create complex rule sets that auto-filter certain types of conversations to appropriate mailboxes. Without this, there would be a lot of noise experienced by our various internal users

Cons

Not significant, but would be great if users were given a more expansive toolkit for editing copy (fonts, sizes, etc).

Pros

Extremely intuitive and easy to use. Learning to use Help Scout takes very little time at all. I enjoy the overall UI and simplicity.

Cons

Reporting. As my company grows we have found that the reporting isn't as robust as we would like. It is pretty difficult to gain insight on particular customers who are reaching out and volume per account.