Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager) vs. Zendesk Suite

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
Score 9.1 out of 10
N/A
Call Manager is a unified call control center from Cisco that supports enterprise collaboration functions across the spectrum of IP telephony, video & web conferencing, and messaging. Features include call forwarding, call back, call transfer, ad hoc conferencing, and call park.N/A
Zendesk Suite
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Zendesk is a customer support solution with built-in ticketing, conversational messaging, and live chat, designed to help businesses of all sizes and industries deliver personalized service at scale. Zendesk's AI agents are trained in CX to help Service teams resolve customer issues faster and more accurately while still providing a human-centered experience. Zendesk ultimately aims to help businesses improve time to value, reduce effort per ticket, and keep costs low.
$69
per month per agent
Pricing
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Suite Team
$69
per month per agent
Suite Growth
$115
per month per agent
Suite Professional
$149
per month per agent
Suite Enterprise
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional DetailsMust contact sales team for pricing20% discount available with annual pricing.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Features
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Cloud PBX
Comparison of Cloud PBX features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
7.6
43 Ratings
6% below category average
Zendesk Suite
-
Ratings
Hosted PBX9.522 Ratings00 Ratings
Multi-level Interactive Voice Response (IVR)5.631 Ratings00 Ratings
User templates6.941 Ratings00 Ratings
Call reports6.940 Ratings00 Ratings
Directory of employee names9.141 Ratings00 Ratings
Call Management
Comparison of Call Management features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
8.1
46 Ratings
3% below category average
Zendesk Suite
-
Ratings
Answering rules9.344 Ratings00 Ratings
Call recording5.528 Ratings00 Ratings
Call park9.340 Ratings00 Ratings
Call screening8.837 Ratings00 Ratings
Message alerts7.640 Ratings00 Ratings
VoIP system collaboration
Comparison of VoIP system collaboration features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
9.0
42 Ratings
12% above category average
Zendesk Suite
-
Ratings
Video conferencing9.232 Ratings00 Ratings
Audio conferencing9.142 Ratings00 Ratings
Video screen sharing8.317 Ratings00 Ratings
Instant messaging9.220 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile apps
Comparison of Mobile apps features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
7.2
26 Ratings
11% below category average
Zendesk Suite
-
Ratings
Mobile app for iOS7.026 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile app for Android7.324 Ratings00 Ratings
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.7
160 Ratings
6% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets00 Ratings9.2159 Ratings
Expert directory00 Ratings8.0108 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications00 Ratings8.3111 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation00 Ratings8.4110 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission00 Ratings9.3159 Ratings
Ticket response00 Ratings9.2158 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.5
145 Ratings
6% above category average
External knowledge base00 Ratings8.4139 Ratings
Internal knowledge base00 Ratings8.5132 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.6
155 Ratings
8% above category average
Customer portal00 Ratings8.8126 Ratings
IVR00 Ratings8.562 Ratings
Social integration00 Ratings7.9102 Ratings
Email support00 Ratings9.2152 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration00 Ratings8.8117 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Small Businesses
CloudTalk
CloudTalk
Score 8.4 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
CloudTalk
CloudTalk
Score 8.4 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Cisco Business Edition 7000 (discontinued)
Cisco Business Edition 7000 (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
SysAid
SysAid
Score 8.9 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
8.6
(47 ratings)
9.0
(198 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(2 ratings)
10.0
(43 ratings)
Usability
9.3
(7 ratings)
8.7
(71 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(14 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(11 ratings)
Support Rating
8.0
(14 ratings)
6.0
(31 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
6.4
(10 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
9.1
(19 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(4 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Professional Services
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Call Manager)Zendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
Cisco
Cisco Unified Communications Manager is suited for medium to large customers who are in search for a solid call control platform with added security in mind. Cisco Unified Communications Manager also supports receptions, small groups and also a mini contact center type of set up with its Hunt Group, Pick up Group and call queuing facilities and also with set up of music on hold function while calls queuing.
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Zendesk
One specific thing I love about Zendesk Suite lately is the ability to use AI "Enhance writing" it allows me to freehand a response and then have it help me sound more formal or friendly, this is very useful, not only for those free handed ones, but also when you need to repeat the same information to a customer, it can help you make it sound slightly different. I don't like that when a ticket comes, even if you have the shortcut to toggle between chat and email, it doesn't actually toggle.
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Pros
Cisco
  • This solution is extremely stable and has been running in our environment for several years without (unscheduled) downtime.
  • The ability to have voicemails automatically sent as an email message is extremely helpful in helping us to keep in touch while away from the desk.
  • The Call Manager provides us very granular settings to route our calls as we want.
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Zendesk
  • UI/UX; mature macros and automations, slick and well thought out UI.
  • Reporting, reporting, reporting. With user, org, and ticket level tags, we can track every aspect of our ticket flow.
  • Extensibility; the app marketplace is a great resource for expanding functionality from the baseline offering.
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Cons
Cisco
  • Administration web page is little bit hard to understand at the beginning specially if you are not familiar with naming convention and GU Interfaces.
  • Call Detail Record interface is fine but would be desirable to include more options that fit organization needs in terms of reporting purposes.
  • Self Care Portal interface could be more useful to the end user if it includes options to manage some features without administrators involving.
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Zendesk
  • The development of messaging out of the earlier Chat module is clunky and still has limitations for multi language flows.
  • When creating queries in Explore, you can't search for 'or' conditions, only 'And', meaning you have to build multiple queries and manually add them.
  • You can't download the charts in the reports, they come down as tables and then you have to make your own charts.
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Likelihood to Renew
Cisco
We have been using this product for 20+ years and will continue too. This is a great product and new features are always coming out.
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Zendesk
Zendesk is an amazing tool for communicating with your customers easily. The communication tickets from sellers to us or from us to sellers are stored, and there are statuses used to make communication easy. We have internal conversations between departments, linked with useful software such as Zingtree, Talkdesk, and Webs.
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Usability
Cisco
The usability part of Cisco Unified Communications Manager is very much simple from a usability point of view. Day-to-day Move Add Change Delete (MACD) can be performed by the administrators very easily with simple training. From the initial deployment point of view, some of the thing can be improved to simplify the process.
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Zendesk
Zendesk Suite is a straightforward solution that provides agents with everything they need on the same screen. Allowing an agent to navigate one tab, one screen and switch between features, pin favorite features while viewing the customer profile and details in 360degrees. A view like this empowers agents to support customers better and in a more composed state.
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Reliability and Availability
Cisco
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
In the past year, I'd say I have only noticed maybe two hours total of downtime in my own usage. Very minimal.
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Performance
Cisco
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
There has been minor performance degradation on a very few days out of the two years I have been using the product.
Read full review
Support Rating
Cisco
CUCM is supported by most third-party vendors for related products, so it makes finding solutions to specific needs easy. Also Cisco TAC is very knowledgeable, and we have never run into a problem they have not been able to resolve. Usually they are resolved without the need to escalate tickers either.
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Zendesk
We rarely need to contact their support team, but when we do they are responsive. However there have been notable times when communication between myself and the support rep was challenging despite me providing clear explanation of the issue, screenshots, and a thorough explanation of the goal we hope to achieve. It took several back and forth attempt, on a few occasions, to get resolution on an otherwise simple request
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Online Training
Cisco
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
Zendesk has tons of available material for training - videos, webinars, articles, etc. The only reason this is not a 10 is because it can be hard to figure out how to navigate to these things and find what you are looking for.
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Implementation Rating
Cisco
This was the first phone system we implemented that could span multiple locations. We were very satisfied once fully implemented
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Zendesk
I was very satisfied. They have a free trial for 30 days and I recommend you do that and use it. It is very easy to get started with the basics and the build on over time.

The only thing technically complex was single sign-on and integration to Salesforce.com required some tweaks – otherwise setting up system was very easy
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Alternatives Considered
Cisco
We have been a Cisco based shop and have looked at other cloud voice options such as MS Teams pbx, and others, but ultimately, the features, endpoints, and reliability of Cisco has been the common factor in staying with them as our voice provider. Their integrations, room systems, and hybrid design allows for us to be flexible and keep a high up time vs reliance on 100% cloud.
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Zendesk
Zendesk Suite is exceptionally user friendly and highly customisable. Free training for all levels and roles of users which is easy to follow and engaging for users is particularly helpful along with the added support behind the scenes from Zendesk support and the Zendesk community is second to none.
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Scalability
Cisco
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
WHY we will use Zendesk in HR and PD internally
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Return on Investment
Cisco
  • Communication and collaboration - Our offices are able to communicate both internally and externally due to this system.
  • Down time - Struggles with CUCM has caused a lot of down time due to the instability of the system.
  • High Costs - the cost of both the license and the maintenance was much higher than other systems.
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Zendesk
  • We have been able to deliver IT accurately and onetime
  • Our customers have been able to provide feedback on a given ticket and helped us build a better support structure
  • Zendesk Suite has allowed us to be more efficient in our every day operations
Read full review
ScreenShots

Zendesk Suite Screenshots

Screenshot of the Zendesk Agent WorkspaceScreenshot of Omnichannel MessagingScreenshot of Zendesk TicketingScreenshot of Bots powered by Zendesk AIScreenshot of Tone shift with Zendesk AIScreenshot of Zendesk ticketing side conversations