Desk.com (discontinued) vs. Kustomer

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Desk.com (discontinued)
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Desk.com was a helpdesk, ticketing, and customer support product offered by Salesforce, and oriented towards the needs of small businesses. It is no longer sold and support has been discontinued. Salesforce recommends its modern Service Cloud as a replacement.N/A
Kustomer
Score 7.7 out of 10
N/A
Kustomer is a customer service CRM platform built for managing high support volume by optimizing experiences throughout the customer service journey. Kustomer was acquired by Facebook in late 2020, but spun out in 2023 and re-launched as an independent entity, Kustomer, LLC.
$89
per month per user
Pricing
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Enterprise
$89
per month, per user
Ultimate
$139
per month, per user
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsAll plans require an annual subscription and 8 users minimum.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Considered Both Products
Desk.com (discontinued)
Chose Desk.com (discontinued)
Desk.com and Salesforce Service Cloud can be very easily implemented, administered, and scaled across support teams within the organization. It is truly an industry gold standard as it has a lot of great out-of-the-box functionality and does not require as much customization …
Kustomer
Chose Kustomer
The support we get with Kustomer is light years ahead. I was not an admin at the time we had Desk.com, but from a users point of view, Kustomer is a lot easier to use and much more intuitive.
Chose Kustomer
The UI of Kustomer is a lot cooler than what we are using before. There are a lot of features that Kustomer has that make things easier and more convenient than Desk.com.
Chose Kustomer
I've used Desk and other platforms in the past and none of them are as interactive or user friendly as Kustomer.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Desk.com (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Kustomer
8.6
17 Ratings
9% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets00 Ratings9.116 Ratings
Expert directory00 Ratings8.314 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications00 Ratings8.513 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation00 Ratings8.013 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission00 Ratings8.417 Ratings
Ticket response00 Ratings9.217 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Desk.com (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Kustomer
7.3
13 Ratings
6% below category average
External knowledge base00 Ratings8.213 Ratings
Internal knowledge base00 Ratings6.413 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Desk.com (discontinued)
-
Ratings
Kustomer
8.6
17 Ratings
12% above category average
Customer portal00 Ratings8.611 Ratings
IVR00 Ratings8.310 Ratings
Social integration00 Ratings7.614 Ratings
Email support00 Ratings9.217 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration00 Ratings9.212 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Small Businesses
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Likelihood to Recommend
8.2
(38 ratings)
9.0
(38 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.4
(14 ratings)
7.9
(2 ratings)
Usability
8.3
(19 ratings)
8.4
(4 ratings)
Availability
1.0
(2 ratings)
9.1
(2 ratings)
Performance
10.0
(1 ratings)
6.4
(2 ratings)
Support Rating
8.2
(21 ratings)
9.9
(7 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
7.6
(2 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
8.3
(2 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(1 ratings)
7.9
(2 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
7.9
(2 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
7.2
(2 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
8.7
(2 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
Desk.com (discontinued)Kustomer
Likelihood to Recommend
Discontinued Products
Once I had to search the logs to find cases and data on a particular keyword, but I was not able to do so as there was no search tool available, nor was there a sort or filter tool. I was totally frustrated as I had to skim through the data to complete my task manually.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
I would say the greatest strength of Kustomer is its flexibility. In the hands of a skilled admin, it can be adapted to tons and tons of different use cases. I've been able to make custom displays for different groups of agents, produce complex cross sections of users, draw interesting data relationships combining marketing contacts and customer-initiated contacts. For example, there's really no other data source in our company which could tell you which users received a specific promo code and checked out with it, received their delivery within 14 days and then can related that to the number of times they contacted us about using our product. At the intersection of communication, marketing, data, and relationship-management, Kustomer shines at the center. I would say it falls short when you are trying to coordinate multiple "side conversations" with multiple sources to resolve an issue. This is a tough task for any type of platform, but if you're maintaining 3 different email chains with a 3PL partner, the customer, and a separate internal conversation, it would be confusing anyway!
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Pros
Discontinued Products
  • Desk.com automatically tracks analytics on all cases coming in and going out.
  • Desk.com helps prevent multiple people from working on the same case. However, it does allow us to assign the case to someone else if we feel that person is more qualified to address the case.
  • Desk.com has very few bugs or server issues that we've seen. This helps prevent any delays in communicating with our customers.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
  • All customer data (past orders, communication with customer service, rewards account data) is in one place. This helps agents avoid confusion and reduces the number of tabs they need to open.
  • The Knowledge Base (or K Base) is very helpful. Any time we roll out a new policy or have a limited-time promotion, we can add all the relevant information and worksheets there for the convenience of the agents. That way they can stay in a chat while looking up the answer to a question.
  • We can seamlessly move from chat into email if the customer leaves or the queue times are too long. All the interactions will stay on the customer profile page, so they are kept up to date.
Read full review
Cons
Discontinued Products
  • Internal knowledge tools are clunky and annoying to access, outside the regular workflow of everyday staff
  • Arbitrary and confusing limitations in business rules and custom fields
  • Arbitrary and confusing limitations in case handling - for example, if you begin a case as a phone call you CANNOT email the customer from the case. As though no one working at Desk has ever sent a follow-up email...?
  • Not very good for B2B, mid-to-large businesses. Difficult to set business rules based on company information (for example, service level/tier) and nearly impossible to track key stakeholders and get clear insight into the relationship at a high level
  • Reporting tools are clunky, slow, and just all-around pretty useless
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
  • Small chat window--maybe the ability to chat in real-time with the person who received your ticket would help.
  • Different teams could have differently colored notes.
  • The notification bell could be a bit bigger. It's hard to keep track sometimes, when a lot of notes pile on.
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Likelihood to Renew
Discontinued Products
We will be very likely to renew our contract with Desk.com. It is easy to use, and provides us with everything we need to keep our customers and employees happy. They have also been very helpful in catering the application to our specific and unique needs, including working across brands and adding specific content for our products
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Kustomer, LLC
I believe at this time, Kustomer is doing a good job. I really love its functionality at the moment.
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Usability
Discontinued Products
Desk.com and Salesforce Service Cloud's usability is seamless to get up and running, administer, and scale across the organization. It allows us to get up and running in days rather than weeks and has transformed our customer support teams globally into efficient, world-class teams. The best practices that the Salesforce and Desk.com teams provide are also very valuable, as we have the right case studies and tips to implement right away in our organization.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
There is a learning curve, but it is more than worth it, especially to have a dedicated resource pointed at Kustomer and any other software it interacts with. The basic implementation is useful, and powerful - certainly a MASSIVE upgrade over taking care of your customers in an email inbox or shuffling between multiple windows and applications! It is also set up really well to grow and reconfigure with your business. I'm a big fan.
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Reliability and Availability
Discontinued Products
We've never had a problem with Desk.com's availability.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
I gave it a 10 rating because it is very helpful and the availability is there when needed. I have never had issues with application errors or unplanned outages so far.
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Performance
Discontinued Products
Fast, responsive, gorgeous, and fun. It's always run like a thoroughbred for me.
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Kustomer, LLC
Kustomer Performances need improvement. The pages do load very slowly but that might be because of the information they carry. If Kustomer integrates with other software or systems it does slow the performance. They need to find a solution to this.
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Support Rating
Discontinued Products
Their support leaves much to be desired. They do not respond quickly and do not follow up with feature requests. There is also a lack of on-demand or live training available for the teams to use as they learn a new tool. Because there is so much customization, a lot of questions do come up regularly.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
I did not reach out to Kustomer support when we had an issue. Still, whenever we provide feedback to our manager regarding what can improve based on our experience using Kustomer, our manager always comments that Kustomer support always replies with some positive feedback based on our suggestions.
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In-Person Training
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Kustomer, LLC
Because they are very hands-on in training us and very approachable
Read full review
Online Training
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Kustomer, LLC
The best training I did was online. Videos teach as well as explain how everything works and what Kustomer's functions are.
Read full review
Implementation Rating
Discontinued Products
As I stated earlier, implementation of Desk.com went more smoothly than most. The resources in the "Support Center" are fantastic, and I never ran into anything that left me stumped, angry, or disappointed.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
Nothing really because it is easy to use. After an hour of using it, we're already getting the hang of it.
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Alternatives Considered
Discontinued Products
Overall, it performs a lot better than all three combined, with a lot fewer glitches and a lot more user-friendly and user experience efficiency. Any new link that needs to be done, takes a lot less time to execute on desk compared to the three others. Simply advanced when it comes to execution this platform is.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
Apps like Intercom, Zendesk, and Gorgios all treat customer inquiries as tickets, just tracking that one issue or interaction with a customer. Kustomer treats each customer as an individual, which allows us to provide top-notch customer service. Customers love that we're able to be more conversational and informal, while still solving their issues quickly. It also helps us build relationships with customers and increases repeat orders.
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Scalability
Discontinued Products
No answers on this topic
Kustomer, LLC
Because customer is flexible and scalable
Read full review
Return on Investment
Discontinued Products
  • Better customer service and employee efficiency when dealing with cases
  • It's so universal, meaning that everyone can use it and it's easy to understand.
  • The only negative impact is that our IT department who is assigned tickets has responded to customers instead of to the local reps and we have to ensure they know to change the email if it's assigned to them.
Read full review
Kustomer, LLC
  • We’re getting so much positive feedback — which is not something you traditionally associate with a customer care team — because we’re making it effortless for customers to deliver both positive and negative feedback, and we can now resolve the bad feedback really really quickly.
  • Primarily from our increased efficiency with Kustomer, we’ve seen a significant reduction of $3 to $4 for every cost per contact.
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ScreenShots

Desk.com (discontinued) Screenshots

Screenshot of Desk.com ConsoleScreenshot of Desk.com Issue ScreenScreenshot of Desk.com Reporting and Analytics

Kustomer Screenshots

Screenshot of Example of a customer profile within Kustomer.Screenshot of Example of how Kustomer’s automated chats can save agents time by handling less complex requests automatically.