Helpdesk software: Kayako vs Deskpro

[ajaychadha]

I personally recommend Kayako over DeskPro however I'd suggest you to take a look at Vision Helpdesk software too. I'm sure you'd like it once you try their online demo.

[ajaychadha]

We would use mainly the searchable knowledge base, support tickets and desktop notifier for staff. We will not use live support. The site is a high traffic site, with many support questions per hour.

If you main requirement is searchable knowledge-base & support tickets then I'd also suggest you to search for a 'knowledge base script' that has trouble tickets system built-in and can intelligently display relevant knowledge-base articles/solutions to customers via 'submit ticket' page in real time so that they do not submit tickets for issues that are already resolved and find the solution immediately via knowledge-base suggestions.

[ManagerJosh]

I personally recommend Kayako over DeskPro

Would you care to elaborate why?

[Alfa1]

ajaychadha is banned.

[TheComputerGuy]

I'm going to pickup a used copy of Kayako, esupport. It has unlimited seats right now, unlike DeskPro. I looked into it, and that is a big issue for me as I grow. Deskpro starts at 195ish and Kayako is 199ish.

Sounds like a better deal to me.

[Alfa1]

I would be highly interested to read your integration experience.

[Jamie Edwards]

WebHostingTalk does this, though for some odd reason, they've stuck to Kayako v2.x

WHT use eSupport v3: http://helpdesk.webhostingtalk.com

[Shamil.]

WHT use eSupport v3: http://helpdesk.webhostingtalk.com

They must have upgraded recently.

[Alfa1]

Disclaimer: I am currently the lead DeskPRO developer. I saw your thread and decided to elaborate on the kind of vBulletin integration the product has to offer.

There are three main points of integration:

1) Authentication. Users from your vBulletin forum can log in with the same username and password in DeskPRO. When the user updates his email address or password, the changes are reflected within DeskPRO automatically.

Note that DeskPRO also supports multiple user sources simultaneously. That means you could potentially add multiple forums, or just about any other user database, to the same helpdesk. Then users from every source can use their favorite login credentials. If a user happens to be members of multiple databases, DeskPRO is able to properly "link" multiple accounts together to keep things organized.

2) DeskPRO is able to read the vBulletin session cookie if your helpdesk is on the same domain as your forum. When a session cookie is detected, the user is automatically logged in on your helpdesk -- creating a seamless browsing experience.

3) DeskPRO provides a simple vB plugin that allows you to easily wrap your forum style with a DeskPRO wrapper. This essentially just wraps the vBulletin page with the standard DeskPRO page with the header (links to the knowledgebase, ask a question etc).

I'll refrain from posting any opinions on the two softwares since obviously I'll be a little bias But if you have any further questions, email [email protected] and I'll be happy to answer them.

Does DeskPRO have any plans to extend the vbulletin integration? Especially in regard to vbulletin moderation/post reports.
Please consider the questions in my post here:

We would use mainly the searchable knowledge base, support tickets and desktop notifier for staff. We will not use live support.
The site is a high traffic site, with many support questions per hour. Due to the diversity of ways they currently come in (email, VM, PM, contact form, forum) and that its scattered to all staff members, its hard to say how often users will be submitting per hour.

Thanks for the information above. Its very helpful.

Does any of the two have vb usergroup integration / permissions?

Optimally users first need to search for their question in the knowledge base, before they can open a support ticket. And that after a non-successful search users get redirected to other support options, like opening a ticket.
I see that if a user searches the knowledge-base and doesn't find what the user is looking for, only Kayako shows a link to the ticket system. I assume this can easily be added in Deskpro?
If submitting a ticket in Kayako, the question is first searched in the knowledge base.

It seems that none of the two systems can be wrapped within vbulletin's style.
Is it possible for kayako or deskpro to easily go from a support ticket to the member profile. How?

It's too bad that neither of the applications is able to alert staff about vb post reports or to integrate the report system with a ticket system. Does anyone have ideas on this? vbulletin post reports are an important form of support requests.

Disclaimer: I am part of Kayako

Alfa,

You contacted me asking to contribute to this thread and answer your questions.

In that case, you'll probably be looking at Kayako eSupport.

How many is "many"? There are Kayako support desks with very high volumes of messages - even hundreds per hour.

Hundreds an hour sounds good. Hopefully we wont hit any such amount in the next years.

wrapping your own forum template around Kayako using Kayako's templating system (much like vBulletin's)

Can you show me an example where this is done?
Are there step by step instructions how to do this?

The only direct integration provided between Kayako and vBulletin is "LoginShare". This lets your users login to your support desk using their vBulletin username and password. Beyond wrapping your own forum template around Kayako using Kayako's templating system (much like vBulletin's), there is no other integration at present.

We have hundreds of customers who use Kayako as their forum support desk. They pull in post reports using e-mail integration. Kayako can poll e-mail from any POP3 or IMAP e-mail box.

You could set post reports to go to [email protected], and tell Kayako to poll that mailbox for new e-mails (which includes post reports). It will then convert those e-mails into tickets (or if the e-mails are replies to existing tickets, append them to the existing tickets).

Does Kayako have any plans to offer more vbulletin integration? vbulletin has 100.000 installs, so more integration would likely be beneficial to kayako and vbulletin.

I am not entirely comfortable with using the vBulletin forum to plug our own software - so if you have any other Kayako questions, you may do well to create a thread on Kayako's own forum, or e-mail [email protected]

I have requested the vbulletin staff to review this thread. If they find anything wrong with it, I assume they will either alert me or post in this thread. The rules of vbulletin.com prohibit spam, but describe "we are quite happy to have constructive comparative conversations about competitor's products, we will not tolerate blatant adverts".
This thread is not meant to advertise any product, but merely to inform about how well the functionality of these products and vbulletin work together. Your post is strictly informational. vbulletin.com has a very high number of such informative threads that discuss commercial products.

[Alfa1]

I am not entirely comfortable with using the vBulletin forum to plug our own software

Wayne Luke has confirmed that this thread is fine and there is no problem with representatives informing us about Kayako or DeskPRO.

[Jamie Edwards]

Can you show me an example where this is done?

Several customers have responded to this blog post of ours with links to their cosmetically customised support desks: http://blog.kayako.com/2009/03/is-yo...-like-to-know/

Are there step by step instructions how to do this?

No, because every website will be different and will require slightly different methods of wrapping a template/design around Kayako SupportSuite's templates. Kayako SupportSuite uses a template system almost identical to vBulletin's own - so much of your work will presumably be in editing the header and footer templates.

Does Kayako have any plans to offer more vbulletin integration? vbulletin has 100.000 installs, so more integration would likely be beneficial to kayako and vbulletin.

At present, no. However, a community developer or third party may decide to further develop the integration in the future.


Hope this helps!

[Alfa1]

It seems that though both desktop pro as kayako have a desktop client / notifier, but neither of them works on linux or mac. Is this correct?

[Floris]

I voted for http://DeskPro.com

[Mr. Mikey]

i voted deskpro

[Makc666]

Kayako is the best helpdesk software!

We use Kayako. And it is nicely integrated with vBulletin.

When I look at Deskpro I see that they really "use" many ideas from Kayako.

Kayako has a nice API you can use to integrate it with anything you like.
www.craigbrasssystems.com/forum/topic/56-details-and-download/

Also Kayako has a great support! I was amassed with it. Hope vBulletin will have some thing near it one day!