Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Cherwell Service Management vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024
 

Categories and Ranking

Cherwell Service Management
Ranking in Help Desk Software
26th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
30th
Average Rating
7.2
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Zendesk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
11th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
9th
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (5th), CRM (21st), Sales Force Automation (7th), Reporting (13th), Knowledge Management Software (2nd), Community Platforms (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2024, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of Cherwell Service Management is 0.5%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 4.2%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

Thobile Moeketsi - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 5, 2022
Having everything in one location has significantly improved our efficiency and reporting
We use the solution for IT service management, it's the key process for recording incidents or problems, and change management. We are customers of Cherwell and I'm an enterprise architect.  Previously, the processes we now use Service Management for, were done manually. Implementing CSM has made…
Ahmed Nassar - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 17, 2023
Stable tool, making it reliable for handling tasks but difficult initial setup
It has a huge problem regarding the price. The price increases every year. Every year, they raise the price of the licenses, which makes a lot of limitations, and you have to pay more. So that's some conditions. Actually, most of the companies that use Zendesk need a customer experience or customer care department. However, Zendesk only works with chatbox or emailing services, but it can also use Genesys, VoIP, or voice sensors. Additionally, Zendesk needs the administration panels to be easier because it's a very complex panel. You need to search for a lot of things to do, like a small job. So you have to do a lot of setup regarding the integration, and it's a little bit challenging to integrate any software in the vendor.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"The dashboard and the reporting functionality are the solution's most valuable features."
"Its integration features, orchestration features, and discovery tools are the most valuable. It is also pretty stable, and it can be as scalable as you want."
"All our activities are carried out in the one place."
"Clear processes with transparent responsibilities led to more efficiencies within the teams."
"The dashboard is very useful to get a quick overview of current tasks."
"Zendesk Support has a lot of good APIs."
"I found the user experience with vendors on Zendesk to be straightforward, especially when it comes to understanding and searching for specific tickets. The search and navigation tools are easy to use, and I haven't encountered any issues with delays or communication gaps in ticket resolutions."
"The most valuable feature is the trackability of incoming requests. The system keeps a comprehensive history of work requests, making it a useful tool for our internal processes."
"It has good management, the ability to sign tickets based on content, the multi-channel support, the self service portal, the integration with Salesforce, the setup process, and the product features as we are currently using them."
"One of the most valuable features is that Zendesk gives you a lot of configurability, and a lot of leeway in terms of customizing the look and theme. Zendesk offers you the facility to design your own landing page, as well as the look and feel of the entire knowledge base. At the same time, they offer themes that you can simply purchase and implement. Either way, it can really be turned into the right look and feel of the knowledge base required by our company, which is very important—if you have a bland-looking page, most of the time, people will lose interest. Zendesk also allows you to test the customizations before you publish it. It gives you a sandbox location where you can test everything new that you're trying to create and publish, which is very interesting."
"The initial setup is simple and straightforward."
"The feature to move over my customer experience team tickets for different specialists is very valuable for my team."
"It's a very stable tool, very powerful."
 

Cons

"Application service mapping, GRC, SecOps, and things like that need improvement."
"Access is only available if we're on VPN."
"Areas for improvement would be the service catalog and customer catalog, which is not very user-friendly. The shopping cart experience is also terrible - you submit and go straight to the cart, you can't continue shopping or see your overall cost."
"The stability, specifically in the on-premises deployment model, could be improved."
"One of the drawbacks of Zendesk is that it doesn't provide a secure way for us to send data. So, we usually use a secure SharePoint folder link. We put that in the Zendesk ticket so that the requester has a secure way of getting to their data."
"Zendesk's stability on inbound calls could be improved as compared to Talkdesk."
"The data you get when logged in to Zendesk Support differs from the data you get when you programmatically query Zendesk Support through its API because of a sync time delay."
"The solution could integrate better with QR codes from some websites such as Facebook."
"There is always a network issue with Zendesk. But we don’t know whether it is managed. The network issue is that when I call, it does not let us."
"You couldn't give administrative access to new hires."
"The support team is time-consuming, and they don't find the answer to our problem."
"Zendesk Guide's customization could be improved. I would like it to be easier and maybe open-sourced, so that if you have a developer in your company, you can do it yourself. Right now, that isn't allowed, so you need to have it done via the integrator. Another improvement—this is nit-picking—is that it could be less easy to make changes. Some things are so easy that they sometimes look a little amateur-ish. Most of the templates are built-in so they can be used directly, so they are very simple."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For an ITIL user, the cost is probably about 50 bucks a month."
"From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive."
"There are different plans that are offered. We are using the entry-level plan. The overall price of the solution should be reduced. The price is too high."
"You have to pay extra for better support. So it's not only the license that you pay for, but you have to pay extra for the support as well."
"Zendesk's licensing is not cheap. For Enterprise, we are paying $200 per agent. It's a per-month cost, so it's pretty steep. There are some services you need to pay extra for. For example, with Zendesk Guide, we had to buy the most expensive offering in order to get Multibrand and everything. We also had to pay a lot of money for themes."
"The price is very competitive."
"We pay for the solution on a yearly basis and my understanding is that the cost is about $30,000. That's the cost for 24 to 25 agents."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Help Desk Software solutions are best for your needs.
814,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
62%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
5%
Healthcare Company
3%
Computer Software Company
22%
Educational Organization
11%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What do you like most about Zendesk Support?
I found the user experience with vendors on Zendesk to be straightforward, especially when it comes to understanding and searching for specific tickets. The search and navigation tools are easy to ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive. One of the reasons for shifting from Zendesk to Talkdesk was cost efficiency.
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
Sometimes, the calls do not record, and your conversation is cut midway. When you want to do a call calibration, you realize that the call is incomplete. Zendesk's stability on inbound calls could ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Ausenco, Highlights for Children, B/E Aerospace
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about Cherwell Service Management vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: October 2024.
814,649 professionals have used our research since 2012.