About LiveAgent
Highlighting the benefits
Satisfied users describe LiveAgent as the ultimate all-in-one customer support solution, and there is a good reason to agree with them. LiveAgent scores high on every platform it appears on, and the innovation efforts of the team behind the wheel pay off. To be more precise, Live Agent enables users to interact with their customers with a new level of flexibility, integrating a knowledge base to help agents solve issues much faster and more efficiently than before.In addition, email addresses are no longer required, which eliminates the spam bot problem. Instead, they are wisely replaced with contact forms to deliver one of the best helpdesk experiences users have ever tried. Let’s take a closer look at how LiveAgent makes business easier:Advantages in ticketing
To facilitate the process of issue tracking, responding and overall managing, LiveAgent brings in the universal inbox. Things are going up as this is a single place for emails, chat conversations, calls, tickets from Facebook and Twitter, forum posts, and the like.A hybrid ticket stream adds up to the productivity of your team. Despite the communication channel, the tickets are always in the same structure. You may get a chat or voice messages, emails, feedback forms, and messages from Facebook or/and Twitter in a single hybrid ticket and keep the pulse of any updates for delivering a quality support service.Your support agents are different - some of them can handle more tickets, and others can manage less. LiveAgent brings in an automated ticket distribution that helps you to set a balanced workload for all agents. Here are also helpful options to improve the support agents' productivity:- to solve button feature allows the admin to choose whether the agent will work with the “All tickets” list or handle the tickets from “To solve button,”
- responsibility is an option to set or change the ticket ownership so each ticket will have a responsible-for agent
- agent collision detection to show who is viewing a ticket and exclude responses from two agents on the same issue
- agent ranking option will show how helpful were each of your support agents to deal with the poor service quality.
Ticket management and ticket view in LiveAgent. Source: LiveAgent
Some companies look for a ticket routing option. If you need this one too, the vendor provides departments feature. You can set filters and routing rules for specific preferences so the tickets get solved by the right agents in a most efficient manner. It delivers a quick view of new, open and fixed queries in every department.Another bundle of features to facilitate the support team routine includes mass actions (fast resolve, transfer or delete of multiple tickets,) merge and split tickets, email templates (can be formatted in HTML, plain text or with WYSIWYG editor,) macros (canned responses,) predefined answers (for making responses to repetitive queries personal.)Benefits offered by live chat
The modern technologies pairing with live chat apps help to help customers before they ask for help. LiveAgent has a built-in chat that works as live chat and internal chat too. The app can be customized in terms of- window position on the website
- chat buttons, styles and animations
- proactive invitations to chat
A built-in live chat in LiveAgent. Source: LiveAgent
The options of chat overview and online visitors help your support service team to see what pages the customers are browsing and collect the referrers, IP addresses or country (due to embedded Google Analytics.) That provides the background for initiating a chat with a customer and boost the purchase possibility.The built-in live chat app has a distribution option (round robin, ring to all, or max utilization), max queue length (works as an offline button if there way too many customers awaited,) and history with filtering capabilities (to see data according to your preferences.)Call center strong side
With LiveAgent, you receive actionable tools that help to work your call center in an organized way. Get in touch with customers via phone or PC to PC calls. There are no additional expenses on the phones, and you can use softphones or receive calls directly on the computer. On the plus side, you also can get a 1-800 number for your service.For more personal service, you can use browser-based video chats, so there is no third-party app integration or software installation. The added benefit is IVR (Interactive Voice Response) online designer. You don’t need any level of technical mastery to design your own IVR trees.A calls history organization in LiveAgent call center. Source: LiveAgent
The calls can be routed automatedly due to the priority, as well as assigned randomly. There is also unlimited recording options for legal or learning purposes.Valuable things in reporting
The collecting and analyzing data play an essential role in workflows, performance and strategy improvements. Yet too many reports may leave you with the feeling that you are lost. LiveAgent reporting delivers options to gather insights from the key areas such as performance, department, tag, time, agent (each one separately) and agent availability, channel, SLA log and compliance reports.Statistics and leaderboard in the reporting view. Source: LiveAgent
These are depicted in the analytics overview shows all the customer interactions, services they receive and statics on the help desk platform usage. Also, you get the agent overview to see who of the support reps were rewarded and rebuked by the customers' comments. That may serve as a resource for:- identifying the weak spots in the customer service
- rewarding the great performing agents
- encouraging and helping those who underachieved the goals.
Reduce the cost and workload with a customer portal
Self-support portal proves to be a win-win feature for:- customers who can get the answer to their question in the FAQ section or on the forum,
- support agents who get reduced workload from the repetitive requests, and
- the business which cuts the expenses cuts the expenses.
Customer portals overview in LiveAgent. Source: LiveAgent
As a customer-focused vendor, LiveAgent offers a customer portal with a range of customizations available. The knowledge base may contain the categories of your products or services, customer’s feedbacks, forum messages, as well you can create search widgets and set where it is the most useful.Are you run a few products or brands? In LiveAgent, you create separate customer portals with unique style and content.Gamification to keep the motivation levels
The job of a support agent is exciting and stressful, and you need to energize the team with motivation to perform great (and even better). LiveAgent makes happen with the gamification feature. There are a set of standard badges (that can be customized anytime) and leaderboards (which are corresponding to the activities) to keep track of best performance and encourage healthy motivation.Gamification option with the ability to view team statistics, badges, and levels. Source: LiveAgent
The mechanism works a bit funny than school stickers. The badges are received nearly on a daily basis - according to specific rules or conditions, while the levels are taking more time to be earned.A whole new level of Client Engagement
Setup is fast and simplified as much as possible to allow users to reach and engage their current and prospective clients and interact with them in real-time. Consequently, LiveAgent can help each brand become more reliable and trustworthy and gain customers based on its excellent reputation.Unified Storage
LiveAgent provides users with a universal, all-in-one inbox, made incredibly simple to handle even by the company’s least savvy users. Whereas somebody could argue that contact forms and one-stop-shop inboxes are not such rare diamonds, this one made a step ahead to simplify sending and storing tickets and requests automatically so that none of them would be lost. On top of that, LiveAgent’s inbox does a pretty good job of responding to requests and managing those responses, as all information is stored in the system and can be used for evaluation.It offers reliable support
LiveAgent delivers support impeccably even without a chat operator online, using a specially designed customer portal where users can get the information they need. As an agent, you won’t have trouble reviewing the tickets afterward, as all data will be saved and categorized for your needs. LiveAgent doesn’t stop here: it is full of fantastic chat and management features that will help you give customers a hand even when they are unfamiliar with their problems.It’s effective in handling queries
The fascinating aspect of LiveAgent is how it can handle many queries without maintaining a large team to support its work. In fact, small teams and businesses are where LiveAgent has been most solicited and successful, as it does ‘the magic’ of processing hundreds of queries per day (including each from the lowest level to the most complex ones, and processing all even the repetitive question). The quality of performance under such circumstances was tested in a crew of 5 expert agents, who nevertheless managed to tackle every inquiry using the universal inbox, char routing, live chat widgets, and the compulsory knowledge base.In case you’re still wondering how that’s even possible, that secret is effortless: all data is stored under one roof, classified, and delivered to different departments depending on a set of preset rules, leaving no more than 25% of the overall routing and redirecting to be handled manually by the agents. In fact, even the repetitive questions are automatically converted into FAQs and placed in the same-name section as a source of information. In this aspect, it is also vital to mention that LiveAgent enables you to deal with entirely new and challenging questions that don’t fall under the scope of any category but are instead referred to a specially assigned expert team within the company.In the long run, this software can increase the efficiency level of your company, as it will empower it to capture serious queries instantly, transfer tickets, create entirely new keys, or rate agents directly and based on their performance.Powerful social channel management
LiveAgent is a brilliant choice when managing multiple social channels simultaneously, where the promise of ‘it doesn’t matter how many works. It is precisely social channel management that makes LiveAgent different from traditional ticket management desks and makes it a top-level help desk software with multiple support channels. For example, it integrates Facebook and Twitter so users can monitor to capture trends, and business opportunities and, even more importantly, avoid negative posts. If you’re wondering how this works, it is as simple as tagging, keywords, brand mentions, fast and accurate responses, information availability, and obviously pulling off important content and marketing data.How to get started with LiveAgent?
To kick things off with this help desk platform, you may start with the 14-days trial with all-inclusive features. If the software suits you - purchase the licenses. LiveAgent enables the monthly subscription for the cloud version and one-time payment for the on-premise version.There are no contracts - you get billed from month to month. As a plus, you can upgrade or downgrade anytime. On top of that, there are no setup fees, and customer service and product updates are free of charge.You need to buy at least one agent seat to the setting off. Later on, you can add more agents and reduce them as you wish. The packages go from ticket support, then ticket + chat, and the third one is all-inclusive. You can start with ticket and then - if it is suitable for you - introduce the live chat and feedback to increase the efficiency of support service and customer experience.Key Features
Ticket Management:- Universal inbox
- Ticketing
- Hybrid ticket stream
- Automated ticket distribution
- Rules
- Time Rules
- Responsibility
- Departments
- Tags
- Service-Level-Agreement (SLA)
- Business hours
- Contact groups
- Contacts
- Agents
- Companies
- Contact fields
- Ticket fields
- SPAM filters
- Pause
- Filters
- Notes
- Ticket/Customer insights (CRM)
- Canned messages (Macros)
- Predefined answers
- Attachments
- Email notifications
- Agent collision detection
- Agent ranking
- Contact forms
- Contact form gallery
- Real-time chat
- Proactive chat invitations
- Chat button gallery
- Chat invitation gallery
- Chats overview
- Chat history
- Online visitors
- Chat distribution
- Real-time typing-view
- Reporting
- Analytics overview
- Performance report
- Agent ranking overview
- Department report
- Tag reports
- SLA Compliance report
- SLA Log report
- Agent availability
- Agent report
- Channel report
- Customer Portal
- Knowledgebase
- Forum
- Feedback & Suggestions
- Gamification
- Rewards & Badges
- Levels
- Benchmarks and Leaderboards
- 39 translations available
- Language adaptable widgets
Technical details to notice
The feature list of LiveAgent is pretty impressive. As the other help desk software vendors, this one offers different toolsets available in the three price tiers: ticket, ticket + chat, all-inclusive. But there is a short list of options that come with an additional fee in lower price tiers and free in the all-inclusive package.- Devices Supported: Windows, Linux, Android, iPhone/iPad, Mac, Web-based
- Deployment: Cloud Hosted, On-Premise
- Language Support: English, Chinese, German, Japanese, Spanish, French, Russian, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Polish, Turkish, Swedish, Arabic
- Pricing Model: Monthly payment, One-time payment
- Customer Types: Small Businesses, Large Enterprises, Medium Businesses, Freelancers
Support Options
- Phone
- Live Support
- Tickets
Use Cases
LiveAgent is an online Help Desk solution for e-commerce businesses at the small and midsize levels. The platform offers live chat applications, ticket management, online self-service portals, and change and license management, all as either in-suite or standalone applications.LiveAgent offers a selection of broader customer relationship management (CRM) applications, such as marketing and sales force automation, in cooperation with various third-party software companies. It is a customizable solution that can scale as small companies grow their customer base and online services. In addition, the software provides a ticket management system containing the complete stream of chat messages, emails, phone calls, or messages from other communication channels between the customer and support staff of the company.LiveAgent for Startups: The startup program is free for the first 6 months for startups that apply. This is an exclusive opportunity for startups to access to the best customer support software in the market with no upfront costs. After the first 6 months, startups can continue using LiveAgent at a discounted rate.LiveAgent is offered as both web-based (cloud) software and on-premise installations. The cloud option is priced on a pay-per-user basis by a number of agents, and the on-premise options use the up-front pricing model based solely on the number of agents.Start with a 14-Day free trial; no credit card needed, no contracts.Awards and Certificates
What does it take to be innovative in a heavily regulated industry? LiveAgent keeps its popularity on user reviews platforms and gets the industry awards from several leading B2B and SaaS related organizations.To illustrate a few, the help desk platform received:- the first place in the G2Crowd Help Desk Software list
- the best customer service software by Chamberofcommerce.org version
- the top performer live chat software by Featuredcustomers.com
- the top-rated help desk software 2018 by Trustradius.com
- the best live chat software 2017 by studio-40.com
Apps, Integrations and Plugins
Business requires a lot of tools to manage various processes. LiveAgent addresses that need and offers API reference for developing private apps and a list of apps and plugins already available to use.LiveAgent integrations and plugins page. Source: LiveAgent
Here are the categories and apps offered:- Billing management (2Checkout and Braintree)
- Chatbot (Quriobot)
- CMS (Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, Weebly, uKit, Adobe Business Catalyst, Wix, GoDaddy, Web.com, Squarespace, Expression Engine)
- Collaboration tools (Slack)
- CRM (Highrise, SharpSpring)
- eCommerce (Shopify, PrestaShop, Opencart, 3DCart, CS-Cart, BigCommerce, Actinic, Fortune 3, Volution, Core Commerce, X-Cart, Post Affiliate Pro)
- Email marketing (MailChimp, GetResponse, AWeber)
- Feedback (Nicereply)
- Migration plugins (Help desk migration)
- Project management (ProjectManager.com)
- Tracking (Google Analytics)
- VoIP Partners (Nexmo, Twilio, Flowroute, Voyced, Didlogic, Mobex, GoTrunk, VNet, Benemen, Swan, Fieber, Fayn, Benestra, Telsome, Actio, Voiptiger and the list goes on)
- Workflow (Zapier, CloudApp, Meetingbird)
Customer support from the vendor
One of the leading values of LiveAgent is caring about its customers. The vendor provides 24/7 customer service, support portal and forum, change log, bug tracker, blog and webinars. Apart from looking for help, you can acknowledge other possible questions and avoid them in the future.The pricing policy
The optimum balance between costs and benefits describes LiveAgent pricing. The SaaS version has three tiers:- Free Trial: Yes
- Ticket $15/agent/mo with a custom domain and native mobile apps, email ticketing, contact forms, automation, SLA, self-service (a knowledge base and forum) and API.
- Ticket + Chat $29/agent/mo adds to the Ticket functionality - a live chat, chat invitations and reports, visitor monitoring, feedback management and multibrand support.
- All-Inclusive $49/agent/mo strengthens the Ticket + Chat with a call center, social media integration, time tracking, audit log, gamification mechanism and advanced reports.
- Downloadable for $11.950 There are 20 agent seats and to add an agent will cost $690. The plan includes 23 months of product updates.
- Enterprise plan is considered for 50 agents, and the price should be discussed with the vendor.
LiveAgent alternatives
Sometimes the information or inspiration needed to solve a problem lies behind the right question. Does LiveAgent correspond to your business requirements? If you aren’t sure about this, then take time to look at possible alternatives. Get ready to meet the dozens of help desk platforms share the features and look alike in design, and the price differs a little. Nevertheless, many organizations search the LiveAgent alternatives to optimize various business processes and ultimately the productivity.- Freshdesk
- LiveChat
- Reamaze
- Zoho Desk
- Help Scout
- Kayako
- Intercom
Hammad Bin Idrees –
The benefits of LiveAgent are comprehensive UI and configurations. You don’t need a tech specialist to create macros, and the learning curve is short. The analytics shows the performance and productivity levels so the useful insights for further improvements. The help desk platform streamlines the processes and improves support team productivity.
anonymous –
Every business has different requirements. If your organization needs a help desk platform with extensive integrations with other business apps and customizations, then LiveAgent answers the rising demand. Small companies may find the software a bit pricy, but the functionality it delivers is worth the costs. The performance of the support team is improved, the platform is easy to use, and the multi-channel support excludes switching between different apps – what saves a lot of time.
anonymous –
In case, you are looking for the comprehensive, cost-effective and (almost) white label software, then LiveAgent is an option to choose. The help desk platform omnichannel and can be leveraged to address customers requests on any channel. Being acknowledged with a customer background, the support team resolves issues faster with a tint of personalization.
Christopher L. B –
The software has become a great medium to meet and address the customers issues on a convenient channel. LiveAgent has a short learning curve, multiple integrations and comprehensive user interface. The platform is successfully used for external and internal ticket management. The notifications should be more personalized and show a bit more information on the incoming case.
anonymous –
The help desk platform is easy to set up and has a bunch of customizations. The functionality and received value are worth the cost. The desktop UI is messy, and the mobile version is limited in features. These things cry for improvement. Despite the minor drawbacks, LiveAgent is efficient in customer support and fast query resolving.
Tolbert D. –
“Email Management in the easiest way possible!!”
Regardless of whether they work in a different industry, LiveAgent can show me the cases handled live by my organization’s various coworkers. I can see how each of my coworkers does, what issues they work on, and how the request develops. Because of its great anti-spam mechanism, visitors can only send a few tickets back-to-back and clog up our LiveAgent mailbox. This program prevents any efforts to spam our live chat.
The LiveAgent platform does not allow for communication with other employees. There are no chat channels for staff to use in this service; only agent and client communication is now permitted. This is a crucial feature because our personnel use outside software to transfer needs and communicate. They should implement that! But overall, it is great!
Many different functions, such as live agent setup and knowledge database, were all in one solution, which was easy to control after LiveAgent helped us solve.
Sosoe Natenadze –
The software is straightforward to use. Our office managers are given the software to learn, and they do so with almost any training.
Since we solely use the software for chat, there isn’t anything we don’t enjoy about it. The software is highly trustworthy.
Daushi Grotto –
LiveAgent provides a comprehensive set of tools to help you implement live chat services on your website. One of my favorite features is location reporting (which shows where the user is in the world) and the ability to push a chat invitation to the user as they browse your website.
The only disadvantage I’ve encountered is the requirement to log in to your account frequently to keep the account active. I dislike having to set a reminder to log in for fear of having my account deactivated.
Devendra Warke –
PROS: I like how we can manage all of our tickets (internal and external) in a single place rather than having them all scattered across different services. We switched to LiveAgent from Zendesk as LiveAgent is much cheaper than them with the same features.
CONS: The UI/interface of the website could be easier to navigate. The UI also needs a quick update.