Salesforce Essentials was released in 2017 with two modules – Sales Cloud, the CRM platform, and Service Cloud, the customer support solution. Essentials is specifically designed to help small sales teams sell faster and smarter with the app’s built-in intelligence, and likewise assist customer support teams organize and manage all support channels to deliver standout service.
Part of Service Cloud is a help desk software that provides support teams tools and capabilities to manage cases promptly, support customers across channels, automate support workflows, extend consistent customer experiences, and help customers help themselves. With the software and its features, SMBs get to leverage Salesforce’s cloud business tools and best practices to come up with solutions for sales and services that are easy to set up, use and maintain, and offered at budget friendly prices.
The cornerstone of customer support is a reliable help desk. Service Cloud offers an efficient and dependable help desk platform which ensures that every inquiry routes to the right agent and gets organized or categorized accordingly regardless of the channel the request came through. For example, one person or team might handle Facebook and Twitter cases while another team responds to phone calls. This is quick and effective case management.
The aforementioned process drives efficiency and productivity, allowing every customer service team member to focus on priority cases without leaving requests unanswered. Furthermore, smooth case management keeps internal teams efficient which improves reporting data to further enhance customer experience, reduces ticket volume, and preempts small issues before they become big ones.
As your organization grows, so does your customer service caseloads. It’s important for you to keep a pulse on the time and resources required for customer support. Implementing automation is one way that you can save time and money, and the help desk software can address that. With automated workflows, customer service agents can speed through repetitive tasks — such as using preset responses that provide answers to the most common questions — so they can focus on more complex ones.
Salesforce is a worldwide leader in technology-driven, cloud business solutions and whose name is synonymous with cloud CRM. The vendor has put its innovation within the grasp of small businesses so they can harness Salesforce’s technologies to deliver quality customer support and service, reinforce customer loyalty, and at the same time boost sales and revenues.
Show MoreSupport customers across channels
Customer service teams need to have the means to manage requests across all communications channels and keep them organized. A help desk can provide multichannel support, so agents can work more efficiently to resolve issues faster, and offer amazing service. Service Cloud automates connecting customers from whatever channel they are in to sales reps which streamlines the process. Consumers can @mention a company on Twitter to ask questions, pick up the phone to voice complaints, send emails, or strike up a live chat with a customer service representative. The help desk software of Service Cloud Essentials makes sure nothing slips through the crack and all customer issues are attended to promptly.
Provide consistent experiences
Consumers today are quite demanding and would want consistent experiences with brands regardless of their interaction takes place. Studies have found out that around a third of customers and business buyers are likely to switch companies if they receive inconsistent experiences with you. You can’t afford that. The help desk software offers cohesion and connectivity across touchpoints, enabling you to have real-time conversation with a customer via a website’s chat feature and then build and continue on that same conversation with a telephone call. This, and many other similar support scenarios, is ably facilitated by the help desk software.
Extend customer self-service
Often, customers simply want to solve issues on their own such as searching for a quick, accurate answer to a product-related question. The help desk software ensures that customers can help themselves by giving you tools to build an easy-to-navigate support portal. A support portal can house key information like FAQs. You can even create a public Q&A forum to help consumers connect with each other and share information. Customers expect seamless experiences throughout their journeys with your brand, and customer service teams need to be ready to handle their inquiries. Help desk software empowers your, your team, and your business to adapt and keep customers happy no matter how the consumer-brand relationship evolves.
Integrate service with the powerful Salesforce CRM
The thing that makes the Service Cloud help desk software quite potent is its pairing off and integration with the robust Salesforce CRM solution in the Essentials platform. It gives you a suite of features and functionalities that simplify the implementation of a CRM-service setup to your workflows from start to finish. With its out-of-the-box tools and setup assistant, the system is quick to deploy and easy to use. You get access to Trailhead which is a system of self-guided tutorials on CRM, and the Einstein AI which analyzes data stream and employs machine learning algorithms to uncover opportunities and account insights that guide reps to the next best action. The whole unified Salesforce Essentials platform supercharges your sales teams to follow up on leads and identify key contacts to sell faster and at the same expeditiously handle and resolve customer issues.
Show MoreSalesforce Essentials Pricing Plans:
$25/user/month
Salesforce Essentials Pricing Plans:
Free Trial
Service Cloud Essentials
$25/user/month
Service Cloud Essentials – $25/user/month (billed annually)
We are aware that when you decide to buy a Help Desk Software it’s vital not only to find out how professionals score it in their reviews, but also to check whether the actual users and enterprises that bought this software are indeed happy with the service. Because of that need we’ve devised our behavior-based Customer Satisfaction Algorithm™ that collects customer reviews, comments and Salesforce Essentials reviews across a broad array of social media sites. The information is then presented in an easy to understand form showing how many customers had positive and negative experience with Salesforce Essentials. With that information available you will be prepared to make an informed business decision that you won’t regret.
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Salesforce Essentials connects with a wide array of business apps with AppExchange, such as:
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ADD A REVIEWThe most favorable review
PROS: Creating and nurturing leads is what this tool is best used for. I love how it fosters the perfect ground for growth and converting opportunities to paying clients. Not only this, but it's also easy to tag clients as lost or won. This makes it easy to track the history and find patterns so we know what works for clients and what results to them being tagged as lost.
CONS: It would be nice to have the system remind me about all my current and due tasks. It will be a great help if I can get notified about these.
The least favorable review
PROS: One of Salesforce Essentials most compensating feature is its usability. So far, I haven't had any issues with its tools and their use. Whenever I do stumble upon any problem, I can easily call up the Salesforce CS reps to help me.
CONS: It would be nice if Salesforce Essentials added a mass email send out functionality. Right now, I still need to outsource this task to other platforms. However, being able to send newsletters and other sales email campaigns through Salesforce would exponentially make my experience a lot easier.
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It helps me organize all my data by providing a centralized platform for all of it.
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PROS: This platform hosts all of my client data and other relevant information in my organization. It's very efficient--allowing me to retrieve all of the details I need with just a few clicks of a button. Now, I don't need to rummage through all my emails and file folders anymore.
CONS: For some reason, Salesforce Essentials does not allow me to modify the time-range of data in my dashboard. I prefer looking at the bigger picture and getting an annual report of my sales, rather than quarterly. However, this does not seem to be possible through this platform. It's not just the time-range too. There are plenty of other things that I cannot customize on my dashboard. For example, I'd prefer for my opportunities to be listed by order of possible profit. But that's not all--there's no history tab where I can see the latest calls I've made either. This would have been helpful so I can quickly view the latest updates about my contacts so I can jump off my conversations with them right away. Right now, I still need to open every contact page just to get more detailed information on this. I wish information were given more freely without me having to dig through my files. Like who's in charge of a particular project, for example. These are just some of the functions that would have been more easily done on Excel. After all, sorting information on that platform is as easy as searching through its fields. I hope Salesforce would consider these requests and make it more simple for users like me to view relevant information about our clients.
The best at making our work seem more manageable.
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PROS: I love the level of flexibility that Salesforce offers its clients. Through it, my team and I have been enjoying freedom in all aspects of our accounts. It provides great support for businesses, no matter the size. This has truly been an ace up our sleeves when it comes to driving efficiency and success. It takes some time getting used to, but trust me, the functionalities are worth it. I cannot recommend this program to both start-ups and established businesses alike.
CONS: Everything works fine for me. The program itself has been thoroughly vetted and provides enough support for its users. Once in a while, I catch myself getting overwhelmed by all of its tools, but it's manageable.
Perfect for helping me identify business opportunities.
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PROS: Thanks to Salesforce Essentials, we've officially said our goodbyes to endless Excel sheets and net drives. It is a great platform that gives us room to customize our dashboard without being too complicated. It's really easy to use and I appreciate how it assists our team in becoming more efficient. It helps us pinpoint areas of opportunity so we know which areas of our business to focus on.
CONS: It would be nice to have a lite version of this. There are far too many functions linked to this program, and I honestly don't have any use for them. I operate a small start-up and I really have no use for all of these tools. With a lite version, I could enjoy all the basic solutions I need from Salesforce Essentials while still saving money. I hope the team over at Salesforce would consider this request. It would be nice if email integration isn't just limited to Microsoft Outlook too.
Very easy to use.
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PROS: One of Salesforce Essentials most compensating feature is its usability. So far, I haven't had any issues with its tools and their use. Whenever I do stumble upon any problem, I can easily call up the Salesforce CS reps to help me.
CONS: It would be nice if Salesforce Essentials added a mass email send out functionality. Right now, I still need to outsource this task to other platforms. However, being able to send newsletters and other sales email campaigns through Salesforce would exponentially make my experience a lot easier.
A great tool for assisting organization and efficiency.
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials makes it possible for us to be transparent within our team. In its dashboard, we can easily access information about our clients and where they are in their buyer's journey. We've also been able to customize this space so that all of the information we need for our operations are easily available to us at any time. Communicating with our clients is a lot more manageable with Salesforce too.
CONS: Despite the significant similarities, I still prefer the classic version over this one. With Salesforce Essentials, simple functions such as organizing our list of leads by the last name become a complicated affair.
Locating opportunities has never been easier.
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials helps me oversee all our sales operations and opportunities from one vantage point. The dashboard is complete, useful, and accurate. Through it, I can have access to the rundown of our reports. This is where we can track all of our orders, best sales performers, amd weighted pipeline. Whenever we need to present our reports to users outside of our corporate account, we can simply download an Excel version of it and send it to them. This is thanks to this solution's intergation to Outlook. Plus, we've been able to log in through a mobile call too--pretty convenient, if you ask me. The chatter feature lets us hold forums and make announcements without being too intrusive as well. Overall, I'm really happy with the service and functionalities that this solution provides.
CONS: I think it's great how we can upgrade easily as our company grows--however, this is easier said than done. The cost of an upgrade is pretty steep. I wish there was an option in between these packages built that is built for medium-sized businesses. Plus, it's a little hard to define the inclusions in the packages too.
Our processes have vastly improved since implementing Salesforce Essentials!
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials has quickly become an ace in our sales department. Through it, we've been able to track all our sales dealings--especially for our communication strategy. One function that I find particularly useful is its email attachment tracking. Whenever we attach our sales proposals through email, we get a notification whenever our client has opened it. This becomes a good indicator of whether or not we should deploy a sales agent to contact them and close the sale. But the sales funnel does not just end with a completed sale. After this, data gets submitted into analytics so we can extract a more thorough and accurate forecast.
CONS: It would be nice if we were given an option to view the dashboard as a customer too. The corporate news feed does not really give us insight into what information is shared with our customers.
This makes lead nurturing seem like a walk in the park.
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PROS: Creating and nurturing leads is what this tool is best used for. I love how it fosters the perfect ground for growth and converting opportunities to paying clients. Not only this, but it's also easy to tag clients as lost or won. This makes it easy to track the history and find patterns so we know what works for clients and what results to them being tagged as lost.
CONS: It would be nice to have the system remind me about all my current and due tasks. It will be a great help if I can get notified about these.
This helps us handle our opp
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials has helped us centralize our knowledge base for our sales reps and marketing members. Now, each of us can easily retrieve information regarding a particular account. It is a great tool for improving our efficiency through pipeline visibility, among anything. Not to mention, we now have better access to insights and reports. Generating and downloading them is a lot easier too.
CONS: The whole point of implementing robust CRM tools such as Salesforce is to fully integrate it into our members' day-to-day processes. With proper training and enough materials, we should be able to get everyone up-to-speed when it comes to fully utilizing this program. However, the downside to Salesforce Essentials is that it does not have any training material that is accessible and easily understood.
Salesforce Essentials is the top-player in the CRM field.
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PROS: For a small-time businessman, Salesforce Essentials has quickly become an indispensable tool for me. It helps me manage my contact details and nurture my leads into paying clients. It barely has any lag time, and I can easily attach reminders, notes, and other important information to each of my contacts.
CONS: I wish Salesforce Essentials would introduce more marketing functions to its arsenal of tools. After all, every small business like mine needs more support when it comes to growing our clientele. It would be nice if Salesforce supported us in this endeavor. On top of this, I have an issue with Chatter too. It doesn't significantly support exchanges in updates and tracking certain conversations is almost impossible to do too.
It makes our work more manageable.
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PROS: One of Salesforce Essentials' salient selling points is its usability. We didn't have any problem setting it up, and most of its functions are pretty easy to understand too. It houses all of the relevant information that we need about our business--from our customer contact details, our leads, and the pipeline available to us. My team and I find it particularly useful how we can easily download our reports and send them to those outside of our Salesforce account users. Overall, I think that this has been a helpful tool in driving our sales and moving the business forward. We appreciate how it facilitates transparency in information.
CONS: This program can take a little while getting used to it. Sure, there had been assistance and some training made available to us at the start, but those didn't really prepare us substantially. I wish the team at Salesforce would invest in more helpful training modules.
It is a full suite of tools–complete and useful.
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials is comprehensive and all-encompassing. It comes with a full suite of tools that allows us to get a better handle on our sales performance--from assisting the computation of labor costs to consolidating our data. I'm in charge of sales analytics in my company, and Salesforce Essentials has been a breeze to work with. The classic view of its dashboard helps me oversee our operations. Through it, I can easily track all our sales activities without any problem. Plus, it even has filters that allow me to cut through the noise and locate the information that I need. Its integration with Google calendar has been pretty useful in scheduling meetings and tracking sales too. However, I just wish that there would be more YouTube video tutorials about it. There are certain functionalities, such as executing calculations, that might be best explained and understood in my native language, not just Indian English.
CONS: I only have two issues with Salesforce Essentials. First, I think that it is quite pricey. Second, I have yet to fully exhaust its functionalities because of the lack of training courses available for them.
We’re excited to expand our business with Salesforce Essentials.
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PROS: Salesforce Essentials is one of the more reputable CRM solutions in the industry. Since it is something that most of our members are already familiar with, we decided to implement it into our own processes. I must say--it was a pretty good idea. Now, we can easily collect and organize our data into a structure that makes more sense for our business. Not to mention, I love how it anticipates growing with its customers too. If all goes well in our business plans, we can easily upgrade our account so it can deal with the volume of our products and revenue.
CONS: We're still in the first phase of our growth implementation, and we're excited to upgrade into the next level of this solution. I bet that there will be plenty of functionalities to uncover. I know that this is not a criticism of the solution, but I just can't wait until we can jump to the commercial upgrade plan.
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It helps me organize all my data by providing a centralized platform for all of it.
Read full review >Overall impression
Customer Support
Value for Money
Ease of Use
The best at making our work seem more manageable.
Read full review >Overall impression
Customer Support
Value for Money
Ease of Use
Perfect for helping me identify business opportunities.
Read full review >Overall impression
Customer Support
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Very easy to use.
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Customer Support
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A great tool for assisting organization and efficiency.
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