Like it or not, even if you offer an excellent product or service that truly meets your audience’s needs, there’s no guarantee they’ll stay loyal. According to Capgemini’s research, over half of the respondents consider customer service “extremely” or “very” important when deciding whether to continue using a product or service. Long wait times and slow issue resolution remain among consumers’ top frustrations, as the report finds.
A reliable customer communication tool is essential for addressing these issues and delivering a seamless experience. In this article, we’ll present the best customer communication software and guide you through the process of choosing the right solution for your business.
What Is a Customer Communication Tool?
These tools are essential for managing inquiries, providing support, gathering customer feedback, and delivering personalized experiences.
Freshdesk, Zendesk, LiveChat, HelpScout, and Front are among the most popular customer communication tools.
Types of customer communication tools
Customer communication tools come in different forms and shapes. For example, based on the contact channel, customer support solutions can be grouped into the following types:
- Live chat software. Live chat tools enable real-time text-based communication with customers directly on the company’s website or app. Often, they also support messaging apps like Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp.
- Email ticketing systems. These tools are designed to manage customer inquiries received via email.
- Call center software. Call center tools specialize in handling inbound and outbound phone calls.
Knowing the various types of tools helps businesses pick the one that meets their communication needs and delivers exceptional customer experiences.
Why Effective Client Communication Tools Are Vital for Modern Businesses
Today, customers expect brands to address their concerns swiftly: Zendesk finds that 72% of customers demand immediate service. Meeting these expectations is crucial for maintaining loyalty. This is where powerful client communication software comes into play with its automated customer issue routing, follow-ups, canned responses, team collaboration tools, chatbots, and AI copilots for agents. These tools empower teams to deliver faster and more efficient service. For instance, businesses using Lyro, Tidio’s conversational AI agent, have reported a 97% reduction in response times — a game-changer for customer satisfaction.
These tools offer more than just speed; they centralize essential customer data, enabling agents to provide personalized, context-driven support. When customers feel heard and valued, their experience improves — and so does the brand’s reputation.
However, fast and personalized service isn’t the only advantage of robust communication tools. They also ramp up team efficiency. Take Lyro: it handles 90% of visitor inquiries for a recruitment company and resolves 85% of customer queries for a suit and tuxedo rental business. Beyond reducing hiring costs, this level of automation enables businesses to scale operations smoothly without the usual complications.
Choosing the Best Customer Communication Tools: What to Look for
Zendesk’s research reveals that 64% of customers are ready to spend more with businesses that respond to their inquiries through the channel they initially used to reach out. This highlights the importance of meeting customers where they are. So, when selecting a customer communication tool, it’s essential to choose one that supports the channels your audience relies on the most.
Beyond channel compatibility, pay close attention to the automation capabilities of your preferred solution. Features like automated workflows, AI-powered chatbots, and copilots play a critical role in optimizing support processes, making them scalable and efficient. This particularly matters for large companies or businesses with growth ambitions.
Integration capabilities matter just as much. A good communication tool seamlessly connects with the software the company already uses, creating a cohesive workflow when agents don’t have to switch between apps.
Finally, consider your customer support team size and budget when reviewing pricing plans. The right solution should strike a balance between affordability and value, delivering the best return on investment while meeting your company’s unique needs.
The Best Customer Communication Tools
Channel support is key when selecting a customer communication tool, so we’ve picked top solutions for the most popular interaction venues: live chat, email, and phone.
Live chat solutions
Adding a live chat widget to your company’s website is a smart move. Research shows that 63% of customers are more likely to return to a website that offers live chat support. What’s more, this communication method delivers the highest customer satisfaction rate — 73% — among other support channels, compared to 64% for email and 44% for phone support.
Here are the best customer communication platforms with the live chat feature:
Tidio Live Chat
Tidio Live Chat is a live chat solution for e-commerce. It provides a single dashboard for interacting with customers through a live chat widget, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger. In addition to chatting with human operators, Tidio enables real-time assistance through automated flows triggered by certain events, and an AI-powered chatbot, Lyro AI Agent. It also integrates over 120 tools and provides automated chat assignments, canned responses, and multi-language support.
Tidio’s pricing starts is $0 for 50 interactions per month, while paid plans start from $29 to $759 and beyond.
LiveChat
LiveChat is a well-known chat tool that facilitates customer interactions through its website widget, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp, and SMS. The tool boasts AI features (reply and tag suggestions and text enhancements), targeted messages, a Message Sneak Peek (agents can see what customers are typing before they send it), and Proactive Chat Invitations (businesses can initiate conversations based on visitor behavior). It integrates over 200 tools.
LiveChat’s pricing starts at $20/month and goes beyond $59/month.
Intercom Messenger
Intercom is a popular client communication platform with powerful real-time messaging capabilities offered by Intercom Messenger, which integrates over 450 apps. Intercom’s Messenger provides all standard live chat features. Fully customizable, it integrates an AI-powered chatbot, Fin, and supports 45 languages.
Pricing starts at $29 per seat/month, with the top tier at $132. The Messenger feature is included even at the entry-level plan, along with core help desk tools like a shared inbox, ticketing, a help center, and basic reporting.
Zendesk’s live chat
Like Intercom Messenger, Zendesk’s live chat isn’t a standalone real-time messaging tool but a part of a popular customer communication system, Zendesk.
Zendesk’s live chat is equipped with intelligent routing, a GenAI-driven knowledge base search for agents, and AI-powered bots. As part of Zendesk’s customer support suite, this live chat platform unifies conversations across channels (voice, email, Messenger, and WhatsApp), so agents have full context in any interaction. The platform is also highly customizable and features AI-powered real-time data analysis.
Access to this live chat requires a Zendesk subscription, starting at $19 and going up to over $115 per seat/month.
Crisp
Crisp is another all-in-one customer communication solution with live chat capabilities. It features live translation, Message Sneak Peek, video and audio call support, fill-out forms, ratings, access to a customer-facing knowledge base, and AI chatbot integration. Crisp’s live chat widget is easy to deploy and highly scalable.
Olark
Olark is a user-friendly live chat software. It features a real-time chat that can be embedded into the company’s website, automations (customer conversation routing, customer engagement through rules-based triggers, canned responses, proactive messaging, and AI-powered chatbots), real-time reporting, searchable transcripts, and custom forms. The tool integrates with a variety of software solutions, including CRMs, help desks, and analytics tools.
Email ticketing platforms
In 2025, the total number of email users reached 4.59 billion and is projected to grow, signaling that this support channel isn’t going anywhere. The good news is that all major help desk platforms support email interactions.
Below are some of the top customer communication management tools with email ticketing capabilities:
Zendesk
A go-to email ticketing tool, Zendesk shines with its smart ticket routing feature, AI-powered chatbots and agent copilot, side conversations (agents can link conversations in Slack to a particular ticket), automated follow-ups, and Light agents (read- and comment-only access for agents without pre-paid seats). The platform also boasts robust reporting capabilities, helping teams improve.
Freshdesk
Freshdesk is another email ticketing platform well-known for its ease of use.
Freshdesk comes with automations (smart ticket routing and automated escalations and follow-ups), analytics, and AI-powered features (AI agents for customers, AI copilots for agents, and AI-powered analytics for leaders). It also integrates with hundreds of widely used business software tools.
Gorgias
Designed for e-commerce businesses, Gorgias deeply integrates with e-commerce platforms like Magento and Shopify, enabling agents to provide assistance based on customers’ shopping behavior. As an email ticketing tool, it covers all the essentials, including automated ticket routing, autoresponders, and analytics.
Gorgias’ pricing model differs from Zendesk and Freshdesk. Each plan includes a limited number of tickets and agent seats, with additional charges for ticket overages. For example, the Starter plan costs $10 per month and covers 3 agent seats and 50 tickets. Any extra ticket costs $0.40. All plans include access to 150 active integrations and 94 apps in the integration library, except for the highest tier, which allows more.
Zoho Desk
Zoho Desk offers a comprehensive suite of tools for managing email-based support, covering ticketing, automation, and reporting.
The platform’s standout features include an automation tool, multi-level escalations, work modes, parent-child ticketing, custom actions, and managing multiple brands from a single platform. Its AI assistant, Zia, can recommend relevant knowledge base articles to customers, analyze conversation sentiment, and flag anomalies in ticket streams.
Intercom
Intercom is another comprehensive help desk solution with email ticketing capabilities. It offers multiple team inboxes, automated ticket assignment (based on agent availability and skills), workflow automation builder, multi-brand messenger and help center, Lite seats (external agents can collaborate on tickets at no cost), and reporting.
Intercom offers three subscription plans, ranging from $29 to $132 per seat/month. Key features — an AI-powered chatbot, Fin AI Agent, outbound support features, and an AI copilot for teams — are available at an additional cost.
ServiceNow CSM
ServiceNow CSM is robust help desk software for managing customer requests — mainly technical — across channels, including email.
The platform features case management, AI agents and AI-powered assistance (predictive intelligence), proactive engagement features (sending reminders about upcoming renewals or updates on service changes), case summarizing, email reply recommendations, and a range of integrations with popular apps and platforms.
Front
Front is an all-in-one email management and customer communication platform.
The solution offers advanced routing and automation features to ensure that emails reach the right team member. It also boosts productivity with AI-powered tools like AI Compose (helps users draft messages quickly using context from ongoing conversations or bullet points), AI Summarize (for quick ticket overviews), and AI Answers (suggests relevant knowledge base articles in response to inquiries). Front also provides analytics tools and integrations with Asana and Salesforce.
VoIP platforms
Even in today’s world of instant messaging, phone support continues to be one of the most preferred communication channels for customers — including Gen Z. So, it’s important to keep this channel in mind when considering your support strategy.
Here are some of the industry-favorite call center software solutions:
RingCentral
RingCentral is a leading cloud-based communications platform designed to help businesses streamline their communication processes through a unified solution. Its call center tool, RingCentral Business Phone, offers all the essentials of phone-based customer support: unlimited domestic calling (within the U.S. and Canada), SMS and MMS, IVR, and automated call recording. It also supports video meetings, integrations with major business tools (including help desk platforms), advanced call monitoring for managers, and an AI assistant that transcribes calls in real-time, takes notes, creates text for SMS and team chats, and beyond.
Nextiva
Nextiva is a cloud-based business communication platform that integrates voice, video, messaging, and customer management tools into one system.
Its voice features cover all call center needs and include unlimited calling in the U.S. and Canada, voicemail-to-email notifications, call forwarding, advanced IVR, automated call routing, and call and voicemail transcription. It also comes with an intelligent Voice Assistant, skill-based call routing, and integration with widely used help desk platforms.
Zoom Phone
Zoom Phone is a cloud-based VoIP business phone system developed by Zoom, designed to integrate seamlessly with its video conferencing platform. It offers unlimited domestic and metered international calling, voicemail with transcription, AI-powered features (post-call summaries, voicemail task extraction and prioritization), and integrations with Slack and Salesforce. It can also convert a call into a Zoom video conference or transfer it to an existing Zoom meeting.
Vonage
Vonage is a leading provider of cloud-based unified communications as a service (UCaaS) solutions. Its call center software, Vonage Business Communications, offers domestic and international calling, call forwarding, rerouting, recording, blocking, and screening, and call conference — plus a virtual AI assistant, team messaging, and anti-spam protection.
Microsoft Teams Phone
Microsoft Teams Phone is a cloud-based telephony solution built into Microsoft Teams. It allows businesses to manage voice calls alongside chat, video meetings, and file sharing — all within a single platform. The solution offers PSTN calling, auto attendants, call queues, voicemail integration, presence-based call routing, and call management features (call forwarding, simultaneous ring, call transfer, call park).
Microsoft Teams Phone is available in three subscription plans, with prices starting at $10 per user/month.
Conclusion
Good customer service isn’t just a nice-to-have — it’s essential for any business that wants to thrive. Luckily, the software market offers a wide range of client communication tools designed to help you meet rising customer expectations, boost efficiency, and scale for growth.
If your current customer communication tool no longer meets your needs, Help Desk Migration makes it easy to switch. We’ll transfer your data quickly and securely so you can upgrade your support system without disruption.
FAQs about Customer Communication Tools
A customer communication tool is a type of software that helps businesses connect with customers across various channels, such as email, chat, phone, or social media. These tools are essential for providing timely and personalized support, which plays a critical role in maintaining customer satisfaction and long-term loyalty.
Customer communication tools vary depending on the channel they support. Some are built for real-time messaging, such as live chat software. Others manage email conversations efficiently, while certain platforms focus on voice-based support through call center solutions. Understanding these categories helps businesses choose the best-fit solution for their support strategy.
When choosing a communication platform, companies should prioritize features that align with their support goals. These include compatibility with their customers’ preferred channels, automation for faster response handling, AI enhancements, integration with other business tools, and scalability to support future growth. Budget and team size are also key factors in the selection process.
There are several strong candidates in the live chat space. Tools like Tidio, LiveChat, Intercom, Zendesk, Crisp, and Olark offer robust chat features along with AI, automation, and multi-channel support. They are well-suited for businesses aiming to provide fast and interactive customer service through their websites and messaging apps.
Help Desk Migration simplifies the process of switching to a new customer communication platform by transferring your support data quickly, securely, and without service disruption. This allows businesses to adopt more advanced tools without worrying about data loss or extended downtime.