This guide shows you how to get familiar with your Zendesk trial account, helps you evaluate Zendesk features to see how they'll work for you, and provides guidelines on where to find more information. Follow the steps in this guide to get your trial account up and running. Each task typically takes less than 10 minutes to complete.
Use Zendesk bots for AI-powered automated answers
Zendesk bots provide answers to incoming questions using machine learning to reply instantly with available, relevant information so customers can get answers without waiting. There are two ways you can use Zendesk bots:
- Autoreplies, which allow the bot to suggest relevant articles from your Guide help center to customer requests via email or web form, or deliver custom responses based on AI predictions about intent, language, and sentiment to customer requests via email.
- Conversation bots, created using our bot builder, that interact with customers and guide them to a resolution through messaging channels.
In this section we’ll walk you through setting up autoreplies in an email notification.
Plan it out
Zendesk bot responses can be delivered in email, web forms, Web Widget, social channels, Slack, API, and mobile SDKs.
Think about which channels you plan to offer and how you can use Zendesk bots to provide instant answers. See Understanding everywhere you can use Zendesk bots.
Try it out
For this trial, you won't be able to see Zendesk bots in action unless you activate your help center and create an article for the bot to suggest. If you can't do that, rely on the images in Understanding everywhere you can use Zendesk bots to understand the experience.
- In Admin Center, click
Channels in the sidebar, then select Bots and automations > Bots. - Click Manage autoreplies, then follow the onboarding steps.
- Activate your help center and create an article about a specific issue, such as resetting your password or viewing your returns policy.
- Send email to your support address the issue covered in the help center article you created.
Your support address is support@yoursubdomain.zendesk.com, where yoursubdomain is the subdomain you chose for your trial account.
- Look for the email notification in your inbox.
Extend your support solution with apps and integrations
To improve agent efficiency, streamline your support workflows, and connect to the many other web applications and services you use everyday, you can extend your Zendesk Suite support solution by adding apps and integrations that you can find in the Zendesk Marketplace.
For example, if services such as Slack and Salesforce are essential for managing your business and customer data, you can add them to your Zendesk. There are hundreds of apps and integrations available in the marketplace. You can add apps and integrations to Support, Chat, and also Zendesk Sell.
Plan it
First, see Using the Zendesk Marketplace for a brief introduction and a link to the marketplace. Then, review the apps that are available and determine which will help you best manage your customer support experience and solve tickets quickly and efficiently. You can add apps and integrations at any time, but some up front planning will help you determine how you're going to set up and launch your Zendesk support solution (see Launch guide for Zendesk Suite).
Try it
To get started in the Zendesk Marketplace and become familiar with the kind of functionality you can add to your Zendesk, follow these steps to install the Time Tracking app. This app, available for the Zendesk Suite Growth plan and above, automatically tracks the time agents spend on each of your Zendesk Support tickets, which will make managing your team’s performance and overall support operations easier.
To install the Time Tracking app
- Access the Time Tracking app in the marketplace.
- On the app details page, click Install.
- From the drop-down, choose the account you want to install the app to, then click Install.
- Read Setting up the Time Tracking app for information about quickly configuring and using the app.
Learn more
Integrate customer data with Zendesk Sunshine
If the Zendesk Marketplace doesn't offer what you need to integrate your customer data with your support solution, you can create custom solutions using the Zendesk Sunshine platform. For example, you may want to integrate external customer actions such as purchase transactions and website visits into Zendesk so that you can unify data about your customer and their actions across applications and systems into a single view. The Admin Center in Zendesk Suite provides the interface for pulling your customer data into a single view.
Learn more
The first step in getting started with the Sunshine platform is to understand how it works. To get an overview of the platform see Zendesk Sunshine and be sure to watch the introduction video. When you're ready for more details and want to start using Sunshine, see Getting started with the Sunshine platform for admins.
Customize your support solution with the Zendesk API
You also have the option of creating custom apps and integrations that extend the functionality of products within the Zendesk Suite. For example, a common use of the Zendesk API is to create a custom ticket form that creates tickets in Support. You can create apps for Support, your help center, Chat, Talk, and also Zendesk Sell.
Plan it
For a better understanding of how the Zendesk API can be used and what you might create with it, review Common tasks for the Zendesk APIs.
Try it
If you want to give the API a try, you can follow the steps in the Zendesk API quick start. This is a 10-minute tutorial that guides you through using the Zendesk API to create tickets.