When Do You Know it’s Time to Switch Helpdesk?
There are times when a company or its support agents can be unhappy with the helpdesk they use. The reasons for this can vary – either the UI is not user-friendly, or the helpdesk does not easily integrate with other platforms, and many more. Yet, businesses tend to stick to one helpdesk despite their shortcomings – why?
Companies face many challenges when they decide to make a switch to a different helpdesk tool -from evaluating alternatives, and planning next steps, to managing change and budgeting. The toughest out of all, however, is data migration. But before we get to that, let’s set one thing clear. How do you know that you need to consider a different helpdesk and migrate data?
Let’s meet Joe. Joe is the Head of Operations at company A. The support team seems to be very unhappy with the helpdesk they’re using. They are missing incoming calls because of software lags, tickets remain unassigned because the help desk does not support auto-routing … the list goes on. It’s clear that software is the problem, so Joe starts looking for a better help desk.
Joe’s case is only one example. As a Freshdesk partner, we decided to talk about the most common reasons for switching helpdesks and migrating data. We’re also going to discuss the options you have to import data to Freshdesk, and offer a way to simplify the switch. Because at Help Desk Migration, we believe that software shouldn’t be a limitation.
When is it time to switch your helpdesk?
1. When you’ve decided to quit email and use a help desk
Most companies started their customer support with a Gmail or an Outlook inbox. While this might suffice for companies setting up their support function, there will inevitably come a time when you will need to leverage all the benefits of help desk software.
2. When you want to move to a better or more cost-effective solution
As your company grows – whether that’s in the number of customers, products or support agents, you will have growing requirements that are not met by your current help desk solution. Alternatively, perhaps budget constraints are forcing you to look for more cost-effective solutions. Typically, these are also some of the reasons why someone might need to migrate their data between help desks.
3. When you need to split or unify support teams
We work with these types of data migrations very often. When a company acquires another company, they usually decide to consolidate support teams and customer bases. And the only way to do it is by migrating data. Similarly, when you need to separate support data because you open a new office or launch a new product, the need for data migration also rises.
4. When the help desk you’re using retires
Take Desk.com, for instance. The company announced the retirement of its software and now users need to migrate their data before March 2020. Sure, this doesn’t happen very often, but it still happens.
What’s so tricky about migrating data?
Finding the right help desk for your team can be exhausting as you weigh the pros and cons of each alternative, and how they will impact existing processes. You need to think through your steps before taking action. However, it’s not the most challenging part of migrating help desks. The technical side is.
Everything inside the help desk depends on something. Each ticket has the details of the customer who submitted it and the agent working on it. It also contains other valuable data such as tags, custom fields, notes, and replies with attachments. All of these dependencies make it harder to migrate data correctly. Simply because there are so many things you need to take into account.
But it doesn’t end there. Another challenge that you will need to consider is the actual method of migrating your data with minimal loss.
How can you import tickets to Freshdesk?
1. Writing your own migration script
You could try and use the API documentation to migrate data on your own. This could be an option if you have a developer who knows how API works and how to use it. But if you don’t, then you’ll have to spend some extra time looking for one.
Whichever option you choose, success isn’t guaranteed. Whoever you get to do the job must have a profound knowledge of the system you’re migrating from, and of Freshdesk itself. The slightest mistake in the code will result in delays and increased migration budget.
2. Using an automated data migration tool
Alternatively, you can use an automated data migration service. Help Desk Migration for Freshdesk allows you to import your data to Freshdesk in a couple of clicks. You don’t need to figure out the API and write your own script. You just have to follow the steps of the Migration Wizard. And the best part is that you can test your migration before moving all data.
What an automated data migration looks like
Step #1 Connecting the platforms
Go to Migration Wizard and create your account. Start with the platform you want to extract data from. Find your software on the list and enter the required credentials. Then do the same with the help desk you’re migrating to, in this case – Freshdesk.
Step #2: Choosing what data to migrate
Next up is choosing what data you want to migrate. Ideally, you should already know exactly what data you want to migrate. The list of records will differ depending on the platform you’re migrating from. For instance, some help desks allow exporting the knowledge base, and others don’t.
Check the boxes with the records you want to migrate and move on to the next step.
Step #3: Mapping ticket fields
Because some help desks have channels and ticket statuses that other help desks don’t, we offer the option of matching up ticket fields. After clicking the “Map ticket fields” button, you will see all the fields that you can map.
Note that if you want to import custom fields, you need to create the same custom fields in Freshdesk before the migration.
Go through each field and Save mapping when you’re done.
Bonus:
If you chose to migrate knowledgebase articles along with tickets, then you can match their statuses too.
Step #4: Trying the Demo
Moving all data right away sounds risky. That’s because it is. You need to import a small portion of data to test the process. That is exactly what the Free Demo Migration does. It takes up to 5 minutes and moves 20 tickets with all related data for you to see how it looks in Freshdesk. And as the name implies, it is completely free.
When you have your demo ready, click “View 20 records” to check how the tickets migrated.
Step #5: Migrating all data
Once everything is tested and looks good, it’s time to push the button. Sit back and wait for the migration to end.
What’s going to be left behind
As mightful as the API might seem, it can’t transfer everything. For instance, macros, canned replies will not migrate. Reports, views, workflow automation, will not migrate as well. Lastly, ticket attachments larger than 15MB will not migrate due to the requirements of the Freshdesk API.
So, there you have it. Now you know when data migration happens, why it’s complicated, and what you can do about it. Feel free to try our Free Demo. And if you have any questions about data migration, don’t hesitate to ask us. Happy migrating!
