Initiate Client Contact via Email by Specific Product (Variant of Compose Email) : Freshdesk

Tyson

started a topic over 5 years ago

Use case scenario:

We support multiple products/services. For one of our products/services our work flow is as follows:

Client signs up for service
Implementation team gathers information for setup of service
Service is setup via phases: 1-3
Development works on phase 1
Phase 1 completed, customer must be notified and prompted for more interaction to move on to phase 2. CLIENT IS SENT NEW EMAIL
Work flow repeats as above for all phases until service is fully implemented for client.

We need to track these email communications via a central support tool. Previously it has been done via standard email, but that isn't scaleable as we need agents to be able to reassign tasks or shift responsibilities by assigning the work to other team members. For the new agent to jump in, they need to see the client interaction history. Using Freshdesk for this would be ideal as the ticket will track client interaction and keep a central history of interaction. Currently email is sent from one agent to the client and then the agent cc's all other agents who may need to back them up. This is terrible because it generates so much email noise and isn't an automated or complete contact history based on a number of factors.

We MUST have a tool/process for centralizing this client communication that looks and feel like email to the client but functions as a Freshdesk ticket on our side.

I've attempted to use a combination of Dispatcher rules and custom ticket fields to create a ticket that looks like it is composing email to the client, but have hit two significant road blocks.

Ideally, there will just be an expanded specific feature that address this issue/workflow, but if there isn't then the next best solution will be to expand the function of the Dispatcher rules to address the two primary roadblocks I've encountered.

My current "work-a-round" solution that is close, but not close enough for actual use:

Agent that needs to initiate client contact creates a new ticket
In the new ticket it is filled out with the following method:
Requester = Email To (Recipient)
The Ticket Subject = Email Subject
The Ticket Description = Email Body
Agent sets a custom field to "Initiate New Email" (arbitrarily named)

Then I have a Dispatcher Rule set that any new tickets with the custom field set to "Initiate New Email" will then have an action of Send Email to Requester, formatted with the following email placeholders: Subject = {{ticket.subject}}, Body = {{ticket.description}}. The client then gets an email with the details without a "RE:" in the subject line and it looks very close to the way we need it with two deal breaking exceptions.

Two Primary Problems:

The sent from address isn't product specific. So the client receives the email from our Global Support Email. This is a major deal breaker as we need the reply to address to be product and group specific.
We will often need to send these new email messages to a group of stakeholders in the client's organization. We commonly have to send these new email/tickets to 2-6 recipients. We we attempt to use the "Add CC" feature in the New Ticket process in Freshdesk it send an email formatted with: "RE:" added to the subject line, and this line "{{Agent}} submitted a new Ticket to {{The Support Center}} and requested that we copy you"

Thus, if the new email composition feature can't be added, I'd request the following features be added to work with our Dispatcher work flow:

Select a "From/Reply to Address" in Dispatcher -I feel this should be added regardless in order to make Freshdesk better at Multi-brand support.
Add the ability to have multiple requesters on a ticket, that way the dispatcher rule would work and we wouldn't need to use the "add CC" feature. -I feel this should be added regardless, as it is common that a ticket will be worked on for multiple client contacts and it would be nice to search a client history and see all the issues they had input on even if they weren't/aren't the ticket's primary "Requester"
Add the ability to change the canned response for every automated reply from the Freshdesk system. We can change almost every thing else, why can't we change the "Add CC" notification format?

As it stands, I can't fully migrate all my agents to Freshdesk until this work-flow is addressed.

Tyson

said over 5 years ago

Forgot to add that I need to be able to attach things to the email, so the "Compose Email" feature, whenever it is rolled out is my only option for this workflow.

Janani Pt Srinivasan

Admin

said over 5 years ago

Hi Tyson,

Thank you explaining your usecase and the problems that you have with the current implementation.

Compose email feature will address all of your concerns. You can :

1) select one requester [to keep conversation and threading of responses with each customer separate]

2) add multiple people in cc.

3) send attachments along with the email

4) Select from address from which you want to send out the email [you can pick one from the list of verified support email addresses]

We will also be including the ability to customise the cc notification content and configure one for each language. This one isn't tied to the compose feature but is being worked on separately. The development is nearly complete and we'll be releasing a beta version next month. Thank you for your patience with us, Tyson. Request you to extend it just a little longer.

Aravind Sundararajan

Admin

said over 2 years ago

Hello,

The outbound email option is now available in Freshdesk. Using this, the agents can send emails to users, attach files and include canned responses and a lot more! Please read this article to know more about the feature. In addition to this, you can also use ticket templates to pre-fill the ticket form for frequent scenarios.

The notifications sent to the CCd users can also be customised under Admin -> Email notifications -> CC notifications section.

Cheers!