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Hiver takes great pride in its position as the pioneer in the global market for help desk solutions that are centred on Gmail. The seamless integration it provides within Google Workspace is what sets it apart from other similar products. This eliminates the need for any additional software installations that could be cumbersome. Using my own personal experiences with a variety of help desk platforms, such as FreshDesk and ZenDesk, which cater to teams with anywhere from three to thirty members, I am able to affirm that Hiver stands out as the most exceptional email help desk system that I have encountered throughout my journey.
Its unparalleled synchronisation with Gmail, which guarantees a streamlined user experience, is the particular feature that sets it apart from other similar products. In contrast to other platforms, Hiver significantly reduces the amount of hassle that is associated with the setup process, providing users with a learning curve that is almost nonexistent. When a platform is able to function without any interruptions within the environment that is already familiar to Google users, it is a demonstration of how user-friendly and efficient it is.
Given that I have placed my data within the Google ecosystem, the dependability of Hiver becomes an extremely important consideration. In contrast to some alternatives, such as FreshDesk, the performance of Hiver is superior to what was anticipated. In addition to boosting productivity, the seamless integration with Gmail also contributes to an increase in the overall level of user satisfaction. When it comes down to it, Hiver is the best option for anyone looking for a sophisticated and user-centric email help desk solution because it delivers on its promises.
Hiver Specification
The email collaboration platform known as Hiver was developed with the intention of assisting teams in more effectively managing shared inboxes. It integrates without any problems with Gmail and provides a wide range of features that can help to improve visibility, streamline communication, and increase operational efficiency.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Shared Inboxes | Convert any Gmail label or folder into a shared inbox that multiple team members can access and collaborate on. This eliminates the need for forwarding emails and ensures everyone is on the same page. |
| Email Delegation | Easily assign emails to specific team members based on their expertise or workload. This ensures the right person handles each email promptly. |
| Internal Notes & Discussions | Add private notes and have threaded discussions directly within emails. This keeps all relevant information and context organized within the email itself. |
| Email Templates & Canned Responses | Create and share reusable email templates and canned responses to save time on frequently sent emails. |
| Follow-ups & Reminders | Set reminders for yourself and others to follow up on important emails and ensure no task slips through the cracks. |
| Reporting & Analytics | Gain insights into team email activity with detailed reports and analytics. Track individual and team performance, identify bottlenecks, and improve overall email workflow. |
| Integrations | Connect Hiver with various CRMs, project management tools, and other popular apps to streamline your workflow further. |
| Visit Website |
What is Hiver?
To engage in meaningful interactions with their customers, employees, and vendors, businesses that use Google Workspace can take advantage of Hiver, a powerful communication and collaboration platform. Hiver enables businesses to engage in these interactions. Teams that use Hiver are able to manage multichannel communication in an effective manner, provide self-service, automate grunt work, integrate with their preferred applications, ensure that they are in compliance with service level agreements (SLAs), and gain real-time performance insights. All of these capabilities are necessary for teams to achieve better business outcomes. Gmail is the only email service I intend to use forever.
Hiver review: Features
The fact that Hiver can function as a help desk directly from your email is the primary selling point of the product. Based on the information provided on the features page, this indicates that if your team has a shared inbox, it is able to transform emails into “actionable tasks.” A user’s ability to tag and/or prioritise messages is available to them. They even have the ability to tag other users in notes, which facilitates collaboration on problems.
Through the use of permalinks, Hiver also allows for the sharing of emails with other departments and with other members of the team. Similar to the process of sharing a Google document, it is simple to grant or revoke editing rights to specific users. Switching to Hiver comes with a number of benefits, one of which is the fact that the company provides specialised mobile applications, which allow your agents to maintain their connection even when they are away from the office. Both iOS and Android versions of these are currently available.
Hiver review: Interface
Since Hiver is built into Gmail, it might help to think of it as an improvement to your Google Workspace. In their video tour of the UI, they make a lot of noise about how well features fit into Gmail. For example, they talk about how they can help customers through different channels, like WhatsApp. You can also use the “Activity” pane in emails to assign and keep track of people who have asked for help.
The good news is that if you and your team are already comfortable with Gmail and the interface, it will take you almost no time to learn how to use it. Hiver also has a page for managing their workflow, which shows all active conversations in your shared inbox and makes it easy to see what tasks have been assigned to your team. You can also sort conversations by things like team member with just one click of the mouse.
Hiver review: Security
Hiver has a section on their website called “Security Centre.” Since it’s built on top of Gmail, we were glad to see that it answered one of our first questions right away: the company doesn’t store your emails on its servers; Google does that. But they do store some metadata, like the subject line of emails. They say that “raw” email data is stored temporarily and encrypted until it is synced across all Gmail accounts. Once that is done, the data is deleted for good.
Hiver also says that they have regular security audits from outside sources. All of their data is stored in the US by AWS (Amazon Web Services). So, their data centres get all the safety features that Amazon offers, like security systems that are on duty 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and fire suppression systems. All of Hiver’s servers have network firewalls, and all data sent to or from Hiver is encrypted with 128 bits of SSL. On SSL Labs tests, their application endpoints get a “A+” grade. They only use TLS/SSL.
Hiver review: Support
The Help Centre that is dedicated to Hiver provides users with helpful guides on a variety of topics, including how to set up your email account and how to integrate a WhatsApp channel into Gmail. In addition, the Resource Centre includes a few benchmark reports and a couple of e-books on various topics, such as how to use Gmail as a help desk.
Despite the fact that these are helpful, the resources that are available appear to be quite limited in comparison to the other help desk providers that we have examined. Regardless of the pricing plan that you select, all users are provided with onboarding support as well as assistance via e-mail and chat around the clock. However, priority support is only available to subscribers of the most expensive ‘Elite’ plan. This support includes callbacks and your very own ‘Success Manager’.
Conclusion
“Hiver” means “winter” in French, which makes me think of how “Hiver” could be the time of change for your business. ‘Hiver’ might be the best choice if you’re already used to Google Workspace and want a quick and easy way to set up a help desk. From my own experience, adding a help desk to an already-existing platform can make things a lot easier.
‘Hiver’ is different because it makes managing tickets easy, and extra features like live chat and giving tasks to other users really make the experience better overall. The pricing plans are also pretty fair, starting at just $15 per agent per month. ‘Hiver’ is a great choice for people who want to deal with the winter of organizational problems because it is both affordable and has a lot of useful features.
Hiver review: The Good and Bad
You are able to set up your help desk entirely from within Gmail with the help of Hiver. There is a reasonable price point, and it is easy to use, provided that you are willing to trust Google with a greater amount of your customer data.
The Good
- Seamless collaboration in a shared inbox environment.
- Efficient email assignment and tracking.
- Collision detection prevents overlapping efforts.
- Enhanced internal communication with email notes.
- In-depth analytics for better team performance insights.
The Bad
- Learning curve for new users.
- Some advanced features may require additional training.
- Limited integration options with certain third-party apps.
Questions and Answers
The customer service solution known as Hiver is based on Gmail and is designed to facilitate collaboration among teams located throughout an organization using shared inboxes such as services@, orders@, and support@. Due to the fact that it operates directly within Gmail, it is the most natural and frictionless method for teams to handle customer email communication.
Even when they are on the move, teams are able to maintain their connection to one another, remain productive, and provide outstanding customer service thanks to the brand-new Hiver mobile apps for iOS and Android.