Gladly - Detailed Review
E-Commerce Tools
Gladly - Product Overview
Gladly Overview
Gladly is a customer-centric support software specifically designed for eCommerce brands, focusing on building loyalty and lifetime value with their customers.
Primary Function
Gladly’s primary function is to transform customer service by shifting the focus from tickets to people. It unifies all communication channels, including email, SMS, chat, social messaging, and voice, into a single seamless platform. This approach allows agents to have a complete view of each customer’s history, ensuring faster resolutions and more meaningful interactions.
Target Audience
The target audience for Gladly includes eCommerce brands and businesses looking to enhance their customer service experience. This includes companies aiming to build strong, lifelong relationships with their customers and improve overall customer satisfaction.
Key Features
Unified Communication Channels
Gladly integrates all communication channels into one platform, eliminating the need for separate tools and ensuring a cohesive customer interaction history.
Customer Profile and History
It provides a single, ticket-free view of a customer’s lifelong history with the brand, allowing agents to access all past interactions across different channels.
People Match and Skills
Gladly intelligently routes customers to agents based on real-time history, situation, or skills, ensuring that customers are matched with the most appropriate agents.
Self-Service and Knowledge Base
The platform offers personalized self-service options and a comprehensive knowledge base that empowers both customers and agents with high-quality, consistent help information.
Real-Time Reporting and Liveboards
Gladly includes real-time reporting and liveboards that provide live updates on contact center performance, agent activities, and trending customer topics.
Proactive Engagement
Features like proactive chat, voice, SMS, and email allow businesses to engage customers proactively with timely and relevant updates.
Integrations
Gladly integrates with various tools and platforms such as Shopify, Klaviyo, Attentive, and more, enhancing its functionality and usability.
By offering these features, Gladly helps eCommerce brands deliver personalized customer service, reduce response times, and increase customer loyalty.
Gladly - User Interface and Experience
User Interface of Gladly in E-Commerce
The user interface of Gladly, particularly in the context of e-commerce tools, is designed to be intuitive, streamlined, and highly user-friendly. Here are some key aspects of its interface and user experience:
Unified Communication Channels
Gladly integrates all communication channels, including email, SMS, chat, social messaging, and voice, into a single, seamless platform. This allows agents to view a customer’s entire interaction history in one place, organized chronologically, which simplifies the process of providing personalized support.
Single Customer Profile
Gladly creates a single customer profile that consolidates all interactions a customer has had with the company. This holistic view enables agents to see the customer’s name, address, contact details, order history, and previous conversations, making it easier to provide personalized and efficient customer service.
Streamlined Agent Interface
The platform allows customer service agents to collaborate seamlessly by sharing information, notes, and tasks. This collaborative agent interface helps resolve customer queries quickly and efficiently, improving service levels and customer satisfaction.
Real-Time Analytics and Reporting
Gladly provides real-time insights into customer interactions, agent performance, and overall customer satisfaction levels. This feature helps businesses make data-driven decisions and continuously improve their customer service operations.
Easy Setup and Integration
Gladly offers an out-of-the-box integration with various e-commerce platforms, such as BigCommerce and Shopify, which makes the setup process quick and straightforward. This integration does not require extensive technical resources, allowing businesses to get up and running in a matter of days.
Personalized Self-Service
The platform offers personalized self-service options based on the customer’s history and preferences. This includes features like order tracking, returns, and cancellations, all accessible through a unified interface.
Customizable Workflows and Automation
Gladly allows businesses to create customized workflows and automate repetitive tasks, such as ticket triaging, tagging, and follow-up reminders. This helps improve efficiency, reduce manual work, and ensure a consistent and personalized customer service experience.
User Experience
The overall user experience is highly positive, with users praising the ease of use and the efficiency it brings to customer service operations. Users have reported that Gladly is “super easy to use,” and it has significantly improved their work rate and response times. The platform’s ability to match customers with the right agents based on real-time history, situation, or skills further enhances the customer experience.
In summary, Gladly’s user interface is designed to be user-friendly, efficient, and highly integrated, making it easier for agents to provide personalized and effective customer service. The platform’s ease of use and comprehensive features contribute to a positive user experience for both agents and customers.
Gladly - Key Features and Functionality
Gladly Overview
Gladly, an AI-driven customer service platform, stands out for its people-centric approach, focusing on customers rather than tickets. Here are the main features and how they work, along with the benefits of each:Omnichannel Support
Gladly consolidates all customer interactions across multiple channels, including email, chat, SMS, Facebook Messenger, Instagram Messaging, and phone calls, into a single, continuous conversation. This unified view ensures agents have all the necessary context to provide personalized and seamless support, regardless of the channel the customer uses.AI-Powered Responses
Gladly integrates AI to enhance support efficiency. For instance, integrations like Gleen AI can resolve up to 70% of inquiries automatically, draft accurate responses, and escalate complex issues to live agents. This AI assistance reduces response times by 56% and ensures consistent, accurate answers.Customer Profile and Context
The platform provides a comprehensive customer profile that includes preferences, purchase history, and relationships. This real-time customer recognition enables agents to deliver highly personalized service, streamlining interactions and enhancing customer satisfaction.Ticket Management
Gladly manages customer interactions without the traditional ticketing system. Instead, it focuses on the customer’s lifelong conversation, ensuring that all interactions are linked and contextual. This approach helps in maintaining a continuous and personalized conversation with each customer.CRM Integration
Gladly integrates with various CRM systems and other external platforms like Shopify, Medallia Agent Connect, Klaviyo, and Magento. These integrations allow for seamless data exchange, ensuring that customer information and interaction history are always up-to-date and accessible to agents.Proactive Conversations
The platform offers features for proactive communications, including Proactive Chat, Voice, SMS, and Email campaigns. These tools enable businesses to reach out to customers proactively, providing updates or messages while they are on the website or through other channels. This helps in building stronger customer relationships and improving customer engagement.Multi-Language Support
Gladly supports over 90 languages, allowing businesses to provide support to a global customer base without the need for additional hires. This feature ensures that customer support is effective and seamless, regardless of the customer’s language.Smart Traffic Management
The platform allows for automatic routing of conversations between AI and live agents based on specific needs. This feature is particularly useful during peak periods, such as holiday rushes, or during off-hours, helping to manage agent workload efficiently.Help Center and FAQs
Gladly includes a Help Center feature where businesses can host FAQs and other information that customers can access. This feature supports multiple languages and helps in reducing the volume of incoming inquiries by providing customers with easy access to answers.Agent Experience
The platform offers various settings to manage agent-specific experiences, such as Agent Status, Conversation Workflow, and Idle Timing. These settings help in optimizing agent performance and ensuring that agents are always ready to assist customers effectively.Conclusion
In summary, Gladly’s AI-driven features and integrations work together to provide a highly personalized, efficient, and effective customer service experience. By centralizing customer interactions and leveraging AI for automated responses and smart traffic management, Gladly helps businesses build stronger customer relationships and improve overall customer satisfaction. Gladly - Performance and Accuracy
Evaluating the Performance and Accuracy of Gladly’s AI-Driven Customer Service Platform in the E-Commerce Sector
Performance
Gladly’s platform is built around a people-centered approach, focusing on the customer rather than tickets. This approach allows for more personalized and efficient customer service. Here are some performance highlights:Unified Customer Record
Gladly aggregates all customer interactions into a single lifelong customer record, which enhances the context available to both AI and human agents. This leads to faster resolutions and more personalized service.Agent Efficiency
The platform automates routine inquiries, allowing agents to focus on high-value interactions such as cross-selling and upselling opportunities. This automation helps in reducing agent handle times and improving overall efficiency.Customer Satisfaction
Gladly’s customers have reported faster resolutions, reduced agent handle times, and higher Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) scores, indicating improved performance in customer service.Accuracy
The accuracy of Gladly’s AI is a critical factor in its performance:AI Capabilities
Gladly’s AI is integrated to provide more accurate, human-like responses. The platform employs advanced hallucination detection technology to ensure AI-generated content remains factual and relevant.Quality Control
Gladly has rigorous quality control measures, including the ability to configure AI behavior to specific tone and brand guidelines. This ensures that the AI aligns with the brand’s voice and standards.Limitations and Areas for Improvement
Despite its strengths, there are some limitations and areas where Gladly could improve:Cost and Scalability
Gladly’s pricing is relatively high, with a minimum cost of $21.6K and a 10-agent minimum, which can be a barrier for smaller teams. The cost can also skyrocket as the team scales up, especially during busy seasons.AI Capabilities Compared to Competitors
Some competitors, like Gorgias, offer more advanced AI features that can adapt to brand voice and execute custom actions without the need for step-by-step rules. Gladly’s AI, particularly its Sidekick product, requires creating rules for every interaction and charges per conversation, even if the issue is not resolved.Integration and Automation
Gladly limits agents to just 12 variables, which can slow down support and reduce efficiency compared to platforms like Gorgias that offer over 35 Shopify data variables for more comprehensive automation.Onboarding and Setup
Setting up Gladly can be complex, especially for small teams with limited resources. This contrasts with more user-friendly and intuitive platforms like Gorgias. In summary, while Gladly’s platform offers significant improvements in customer service through its unified customer record and AI integration, it faces challenges related to cost, scalability, and the sophistication of its AI capabilities compared to some competitors. Addressing these areas could further enhance its performance and accuracy. Gladly - Pricing and Plans
Pricing Structure of Gladly
The pricing structure of Gladly, a customer service platform, is structured into several plans, each with distinct features and requirements. Here’s a breakdown of the available plans:
Support Hero Plan
- Price: $180 per user per month (or $150 in some sources, but $180 is the more commonly cited price).
- Minimum Requirement: You must enroll a minimum of 10 agent accounts, resulting in a total of $1,800 per month.
- Key Features:
- Access to all natively built-in channels including voice, IVR, self-service, text, chat, in-app chat support, social, and email.
- Integration with social platforms like Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
- E-commerce integrations with Shopify, Magento, Big Commerce, etc.
- Hybrid support leveraging agent support and AI-enabled answers.
- Single Sign On (SSO) using SAML.
- Unified answers database for customer self-service and help center.
- Ability to add agents for holidays or peak season and pay only for those months.
- Multi-channel communication and centralized customer view.
- Real-time and historical reporting, and seamless integration with existing apps.
Task User Plan
- Price: $38 per user per month.
- Role: This plan is for backend agents who are not customer-facing.
- Key Features:
- Assign internal tasks, follow-up reminders, proactive scheduling, and task alerts among teams.
- Access to the complete customer conversation history.
- SSO and access to the unified answers database.
- This plan does not include analytics dashboard or multi-channel communication features.
Free User Plan
- Price: Free.
- Role: This plan is for team members who need to manage teams and operations but are not customer-facing.
- Key Features:
- Viewing access to all customer information within Gladly.
- Access to the real-time Liveboard dashboard to monitor day-to-day contact center activity.
- Analytics and reports, including real-time metrics and detailed historical reports.
- SSO and access to the unified answers database.
- This plan does not include the Tasks feature or multi-channel communication.
Super Hero Plan
- Price: $210 per user per month.
- Minimum Requirement: You must enroll a minimum of 45 agent accounts.
- Key Features: This plan includes all the features of the Support Hero plan plus additional features tailored for larger teams and more complex operations. However, specific additional features are not detailed in the sources provided.
Personalized Consultation
- This is not a standard plan but an option to get a custom quote based on your business requirements. It involves a 15-minute personal meeting with a Gladly executive to assess your needs and provide a tailored demonstration.
Key Points
- No Free Trial: Gladly does not offer a free trial period, but you can request a free demo to explore its features.
- No Mobile Apps: Gladly is web-based and not compatible with tablets or mobile devices.
- Additional Costs: Some features, like custom reports, may incur extra costs.
This structure highlights that Gladly is geared towards businesses that need comprehensive, integrated customer service solutions, but it comes with a significant cost, especially for smaller organizations.
Gladly - Integration and Compatibility
Integration with External Tools
Gladly supports two primary types of integrations: Out Of The Box (OOTB) integrations and custom integrations.Out Of The Box (OOTB) Integrations
These integrations are pre-built by Gladly or its partners and require minimal setup and maintenance. They use a Lookup Adaptor to link partner apps to Gladly. Some notable OOTB integration partners include Shopify, Netomi, Stella Connect, BigCommerce, and Delighted. For example, the Delighted integration automatically syncs feedback from Delighted projects to matching customer profiles in Gladly, allowing for the creation of tasks based on survey responses.Custom Integrations
For more specialized needs, Gladly offers custom integrations using APIs and webhooks. These integrations can be set up with the assistance of Gladly’s Implementation team to customize the integration according to specific requirements.Compatibility with E-Commerce Platforms
Gladly integrates well with several e-commerce platforms to provide a unified view of customer interactions. For instance:Spree Integration
This integration allows customer service agents to access key customer details such as contact information, lifetime value, and real-time order history directly within Gladly. Agents can handle refunds, cancellations, and view product details, enabling more personalized customer interactions.Shopify Integration
Gladly’s OOTB integration with Shopify ensures that customer data and order details are seamlessly integrated into Gladly, enhancing the ability of customer service agents to manage customer inquiries efficiently.Browser and Operating System Compatibility
Gladly has specific compatibility requirements:Browser
Gladly is only compatible with Google Chrome, and users must ensure they have the latest version installed. Running Gladly on multiple browser tabs is not recommended as it can lead to undesired behaviors.Operating System
Gladly supports Windows 7 and later versions, as well as Mac OSX. For VM environments, browser redirection needs to be configured to enable Voice over webRTC.Hardware Requirements
To ensure optimal performance, Gladly has defined hardware requirements:Processor and Memory
A minimum of an Intel Core i3 processor and 4 GB of RAM is recommended. The system should be 64-bit with at least 500 MB of free memory.Headset
For Gladly Voice, hands-free headphones with a microphone are recommended. Wired headsets are preferred over wireless ones to avoid interference.Monitor
Gladly operates best on screens with a resolution of 1280px or wider. Screens with resolutions such as 1366×768 or higher are suggested for the best user interface experience. By integrating with various external tools and adhering to specific compatibility and hardware requirements, Gladly ensures that customer service agents have all the necessary information and tools to deliver exceptional customer experiences. Gladly - Customer Support and Resources
Gladly Customer Support Overview
Gladly, an AI-driven customer service platform, offers several comprehensive customer support options and additional resources to support its users, particularly in the e-commerce sector.Contacting Gladly Support
To get help from Gladly, administrators and team managers can directly contact the support team. Here’s how:Access the Support Form
Log into your Gladly account as a Team Manager or Administrator to access the Support form.Complete the Support Form
Be as detailed as possible when describing the issue. Select the correct Application Component Affected and Business Impact priority level to ensure your request is routed to the right team.Operating Hours
Support is available Monday to Friday, 6 AM to 6 PM Pacific Time. You can submit requests anytime, but responses will be based on the priority level chosen.Priority Levels and Response Times
Gladly has different priority levels with corresponding response times:Critical Business Impact
Platform outage or major issues preventing business operations. First response time is 1 hour for Premium users.Major Business Impact
Significant issues impacting multiple users but allowing limited work. First response time is 4 hours for Premium users.Partial Business Impact
Non-critical issues affecting a few users. First response time is the next business day for Premium users.Minimal Business Impact
Issues on non-production systems or general questions. First response time is 3 business days for Premium users.Additional Resources
Documentation and FAQs
Gladly provides extensive documentation and FAQs to help users resolve common issues. These resources cover topics such as why Gladly emails might be going to spam, how to create filters in Gmail, and troubleshooting the support form if it is not loading.Guides and Whitepapers
Gladly offers guides like the “Scaling Your Customer Service Center For High Growth in Ecommerce,” which provides insights into building and scaling a customer service center, including assessments, training, and the use of technology to enhance customer service.AI and Automation Tools
Gladly has introduced Gladly Sidekick, an AI and automation platform that works alongside Gladly Hero. Gladly Sidekick helps brands deliver personalized self-service, automate common customer service requests, and provide conversational responses using a no-code authoring solution.Integrations and Features
The platform integrates with various third-party tools such as Shopify, Medallia Agent Connect, Klaviyo, and more. It offers features like omnichannel support, CRM integration, ticket management, and live chat, all designed to centralize customer interactions and enhance agent efficiency. By leveraging these support options and resources, users of Gladly can effectively manage and resolve issues, ensuring seamless and personalized customer service experiences. Gladly - Pros and Cons
Advantages
Unified Customer View
Gladly centralizes all customer interactions across multiple channels, providing a continuous and lifelong conversation history. This enhances contextualization and personalization, allowing agents to deliver more meaningful and tailored service.
AI-Powered Responses
The software features an AI chatbot, Gladly Sidekick, which can handle complex interactions and automate routine queries, freeing up live agents for more complex tasks. This AI capability supports multiple languages and can trigger a sequence of steps to resolve customer issues efficiently.
Multi-Channel Support
Gladly offers omnichannel support, integrating with various platforms such as Shopify, Magento, and more. This ensures seamless engagement across different communication channels, enhancing agent empowerment and customer satisfaction.
Enhanced Staffing Efficiency
The software provides real-time visibility into agent activities, optimizes cross-channel staffing, and enables immediate adjustments to ensure adequate coverage for incoming customer requests. This improves staffing efficiency and decision-making.
Comprehensive Integrations
Gladly integrates with over 40 popular apps, including CRM systems like Salesforce and HubSpot, which adds significant functionality and flexibility to the platform.
Advanced Analytics and Reporting
The software offers extensive analytics and reporting capabilities, allowing businesses to track conversations, busy times, and other key metrics. This helps in making informed decisions and improving overall service efficiency.
Disadvantages
Cost
Gladly’s pricing can be steep, especially for smaller organizations. The Hero plan starts at $180 per month per user (with a minimum of 10 users), and the Superhero plan is $210 per month per user (with a minimum of 45 users).
No Free Trial or Plan
Unlike some other customer service platforms, Gladly does not offer a free trial or a free plan, which can be a barrier for businesses that want to test the software before committing.
Limited Mobile Accessibility
Gladly does not have mobile apps, which might limit the flexibility and accessibility for agents who need to manage customer service on the go.
Support Limitations
While the AI chatbot is highly capable, it may not always have the answer to complex or niche customer queries, requiring human intervention. This can sometimes lead to a delay in resolving customer issues.
Data Requirements
For AI tools to work effectively, they require a significant amount of customer data. If customers are unwilling to share this data, the insights generated may not be accurate or meaningful.
Overall, Gladly is a powerful tool for enhancing customer service through AI-driven solutions, but it comes with some notable costs and limitations that businesses should consider.
Gladly - Comparison with Competitors
When Comparing Gladly to Other AI-Driven Customer Service Tools in E-Commerce
Unique Features of Gladly
- Customer-Centric Approach: Gladly is distinguished by its focus on the customer rather than the ticket. It consolidates all customer interactions into a continuous, lifelong conversation, enhancing personalization and service efficiency.
- AI-Powered Responses: Gladly uses AI to provide engaging, conversational responses to routine queries, freeing up live agents for more complex tasks. It also offers real-time customer recognition, accessing a comprehensive view of customer details including preferences, purchase history, and relationships.
- Omnichannel Support: Gladly supports multi-channel interactions, ensuring seamless communication across various platforms such as live chat, email, and social media.
- Staffing Efficiency: The software optimizes cross-channel staffing by providing real-time visibility into agent activities and enabling immediate adjustments to ensure adequate coverage for incoming customer requests.
Alternatives and Competitors
Gorgias
- Multi-Channel Helpdesk: Gorgias integrates with e-commerce merchants’ back offices, allowing them to manage all support from one place. It automates up to 60% of customer inquiries and resolves common issues like shipping, returns, and order questions quickly.
- AI-Driven Automation: Gorgias trains an AI agent to learn the brand’s policies and voice, ensuring consistent support. However, it is more geared towards small to mid-sized businesses.
Kustomer
- Omnichannel Support: Like Gladly, Kustomer offers multi-channel support, but it is known for its strong focus on CRM integration and providing a unified customer view. It is a more comprehensive CRM solution that also handles customer service.
- Automation: Kustomer automates routine tasks and provides advanced analytics to improve customer service efficiency.
Trengo
- Business Communication: Trengo focuses on business communication across multiple channels, including email, chat, and social media. While it offers multi-channel support, it is less specialized in AI-driven customer service compared to Gladly.
Other AI-Driven Tools for E-Commerce
Lyro AI Chatbot
- 24/7 Customer Support: Lyro AI Chatbot provides instant customer support and shopping assistance using natural language processing (NLP). It continually learns from customer interactions to improve its responses but is more limited to chatbot functionalities compared to Gladly’s comprehensive customer service platform.
Nosto
- Personalized Shopping Experiences: Nosto creates personalized shopping experiences by analyzing customer behavior, preferences, and purchase history in real-time. While it enhances the shopping experience, it is more focused on marketing and product recommendations rather than customer service.
Key Differences
- Scope of Service: Gladly is a comprehensive customer service platform that centralizes all customer interactions, whereas tools like Gorgias and Lyro AI Chatbot are more specialized in specific aspects of customer support.
- AI Capabilities: Gladly’s AI is integrated deeply into its customer service model, providing AI-powered responses and real-time customer recognition. Other tools, like Nosto, focus more on personalization in marketing and product recommendations.
- Integration and Compatibility: Gladly integrates with a wide range of platforms including Shopify, Medallia Agent Connect, and Big Commerce, making it versatile for various e-commerce businesses.
Conclusion
In summary, while Gladly offers a unique customer-centric approach with advanced AI features, alternatives like Gorgias and Kustomer provide strong multi-channel support and automation capabilities. The choice between these tools depends on the specific needs and scale of the e-commerce business.
Gladly - Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions about Gladly
How do I block or stop Customers from contacting us?
If you need to block or stop customers from contacting you, such as in cases of abusive customers or spam, Gladly provides several methods to achieve this. You can manage this by adjusting settings within the platform. For example, you can block specific customers or set up rules to filter out unwanted contacts. Refer to the FAQ section on blocking or stopping customer contacts for detailed steps.
Why did I receive a chat while I was on a phone call?
You should not receive chats or other messaging requests while you are on a phone call. However, if this happens, it might be due to a misconfiguration of your availability settings. Ensure that your status is correctly set to “unavailable” when you are on a phone call to prevent this issue.
How do I adjust the time-out setting to be longer when reviewing interactions?
To adjust the time-out setting so you have more time to review interactions without being marked as idle, you can manage your Idle Timing settings. This allows you to extend the period before the system considers you inactive, giving you more time to review interactions without interruption.
Is Gladly compatible with Grammarly?
Gladly does not officially support Grammarly. While you might still be able to use Grammarly in some capacity, it is not integrated or supported by Gladly’s platform.
How do I delete a Customer Profile, Attachment, or Conversation item?
To delete customer data, such as profiles, attachments, or conversation items, you need to follow the data retention and deletion settings within Gladly. This ensures you comply with privacy and data regulations. Refer to the documentation on configuring data retention settings and data deletion options for step-by-step instructions.
How can I view Daily Contact Center Performance Trends in Gladly?
To monitor your contact center’s daily performance, you can use the Daily Trends Dashboard in Gladly. This dashboard provides an overview of key metrics and trends, helping you assess performance and make informed decisions. Check the section on the Daily Trends Dashboard for more details.
What are Gladly’s core routing concepts?
Gladly uses specific routing concepts to manage how customer interactions are assigned to agents. These concepts include time-based priority boosts, wait time, and due dates. Understanding these concepts can help you optimize how conversations are routed to your agents. Refer to the section on routing concepts for a detailed explanation.
How do I set up a new language on Gladly?
If you need to support multiple languages, you can set up new languages in Gladly. This involves adding and removing answer languages to ensure your customer service team can communicate effectively with customers in different languages. Check the documentation on adding and removing answer languages for the steps.
How do I integrate e-commerce platforms like BigCommerce with Gladly?
Gladly integrates seamlessly with e-commerce platforms like BigCommerce. This integration allows you to pull customer and order details directly into Gladly, enabling agents to manage orders, process refunds, and offer discounts without leaving the platform. The setup is quick and easy, typically taking only a few days without requiring technical resources.
How does Gladly’s AI enhance customer service?
Gladly’s AI-powered customer service platform automates routine inquiries, allowing agents to focus on high-value interactions. The AI provides accurate, human-like responses and ensures that agents have the context they need to be more effective. It also includes features like tone and brand guideline configuration and advanced hallucination detection to maintain factual and relevant AI-generated content.
How can I ensure SMS compliance to avoid carrier blocking?
To ensure SMS compliance and avoid carriers blocking your messages, you need to comply with SMS industry guidelines. Gladly provides guidance on SMS compliance requirements, which include understanding and adhering to specific rules and best practices for sending SMS messages.