In our research, we ended up trying dozens of alternative shared inbox tools like Zoko and we hope our research can help you make a better and more informed decision today.
Now, before we dive in, let’s learn a bit about Zoko and what are the features that make it good for ecommerce businesses.
What is Zoko?
Zoko is a shared inbox that lets you share your WhatsApp Business number with your entire team. Now, Zoko is a fairly simple tool and doesn’t offer too many features.
But if you’re a starter business who only needs canada mobile phone number list to share your WhatsApp Business number, Zoko can be a good fit. This might be quite an affordable option for you if you can stay within their tier limits for the basic plan.
Let’s look at some of the features that are offered by Zoko
Pricing:
$24.99/month for 500 monthly unique customers
Pros:
Affordable: If you can stay within the tier limits of their plans, Zoko can be quite an affordable solution for your business
Interact chat messages: You can send WhatsApp messages with response buttons that allow users to interact with the message
Ticket assignment: Improve team communication and accountability with ticket assignment depending on the type of query
Chatbots: Can create WhatsApp chatbots where users can respond to bot messages with specific numbers of keywords to get the desired information
Cons:
Basic functionality: Very basic in terms of functionality as it focuses completely on WhatsApp
Lack of integrations: Zoko is a basic tool and you may need to consider alternatives if you’re looking for better support with integrations
Can be expensive as chats increase: Since the pricing is based on the number of conversations, you can expect the costs to rise as the number of chats increase.
Top Zoko alternatives for your business
Zoko is a great tool without a doubt. They’ve focused their attention on perfecting their WhatsApp inbox solution. But it may not be the best solution for all businesses.
And from my observation, very few businesses support customers exclusively on WhatsApp.
We’ve covered both alternative WhatsApp inboxes and alternative omnichannel customer support inboxes in this list.
So if you’re a business owner overwhelmed by the number of customer messages from across channels, you can find the right solution for your business as well.
Top 10 Zoko alternatives
DelightChat
Front
Interakt
Twilio Flex
TimelinesAI
WATI
Trengo
Freshchat by Freshdesk
Messagebird
Helpwise
DelightChat: Manage WhatsApp Support + Marketing
DelightChat
DelightChat is an Omnichannel Helpdesk + WhatsApp Marketing Software built for SME brands that enables them to deliver out-of-the-box customer service. It’s designed with a conversation-first approach that enables you to manage your store’s support & painlessly resolve customer queries - all from a single screen.
Pros:
Omnichannel inbox that helps you manage WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook, Emails & Live Chat.
Complete WhatsApp Marketing suite - Send WhatsApp Broadcasts to your customer lists using Official API.
Get Official WhatsApp API access with free Green Tick application.
Automated WhatsApp notifications such as Abandoned Cart, Order Confirmation, Delivery Notifications & Cash on Delivery Order Verification.
DelightChat enables you to respond to customer queries & collaborate with your team, all from a single screen. No need to toggle between tabs, which leads to a loss in productivity & loss of work hours.
Cons:
For now, DelightChat only integrates with Shopify that allows it to access your Shopify admin dashboard data. However, it will soon be available for other ecommerce platforms like WooCommerce.
Sign up today for free!
Front
Frontapp is a collaborative team inbox tool that brings emails and messages from different channels together. It supports a wide variety of integrations ranging from Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Email to popular business tools.
It is built for small to medium businesses with a collaborative experience in mind. However, the tool is quite expensive compared to many on this list and it may not suit your needs if you’re looking for an affordable shared inbox.
Pricing:
Starts at $19/user/month for 10 members. Price per user increases as the number of team members increase
Pros:
Onboarding is fast and can be done within 2 days
Supports a lot of integrations with apps and business tools
Intuitive UI/UX with minimal learning curve.
Allows you to snooze emails making it easier to prioritize
Possible automation with rules and advanced workflow templates
Cons:
There are a lot of complaints about customer support from Front
The cost is very high even if you’re a small team
Need to know the keywords to search for canned responses. Not easily accessible
Interakt
Interakt is one of the most affordable official WhatsApp Business solution providers (BSP) on the list.
It offers a shared inbox for WhatsApp so your entire team can get online to assist with customer support. It also supports automated order notifications to users and good contact management on your admin dashboard.
Pricing:
INR 999/month or $15/month for unlimited logins
Pros:
Very affordable pricing compared to other providers
Shared team inbox and a live chat widget that directly connects customers over WhatsApp
Supports automated message templates and canned responses
Integrates with Shopify and Woocommerce to pull order details and display it on the chat screen
Cons:
Lack of support for other channels can be a deal breaker
Read on: Learn about the best Interakt alternatives for your business.
Twilio Flex
Twilio is one of the most well-known messaging and WhatsApp Business API services.
Built with developers in mind, it makes their lives easier and offers solid documentation for their APIs.
Twillio also offers a Flex Cloud Contact Center platform where you can combine voice, SMS, WhatsApp, live chat, and many other channels for a seamless customer service experience.
The Flex app is extensible and the features can be added or removed as per business requirements.
Pricing:
$1/user/hour or $150/user/month
Pros:
Supports phone calls, VoIP, messaging, WhatsApp, email and more.
Convenient pricing for starter businesses as you can get your work done at lower costs given the pay-as-you-go pricing.
Developer-oriented
Monitoring of sms and call status process is seamless.
Cons:
Needs technical knowledge to get started else you’ll need to connect with the support team at Twilio
Slower customer support
Deliverability suffers when you mass send messages or emails
Costs can skyrocket as you scale up since there is no fixed pricing
TimelinesAI
TimelinesAI is a popular shared WhatsApp inbox that helps your team manage multiple WhatsApp business numbers from one dashboard.
It works best for teams that interact a lot with clients through different channels over a long period of time, and you want to keep all this knowledge in the same place, shareable and available for all team members.
Pricing:
$25/month billed yearly for 1 WhatsApp number and 5 team members
Pros:
You can manage and collaborate with other team members from the same screen
If you have multiple WhatsApp numbers, TimelinesAI allows you to add them
All your chats are backed up in the cloud
You can integrate with existing CRM tools using Zapier
Cons:
Can only work with WhatsApp and does not integrate with social media or Email channels
As your team grows, the cost of using Timelines can grow as well
Customizations of any sort are locked for business plan users
WATI
WATI is a WhatsApp Business Solutions Provider (BSP) and customer support tool owned by Clare.ai.
Customers can apply for the WhatsApp Business API through them and use their shared inbox tool for customer support.
It also offers a no-code chatbot builder to automate customer responses and to create conversation flows.
Built for B2C businesses of all sizes, WATI is a great customer support tool if you only need to respond to customers on WhatsApp.
Price:
$40/month billed yearly for 5 agents. No free trial.
Pros:
After getting access to the WhatsApp API, the support team handles the complete integration
The support team assists in each step of the onboarding process
You can create team structures within WATI with its team and user management features
Create chatbots and conversation flows to speed up responses to common questions and offer solutions instantaneously
Cons:
If you support customers on any other platform, you’d still need to purchase an additional CRM tool.
It responds based on keywords and cannot continue conversations. For the flow builder, you need to pay an additional $49 monthly fee.
Read on: Learn about the best Wati alternatives for your business.
Trengo
Trengo is one of the well-known helpdesk tools in the list.
It is an expensive software where the initial costs may seem lower but increase as you add multiple addons to your shared inbox.
However, the pricing is compensated by their well-thought-out user interface, and a lot of integrations. So depending on your budget and feature requirements Trengo may suit your business well.
It also allows you to merge Email, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, SMS, voice, live chat and many more applications in one place.
Pricing:
