Help desk vs CRM: which does a Kenyan small business need?

A help desk and a CRM answer different questions. A help desk shows what is going on with a customer’s problem, and a CRM shows where a buyer is on the way to paying. A help desk is built around tickets and a CRM around leads. A small business in Kenya that sells by phone and WhatsApp and then supports those customers by phone and WhatsApp needs both, and SautiDesk puts them in one product so a customer is one contact from the first enquiry to the hundredth ticket.

What is the difference between a help desk and a CRM?

The difference is the moment in the customer’s life each one covers. A CRM system, also called sales CRM software, tracks people who might buy: who they are, what they might spend, who owns the conversation and what happens next. A help desk tracks people who already bought, or who are asking a question: what they said, who answered and whether it is solved.

What does a help desk do for a small business?

A help desk stops customer messages getting lost. Every call, WhatsApp message, SMS, email and web chat from one customer joins one ticket with one owner, so nobody asks the customer to repeat themselves and nobody answers twice. A missed call opens a ticket on someone’s list, so someone rings back. What a ticketing system is explains the parts of a ticket, and how to choose help desk software lists what to check before you buy.

What does a CRM do for a small business?

A CRM keeps a pipeline of leads that a sales team works through. Each lead has a stage, a value in shillings, an owner and a next step, so the team can see how many leads sit in each stage and what they are worth. It shows which conversations need a nudge today. Without one, leads live in a notebook, a spreadsheet or one salesperson’s WhatsApp, and they leave with the phone.

Which one does your business need first?

Start with the one that matches the work that is slipping today. The list below gives the usual signs for each.

• Help desk first: customers complain they were asked the same thing twice, calls go unanswered, or two people replied to the same WhatsApp message.
• CRM first: enquiries arrive from ads, a website or walk-ins and nobody can say how many were followed up, or why deals were lost.
• Both: the same people sell and support, or a buyer becomes a regular customer who calls back about orders and deliveries. This describes most small shops, clinics, schools and service businesses.

Two separate products for a team of five means two bills, two logins and two copies of every customer, with one set of phone numbers that never matches the other. A team of five is better served by one list of contacts with tickets and leads hanging off each one.

How SautiDesk covers both

SautiDesk is a help desk and call centre first, and on Pro it adds a sales CRM with a lead pipeline and follow-ups. The same contact carries both: a customer who has a lead open and a ticket open has one record, with every call and message on it.

• A pipeline you can see. Leads sit in a column for each stage you set, with the number of leads and their total value at the top, or in a list. A lead ends as Won or Lost, and Lost asks why.
• Follow-ups that remind. Set a time for the next step. Its owner is reminded before it is due, when it is due and if it goes overdue, and supervisors are told if it stays overdue.
• Leads from where your buyers are. Press Create lead on a customer’s ticket or contact, import a CSV file of up to 500 rows, or let new conversations on a channel open a lead. Click to WhatsApp ads are the worked example.
• Calls and messages stay on the lead. A call or message sent from a lead is recorded on that lead, beside the customer’s earlier chat.
• Calling campaigns. Pro also includes calling campaigns that dial a list in pre-recorded, progressive or predictive mode, so the same team can work a list of leads by phone. Run your first calling campaign walks through it.

A lead records a name, a stage, a value in shillings, a hot, warm or cold temperature, a source, an owner, tags and a company. A contact has one open lead at a time, so a repeat enquirer never creates a duplicate.

What does it cost for five people?

SautiDesk has one price per person a month, and one plan for the whole workspace. A support-only team of five is on Basic. A team that also sells is on Pro, which is where leads, reports and campaigns are.

Incoming calls are free and outgoing calls are KES 0.05 per second, billed from a prepaid balance you top up by M-Pesa or card. A ten-minute outgoing sales call is KES 30. The pricing page has the full list and the calculator works out your own team size.

A week to run both in one place

1. Day 1. Connect your number, your WhatsApp Business number and your support email, and invite the team.
2. Day 2. Turn Sales on in Settings and name your stages, for example New, Quoted, Negotiating, Won and Lost.
3. Day 3. Import your existing list of enquiries as a CSV file, or press Create lead on the tickets from people who were asking to buy.
4. Day 4. Give every lead a value and a follow-up time, and agree who works leads and who works tickets.
5. Day 5. Read what is overdue: follow-ups first, then the oldest tickets, and reassign anything with no owner.

Start on SautiDesk

1. Pick Basic at KES 1,000 per person a month for tickets, or Pro at KES 3,000 per person if you also want leads, reports and campaigns.
2. Add your people and choose a Kenyan number for KES 500 a month.
3. Connect WhatsApp and your support email so every channel lands in one list.
4. On Pro, turn Sales on and set your stages.
5. Top up your balance by M-Pesa or card and take your first call in the browser.

Calls, WhatsApp, SMS, email and web chat are on both plans. See the pricing page, or read how WhatsApp customer service works as a team if your sales already happen in chat.