Enterprise software company Jive is launching a Social Customer Service software, which aims to help enterprises manage all things customer service while also tapping into social channels like Facebook and Twitter.
As you may know, Jive is one of the giants on the social enterprise space. Modeled to offer Facebook-like features to enterprises, Jive’s software combines computing with social collaboration to offer fully-featured social networks for businesses. Its suite of applications help businesses collaborate on a variety of tasks, including holding discussions, communication, sharing documents, blogging, running polls, social networking features and more.
Jive claims that their customer service platform is one of the more full-fledged, comprehensive applications on the market. Jive says that the software supports not only external customer communities but also internal team communities where customer service teams can share expertise and collaborate to resolve customer cases. The two communities are connected so that customer service teams can communicate easily with the customer community.
The application features integration with existing, CRM and case management systems; Facebook connectors that automatically pull customer questions on the company’s fan page into the customer community and pushes answers back to the Facebook page, as well as social media monitoring and engagement so that agents can spot and respond to concerns on Twitter, Facebook and other channels.
Jive also connects with Outlook, and has added elements of game mechanics that encourage and reward active participation in customer service communities (powered by Bunchball. Additionally, customers and service agents can participate in their communities, post questions, access resources and participate in discussions direct from their mobile devices, including iOS and Android.
We’re told the application is currently in private beta and will be broadly available at the end of the first quarter.
It’s not surprising that Jive is making a big push into the help desk market, considering the explosion of the space. Customer service SaaS applications are proving to be a competitive (and potentially lucrative) market. Zendesk has seen pretty significant success with its offering, and Get Satisfaction is also a leader in powering customer service communities. And Salesforce recently debuted its full-fledged customer service software, Desk.com.