Customer Experience Platforms: Guide and Best Software

Competition is so fierce in many markets today that your product or service alone isn’t always enough to stand out. This often makes the customer experience a critical competitive differentiator.

Businesses are striving to create better user experiences, strengthening every touchpoint across both in-store and online interactions, to attract and retain new customers.

While this sounds straightforward, it’s no easy task. Fortunately, there are some outstanding customer experience (CX) platforms that can help your business identify potential pain points, optimize the customer journey, and create new and improved customer interactions.

In this article, you’ll learn what customer experience platforms are, key features to look for, and questions to consider before making your choice. You’ll also get a list of the best software out there, including key features, pricing, and who it’s best for.

Key takeaways:

• Customer experience (CX) platforms offer a wide range of features that help businesses improve the user experience throughout the entire customer journey.
• Many CX platforms focus heavily on improving and facilitating customer support.
• Cloud-based CX platforms like CloudTalk are versatile, offering advanced features at affordable costs to help businesses improve CX without breaking the bank.

What Is a Customer Experience Platform?

Customer experience platforms — commonly called “customer experience software” or “customer experience tools”— help businesses improve client experiences with their brand. CX platforms do this by collecting or assessing customer data (or both) so you know exactly what drives customers or deters them from coming back. 

Many leading CX tools focus on customer support and communication with features like live chat for customers or streamlined and automated workflows for support agents.

Must-Have Customer Experience Platform Features

When choosing a CX platform, it’s important to consider your individual business needs. Some brands might prioritize AI workflows, for example, while others care more about available integrations with specific tools already in their tech stack.

That said, many businesses benefit from choosing customer experience software with these features: 

• Omnichannel support across multiple channels, including voice, video, SMS messaging, live chat, and potentially even social media channels
• Integrations with popular customer relationship management (CRM) software for a unified customer view and complete customer profiles
• Integrations with help desk or knowledge base software for self-service options 
• Advanced Analytics and Reporting, ideally including analytics based on customer feedback and call data
• Call center solutions
• Advanced call options, including Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and Smart Call Routing 
• Intuitive Dashboard with Real-Time Data 
• High uptime reliability and call quality 
• Ease of use, with a quick time-to-value even for non-technical users who may be overwhelmed with an existing tech stack
• AI-powered tools like chatbots or workflow automation

Questions to Consider When Selecting Customer Experience Management Software

Before you start looking at different software options, ask yourself the following questions:

• What does your existing tech stack look like, and which tools do you already use that impact your customer experience or CX software?
• Which channels are part of your customer journey?
• What are your goals for the CX software, and what do you want it to help you accomplish?
• Are there specific features you need from a CX tool, such as collecting customer data or supporting personalized experiences for individual customers? 
• How much can you afford to spend on a new CX solution? 

Answering these questions can help you better understand what you need and what to look for in a solution.

7 Best Customer Experience Management Platforms

Ready to find a customer experience management platform that’s right for you? We’ve compiled seven of the best CX platforms on the market in 2024 to give you a jump start on the research process.

#1  CloudTalk

CloudTalk is a versatile cloud-based communication platform used by small businesses and large enterprises alike. Its strength lies in its comprehensive sales and call center software—giving you the flexibility to automate CX, save time, and increase efficiency. 

With CloudTalk, you can create intuitive and customized call flows that connect your customers to the right agents every time. Plus, you can make real-time adjustments to automations so you never miss a call again.

 Key features:

• Outstanding call quality and reliability for voice and video
• AI-powered data collection and analytics to better understand the customer experience
• Integration with key CRM systems for improved customer information access and enhanced support personalization
• AI conversation intelligence features that include auto-summaries, Topics Extraction to identify key trends impacting customer success, and Sentiment Analysis 
• Advanced call options like Interactive Voice Response and Smart Call Routing 
• Expansive integrations with other popular CX tools, including Zoho CRM, Zendesk, HubSpot, Zapier, and more 

Pricing:

• Starter: $25 per agent
• Essential: $30 per agent
• Expert: $50 per agent
• Custom pricing 

Best for: 

CloudTalk is a great choice for organizations of all sizes looking for cloud-based solutions to optimize their productivity—while providing full employee and agent support. 

#2 Zendesk

Zendesk is an incredibly popular help desk and customer support platform. The platform relies on a customer support ticketing system, though they also offer knowledge base tools for self-service customer support options.

Key features:

• Intuitive customer support ticketing system
• Easy-to-use knowledge base software
• Simple configuration and code-based configuration options available 
• Features designed to streamline personalized support for individual customers 
• Integrates with many other CX tools
• Available Zendesk bots to offer omnichannel support around the clock

Pricing:

• Zendesk’s Suite Team: $55 per agent/month
• Suite Growth: $89per agent/month
• Suite Professional: $115 per agent/month
• Suite Enterprise: Custom pricing 

Best for:

Zendesk is an ideal solution for small and medium businesses looking for ticketing-based customer support solutions that can handle simple and complex customer concerns. 

#3 Nextiva

Nextiva is a popular cloud-based communication platform specializing in omnichannel support. For example, it has features like live chat, SMS messaging, and social media messaging through platforms like WhatsApp or Messenger. It offers decent analytics that help you understand customer behavior and preferences. The interface is straightforward, and the security features are reliable. 

Key features:

• Optional integration with Nextiva’s VoIP platform, which includes voice and video call and conferencing options 
• AI-powered live chat solutions 
• Customer service reporting and analytics designed to improve agent performance
• Advanced call routing and forwarding features 
• Automated workflows and workforce engagement management to improve agent productivity
• Omnichannel support options for call centers 

Pricing: 

Nextiva’s customer experience management (CXM) pricing doesn’t include VoIP services

• Digital plan: $20 per user/month
• Core plan: $30 per user/month
• Engage plan: $40 per user/month
• Power Suite plan: $60 per user/month

Best for: 

Nextiva is a good choice for large enterprises or call centers looking for omnichannel support solutions. 

#4 Medallia

Medallia is a customer experience management software that focuses on customer journey personalization.  It covers all the bases for gathering and analyzing customer feedback from different sources. Its powerful data analytics help businesses turn feedback into actionable insights, but it can require a steep learning curve due to the range of utilities, tabs, and metrics. 

Key features:

• Comprehensive feedback-capturing abilities with multiple collection and analysis options
• Self-service options for complex global processes and systems
• AI and machine-learning predictive analytics 
• Employee learning opportunities from detailed feedback with personalized reporting options 
• Improve omnichannel customer touchpoints 
• Unified customer views 

Pricing:

• Custom pricing

Best for:

Medallia is a great solution for large businesses with IT support teams who want to invest in personalized customer journeys.

#5 HubSpot Service Hub

HubSpot is one of the most popular CRM platforms on the market, and it also offers suites of tools for sales, marketing, and operational functions. HubSpot Service Hub is known for its incredible segmentation features, and existing HubSpot users may benefit from access to customer insights within a single dashboard. 

Key features: 

• Real-time feedback based on customer interactions 
• Easily track customer behavior and offer support based on the customer journey
• Simple but effective ticketing system to resolve customer concerns 
• Email and chat to issue ticket support 
• Simple automation, knowledge base software, and multiple ticket pipelines available with paid plans

Pricing:

HubSpot’s free plan includes a basic ticketing system, live chat, email templates, and simple reporting.

• Service Hub Professional plan: $90 per seat/month, with a one-time onboarding fee of $1,500.
• Enterprise plan: $150 per seat/month

Best for:

Small businesses on tight budgets looking for streamlined chat and email support solutions can benefit from HubSpot’s free plan. Meanwhile, large organizations can benefit from advanced features and seamless integration across Hootsuite’s different product hubs.

#6 Adobe Experience Manager

Adobe Experience Manager helps you manage and optimize digital experiences across multiple channels. It leverages automation and specialized tools to help brands source, adapt, and deliver assets across diverse channels to create stronger customer experiences and detailed customer resources. For instance: help desk support, installation tutorials, and customer success content. 

Key features:

• Digital asset management system
• Quickly adapt and deliver content through diverse cross-channel platforms
• Learning management system that integrates with your site to engage customers 
• Scale product and business documentation to create thorough customer resources 

Pricing:

• Custom pricing

Best for:

Organizations that need support managing, improving, and adapting customer-facing content and documentation. 

#7 Zoho

Zoho stands out for its affordability and comprehensive feature set. It offers tools for customer feedback management, analytics, and customer journey mapping, all integrated into a single platform. Zoho’s customization options also let you tailor the software to your specific needs—so you can improve collaboration and data sharing across teams in large organizations.

Key features: 

• Unified customer experience platform that integrates with Zoho’s CRM and other suites of tools
• Personalized customer journey support 
• Create cross-channel campaigns and leverage omnichannel support 
• Automated and streamlined support processes to improve agent productivity
• Cross-departmental customer views 
• Custom mobile app and desktop applications 
• Detailed customer data platform with advanced analytics, including pipeline monitoring 

Zoho’s customer experience tools are part of their CRM enterprise software. 

Pricing:

• Custom pricing

Best for:

Large enterprises already using Zoho or that are looking for advanced customer support tools with diverse functionality.  If you’re a small business that relies heavily on third-party apps, you might want to look for a platform that lets you automate across integrations. 

Boost CX With the Best Customer Experience Software

CX tools can be a powerful asset for businesses looking to improve essential customer support metrics, including customer satisfaction score (CSAT) and net promoter score (NPS). Whether you’re a call center monitoring for improved success or a small business trying to create a competitive advantage through stronger customer experiences, CX software can benefit you.

There are plenty of different tools on the market, so it’s important to choose the platform that’s best for you. Zendesk, for example, is best for businesses looking for scalable ticketing-based support solutions; while Nextiva is a powerful omni-channel communication platform well-suited for large enterprises. 
While each tool has its own pros and cons, CloudTalk is the most well-rounded solution. You can create an incredible all-around customer experience without the need for external IT support or coding—and get started for free.