Delivering a quality customer experience is the top priority of businesses today. And to keep up with the emerging market trends, companies rely on the best customer experience management software.
So, in the competitive market, how do you decide which one is actually best for you that meets your business requirements without exceeding your budget?
Well, in this blog, we have handpicked the 10 best customer experience management software solutions along with their quick summary, pricing, pros, and cons.
✨ Key Takeaways
- Customer experience management software is a set of tools that allows businesses to manage and improve how they interact with customers across various channels.
- The best customer experience management software is Zendesk, Freshworks, Birdeye, Survicate, Tidio, Podium, ZohoCRM, Sprinklr, Hiver, and Qualtrics XM.
- The primary criteria to choose a customer service experience management tool include core features, ease of use and setup, scalability and pricing, integration capabilities, feedback and reputation tools, and target audience fit.
What is customer experience management software?
Customer Experience Management (CEM/CXM) software brings together data from different customer touchpoints, such as calls, chats, emails, social media, and in-store visits, so companies can see the whole customer journey at once.
Instead of handling each channel separately, this software connects every interaction in one place to provide consistent support, fix issues, and build stronger relationships. More than just collecting feedback, it gives teams the tools to act on it and automatically assigns tasks or follows up directly with the customer.
Its primary purpose is to consider customers’ needs and address them one by one to increase customer lifetime value, revenue growth, higher retention rates, competitive advantage through positive word-of-mouth, and a strong customer-centric culture.
How do we evaluate this software?
We evaluated each customer experience management solution using a consistent, repeatable process designed to surface real-world value, technical capabilities, and fit for different business sizes.
Our review combined hands-on testing, vendor documentation, pricing analysis, and comparison against industry-standard benchmarks.
We prioritized features that directly impact customer outcomes, omnichannel support, feedback collection and analytics, AI assistance (for automation and personalization), integration ability with common CRMs and business tools, ease of deployment and use, and total cost of ownership.
For transparency on our procedures and periodic updates, see our detailed content update and review policies: Content update methodology, Software review methodology, and Content integrity statement.
10 best customer experience management software
| Software | Key Features | Ideal For | Free Trial |
| Zendesk | Workflow automation, omnichannel support, and AI automation | Mid-to-large businesses | Yes |
| Freshworks | Omnichannel engagement, analytics, and AI chatbots | SMBs and enterprises | Yes |
| Birdeye | Review management, surveys, and messaging | Local businesses, service firms | No |
| Survicate | Customer feedback, NPS surveys, integrations | SaaS, e-commerce, B2B | Yes |
| Tidio | Live chat, AI chatbots, CRM integrations | SMBs, e-commerce stores | Yes |
| Podium | Messaging, review requests, and payments | Local businesses, SMBs | No |
| Zoho CRM | Sales & marketing automation, analytics | SMBs to large enterprises | Yes |
| Sprinklr | Social listening, CX analytics, AI insights | Large enterprises, global brands | No |
| Hiver | Email-based support, team collaboration | SMBs using Google Workspace | Yes |
| Qualtrics XM | Advanced analytics, experience management | Enterprises, research-focused | No |
1. Zendesk
Zendesk is a popular customer experience platform that offers advanced features and scalability for businesses of all sizes. It provides a wide range of tools and features that are designed to help businesses manage and improve all aspects of customer interaction.
It delivers personalized and efficient customer experiences across multiple channels. It helps businesses personalize customer interactions by providing agents with access to a complete view of the customer’s history and preferences.
Additionally, it also enhances customer loyalty and the bottom line of customer experience software with its complete CX solution designed for the AI era.
Pros:
- It supports a wide range of tools for various support channels.
- It is highly scalable as it is designed to handle growing business needs.
- It supports multiple languages to serve customers worldwide.
Cons:
- It has a high cost for premium features.
- It offers limited customization for lower-priced plans.
- Its extensive features can be overwhelming for new users.
Why we picked Zendesk: We included Zendesk due to its strong focus on customer service and ability to scale with business needs. It also offers a wide range of AI-powered features like AI Copilot and AI agents. Zendesk uses all of your customer interactions (AI agent and human agents) to identify areas for improvement and help you evolve in response to your customers’ needs.
Zendesk Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Support Team | $25 | $19 |
| Suite Team | $69 | $55 |
| Suite Professional | $149 | $115 |
| Suite Enterprise | $219 | $169 |
2. Freshworks
Freshworks is a popular customer engagement platform that is designed to simplify support and improve interactions across multiple channels. It offers an interactive interface and products that are customized for businesses of all sizes. It allows companies to manage customer queries via email, chat, phone, and social media from a single dashboard.
The Freshworks platform features AI-powered automation to help teams enhance customer care and personalization. Its features, like self-service, predictive analytics, and workflow automation, make it a strong choice for organizations that aim to improve efficiency and customer satisfaction.
Pros:
- It has a user-friendly interface with a minimal learning curve.
- It offers AI-powered tools like chatbots and predictive insights.
- It has affordable pricing with multiple tiers for different business needs.
Cons:
- Limited customization on entry-level plans.
- Advanced reporting features may require higher plans.
- Some users report delays in customer support response times.
Why we picked Freshworks: We included Freshworks for its balance of simplicity, powerful features, and affordability. It provides enterprise-level AI-assisted customer service software to deliver an outstanding customer experience. It uses Freddy AI to provide meaningful insights, act when needed, and resolve all your customer queries to boost your performance.
Freshworks Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Growth | $11 | $9 |
| Pro | $47 | $39 |
| Enterprise | $71 | $59 |
3. Birdeye
Birdeye is an agentic marketing platform for multi-location brands. It allows you to maintain a consistent brand across every location and touch points. It scales business with supervised and autonomous AI agents that are actually trained to your brand and industry.
Its primary purpose is to build your brand presence with accuracy and visibility that can significantly increase your product traffic. Furthermore, it utilizes its social AI agents to draft, publish, and optimize your product content across all platforms. Moreover, its survey AI and Insight AI help to capture feedback and provide growth opportunities to maximize ROI.
Pros:
- It provides a user-friendly interface.
- It offers a wide range of features for reviews, messaging, and social media.
- It centralizes multichannel communication and customer data into a single dashboard
Cons:
- Some users find it overpriced compared to its competitors.
- Its extensive features may be overwhelming for small businesses.
- Some reviews mention issues with unclear contracts and difficulty with cancellations.
Why we picked Birdeye: We selected Birdeye due to its AI-powered automation and user-friendly platform. It ensures that every interaction is aware of the context and is aligned with your unique brand identity. It further analyzes your customer sentiments to provide insightful feedback.
Birdeye Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Starter | $299 | Contact sales |
| Growth | $399 | Contact sales |
| Dominate | $449 | Contact sales |
4. Survicate
Survicate is a customer feedback platform for creating, distributing, and analyzing surveys across websites, apps, and emails to gather insights into customer experience transformation. The major purpose of Survicate is to collect customer feedback through various survey types (NPS, CSAT, CES) that are embedded in websites, mobile apps, and emails.
It collects feedback across digital touchpoints and uses AI-powered insights to analyse survey responses and other feedback sources to provide actionable insights.
Additionally, it provides a customizable dashboard and quick setup for users to distribute surveys across various channels.
Pros:
- It collects the customer feedback in real-time.
- It offers a good selection of integrations that connect well with other platforms.
- It uses an AI-powered hub for a quick summary to help make faster decisions.
Cons:
- Some users find Survicate to be expensive.
- Reporting and analysis features might not be as advanced as those of other competitors.
- Some users have experienced inconsistency in the availability of online customer support.
Why we picked Survicate: We picked Survicate in this list because it is a feedback platform that surveys every channel and unifies all feedback sources to track insights and make faster decisions. It also makes sure that the right decisions are taken with all your tools synced and the key people are informed.
Survicate Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Free | $0 (25 responses per month) | $0 (25 responses per month) |
| Starter | $79 | Contact sales |
| Growth | Contact sales | $49 |
| Volume | $299 (Yearly commitment) | $299 (Yearly commitment) |
| Pro | $299 (Yearly commitment) | $299 (Yearly commitment) |
| Enterprise | $499 (Yearly commitment) | $499 (Yearly commitment) |
5. Tidio
Tidio is one of the popular names in customer experience management software companies. It is an easy-to-use customer experience platform that combines live chat, AI chatbots, and email marketing tools for small and midsize businesses. Its AI chatbot Lyro can handle customer questions and provide 24/7 support, allowing human agents to focus on more complex tasks.
The platform features a user-friendly interface and a drag-and-drop chatbot builder that requires no coding. It’s great for creating automated conversation flows for things like lead generation, abandoned cart recovery, and proactive customer engagement.
Pros:
- It provides multichannel support to simplify communication management.
- It offers excellent integration with platforms like Shopify.
- It provides a free plan so you can test it before committing to a paid plan.
Cons:
- It does not provide the in-depth analysis needed by larger businesses.
- Some users have reported inconsistencies in the reliability of notifications for incoming chats.
- The costs may increase with the increase in requirements.
Why we chose Tidio: We picked Tidio because it resolves customer requests instantly with AI customer service. It automates 67% of conversations across multiple channels using its Lyro AI agent, which supports 12 different languages. It offers personalized services at scale, with the vast majority of responses being perfect.
Tidio Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Free | $0 | $0 |
| Starter | $29 | $24.17 |
| Growth | $59 | $49.17 |
| Plus | $749 | $749 |
| Premium | Contact for pricing | Contact for pricing |
6. Podium
Podium is a tool that helps businesses connect with their customers more easily. It is popular among local companies and brands with multiple locations. It is easy to use and helps you convert multiple leads in just a few months.
It is an all-in-one, AI-powered lead management platform used by over 100,000 businesses. It manages projects efficiently with an overview of all ongoing and completed work. It is a communications and marketing platform that helps small local businesses manage all customer communications in one easy-to-use inbox
Pros:
- It is an easy-to-use tool for customer management and automation.
- It can easily integrate with various tools like marketing automation and automated social media posts for positive reviews.
- Users appreciate the ability to access and manage conversations on both mobile and desktop devices.
Cons:
- It has limited advanced analytics compared to enterprise-level CXM tools.
- It does not provide transparent pricing on its website.
- Some users complained about potential delays.
Why we chose Podium: We selected it because Podium’s AI is designed to engage with more leads, schedule more appointments, and provide valuable insights for your business. It is designed to convert more leads, establish your business’s brand recognition, and drive repeat business.
Podium Pricing
| Pricing | Monthly (per line per month) | Annually (per line per month) |
| Core | Get a quote | Get a quote |
| Pro | Get a quote | Get a quote |
| Signature | Get a quote | Get a quote |
7. Zoho CRM
Zoho CRM is an all-in-one tool for managing customer relationships and improving customer experience. It’s well-known for being affordable and scalable, making it a good fit for businesses of any size.
The platform includes features like sales automation, omnichannel communication, AI-driven insights, and detailed analytics to improve interactions throughout the customer journey. It supports email, live chat, and social media, so businesses can deliver consistent and personalized service. Its automation tools also help teams work more efficiently.
Pros:
- It comes with affordable pricing plans with extensive features.
- It provides automation and AI-powered tools (like Zia AI assistant).
- It offers a wide range of integrations and customizations.
Cons:
- The interface can feel complex for beginners.
- Advanced features often require higher-tier plans.
- Some users have reported issues with the quality and responsiveness of customer support.
Why we chose Zoho CRM: We picked Zoho CRM because it’s flexible, budget-friendly, and packed with features. It combines strong CRM functions with tools like automation and AI insights, making it a great choice for businesses that want an all-in-one solution to manage relationships and create better customer experiences.
Zoho CRM Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per user per month) | Annually (per user per month) |
| Standard | $20 | $14 |
| Professional | $35 | $23 |
| Enterprise | $50 | $40 |
| Ultimate | $65 | $52 |
8. Sprinklr
Sprinklr is a unified customer experience tool that promises to provide context and collaboration to your team to drive a consistent customer experience. It offers multiple features, including real-time market insights, crisis mitigation, content cost savings, and social engagement boosts.
It also unifies contact center teams across multiple channels to provide actionable insights and deliver exceptional CX. The platform offers our AI-powered product suites like social media management, automated customer service, AI-powered insights, and marketing campaign optimization.
One of its key strengths is social listening and sentiment analysis, which helps businesses understand customer behavior and respond proactively.
Pros:
- It offers a single platform to manage customer interactions across various social and digital channels.
- Users often praise Sprinklr’s customer support and advanced AI tools for analytics.
- It offers well-suited scalability options for large enterprises and global teams.
Cons:
- It is highly expensive compared to other CXM tools.
- It has a complex learning curve and requires proper training and onboarding to use effectively.
- Implementing and fully utilizing the vast feature set can be challenging and may require significant technical resources.
Why we chose Sprinklr: We selected Sprinklr because it brings your teams together with every customer touchpoint with the required tools at a unified platform. It also promises to drive your productivity up to 40% and bring cutting-edge AI to your teams.
What sets Sprinklr apart is its customized AI models augmented by generative AI and enriched by five years of refinement, optimization, and feedback built on the foundation of customer experience data.
Sprinklr Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per seat per month) | Annually (per seat per month) |
| Self-serve plan | $249 | $2988 |
| Enterprise plan | Contact sales | Contact sales |
9. Hiver
Hiver is a customer experience tool built specifically for Google Workspace and Gmail users. It turns Gmail into a full helpdesk, so teams can manage customer conversations without moving to another platform.
Hiver includes features like email templates, internal notes, and advanced analytics for support, sales, and operations teams. It makes it easy to assign, track, and collaborate on customer emails. The platform also provides automation, SLA tracking, and reporting to improve response times and boost customer satisfaction. Since it works directly inside Gmail, there’s almost no learning curve for teams.
Pros:
- It can easily integrate with Gmail without requiring extra software.
- It is easy to use and quick to implement for teams already on Google Workspace.
- It allows for the creation of automated workflows to handle everyday tasks.
Cons:
- It has limited advanced CX features compared to full-scale platforms.
- AI-suggested replies can sometimes miss the mark on tone.
- This is not ideal for large enterprises with complex workflows.
Why we chose Hiver: We picked Hiver because it is an easy-to-use AI platform that feels just like your inbox. It manages group emails, like info@ and help@, with a shared inbox to improve visibility and make sure no query goes unanswered. It provides you with better visibility, increased productivity, and decreased email resolution time.
Hiver Pricing:
| Pricing | Monthly (per user per month) | Annually (per user per month) |
| Free | $0 | $0 |
| Lite | $24 | $19 |
| Growth | $34 | $29 |
| PRO | $59 | $49 |
| Elite | Contact sales | Contact sales |
10. Qualtrics XM
Qualtrics XM is a powerful enterprise-level platform that offers advanced features like data collection, analysis, and action-taking using AI-driven insights. It is known for its ease of use, advanced features, and ability to help organizations act on customer feedback for tangible results.
It manages customer experience and handles large datasets and scale operations, which makes it suitable for CX management. Overall, it optimizes all the experiences your business delivers and helps you uncover insights from data to drive results.
Pros:
- It provides a clean and organized interface for the data collection process.
- It creates advanced surveys with various question types, logic, and skip patterns.
- It is an action-oriented platform that triggers automated workflows to address customer issues.
Cons:
- It lacks a flexible pricing planning model based on usage and access time.
- The platform’s complexity can make it challenging to navigate and set up.
- Customer support may not help with complex customization issues.
Why we picked Qualtrics XM: We chose Qualtrics XM because it changes how you interact with your customers by linking testing, design, and development teams together to build a breakthrough product and resolve customer pain points by modernizing interactions using AI features.
Qualtrics XM Pricing:
- Contact sales
Criteria for choosing the right customer experience management software
While choosing the right customer experience management software, make sure you consider these primary criteria so you don’t regret it later:
1. Core features
The core features are the first thing you should look for while choosing the right customer management software. Look for the software that offers real-time insights into customer analytics using technology like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning for predictive analysis.
2. Ease of use and setup
Always select the setup that is easy to set up and use. You do not want a complex system that requires multiple training sessions and a UI that is difficult to cope with. Always look for the advanced features with minimal effort to use and set up.
3. Scalability and pricing
In the near future, if you plan to scale up, your CXM software should also be able to adapt to it in the long run. Also, check the pricing, including hidden fees and early termination costs, and compare those prices between providers to get a clear understanding of the features that fit your budget to avoid overpaying for unnecessary features.
4. Integrations
The software you choose should be capable of integrating with your existing tools, like CRM systems, help desks, or marketing automation platforms. This will prevent data silos and create a unified view of your customer interactions.
5. Feedback and reputation tools
A good CXM platform makes it easy to gather, analyze, and act on customer feedback. Look for features like surveys, review management, and sentiment analysis to help you measure satisfaction and enhance your brand’s reputation.
6. Target audience fit
At the end, make sure your customer experience management software fits your targeted audience. After all, you are trying to improve your customers’ experience, so look for a customer-centric platform that can provide you with real-time insights into your target audience to help your business stand out from competitors.
