SaleSmartly vs. Freshchat: Choose the Right Customer Service Tool for Global Expansion

SaleSmartly and Freshchat are two of the most popular cross-border customer support platforms. Many global sellers and independent station operators consider these tools when choosing a customer service system. Both offer robust customer management features such as conversation tagging and bulk messaging. However, they differ significantly in functionality and user experience. This article compares pricing, key features, and unique advantages to help businesses make an informed decision when selecting a cross-border customer support platform.

Pricing Comparison: SaleSmartly vs. Freshchat

Note: Prices as of March 18, 2025. Visit the official websites for the latest details.

Feature Comparison: SaleSmartly vs. Freshchat

Key Strengths

1. Omnichannel Support

• SaleSmartly: SaleSmartly offers wide-ranging channel integration, including live chat, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Telegram, Line, Email, WeChat, TikTok, VKontakt. This extensive coverage includes nearly all major international social media and e-commerce platforms, enabling cross-border businesses to efficiently manage and expand their operations across diverse channels.

• Freshchat: Covers fewer platforms, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Linkedin, etc.

2. Automation & AI Chatbots

• SaleSmartly:

①Automation workflow:

SaleSmartly builds automated workflows using three key modules: triggers, conditions, and actions. Businesses can configure automation rules based on their operational needs. When a customer triggers a specific behavior or keyword, the system automatically executes predefined actions, such as sending messages, assigning customer support, or updating customer information.

②AI chatbots:

SaleSmartly supports integration with multiple leading AI platforms, including ChatGTP, Coze (International & Chinese version), DeepSeek, HelpLook, OpenAI Assistants. AI chatbots leverage semantic understanding to provide intelligent and flexible automated responses, reducing the workload for human customer support.

Traditional automated workflows have limited flexibility—if a customer’s question does not exactly match the predefined triggers, the automation may fail to respond. SaleSmartly allows businesses to run both automated workflows and AI chatbots simultaneously, creating a complementary system. The automated workflows provide precise answers to customer inquiries, while AI chatbots offer more flexible, natural responses based on semantic understanding. This combination effectively overcomes the limitations of traditional automation, making customer support more efficient and intelligent.

• Freshchat:

①Automated workflows: Supports setting up automated workflows to simplify customer support tasks.

3. Team Collaboration

● SaleSmartly:

①Internal knowledge sharing: SaleSmartly enables all employees to share conversation histories and files. Even if different support agents handle the same customer, they can quickly trace past interactions and gain a better understanding of customer needs.

②Employee management: Scheduling & Monitoring:

• Scheduling: SaleSmartly helps scheduling management that allows administrators to set customer support shifts. The system automatically adjusts the agents' online status (Online/Busy/Offline) based on the schedule, ensuring efficient workload distribution.
• Monitoring logs: Administrators can track team members' login, logout, and online status, helping to monitor work activities, optimize resource allocation, and improve efficiency.

● Freshchat:

①Internal assignment transfer: Share internal notes and conversation transfer easily, allowing team members to access chat histories for better collaboration.

4. Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

● SaleSmartly:

①Customer list: Supports importing customer information from WhatsApp and Email, with a built-in search function for easy customer data management.

②Customer conversation management: Businesses can review ongoing and completed conversation records for quality assurance and auditing, improving customer service interactions.

③Form management: Allows businesses to filter and manage marked order information within conversations, making it easy to locate transaction details.

④Tag management: Enables businesses to add and manage visitor and conversation tags, which can be used later for targeted actions, such as bulk email campaigns.

● Freshchat:

①Customer search: Supports customer segmentation and search but does not allow customer data imports. ②Customer conversation management: Provides a view of customer interaction history and other relevant details to enhance customer engagement.

5. Data Analytics

● SaleSmartly:

①Channel analytics: Provides an overview and trend analysis of new customers, returning customers, customer replies, and support agent replies across integrated channels.

②Service overview: Displays key service metrics such as new conversations, ongoing conversations, and conversation trends for better performance tracking.

③Comprehensive reports: Businesses can access detailed customer support metrics, including the number of messages, first response time, response duration, customer feedback scores, and satisfaction ratings to evaluate service quality and agent workload.

● Freshchat:

①Reports & Analytics: Offers key performance reports on conversation volume, response time, and customer satisfaction to assess customer support effectiveness.

②Custom reports: Allows businesses to create customized reports to meet specific data analysis needs.

6. Real-Time Translation

● SaleSmartly:

SaleSmartly offers real-time translation for 134 languages. Businesses can simply enter content in the translation window and send it, and the system will automatically translate it into the customer's language, eliminating language barriers in cross-border communication.

● Freshchat:

As of June 8, 2024, new Freshchat users will no longer have access to the real-time translation feature.

Why Choose SaleSmartly?

As evident from the analysis above, SaleSmartly demonstrates significant competitive advantages over Freshchat in terms of feature coverage, customization capabilities, and global adaptability. For businesses aiming to enhance customer service efficiency, optimize user experience, and expand into international markets, SaleSmartly is undoubtedly the superior choice. Below are its core strengths:

1. Extensive global reach to help cross-border businesses

SaleSmartly integrates with a wide range of social media and e-commerce platforms (Facebook, Instagram, LINE, Telegram, TikTok, VK, WhatsApp, Shopify, WordPress, etc.), helping businesses expand globally. In contrast, Freshchat lacks comprehensive platform coverage. For businesses relying on multiple social platforms, SaleSmartly offers greater market advantages.

2. Advanced AI & Automation to Reduce Labor Costs

SaleSmartly provides a variety of intelligent AI chatbot modes, including FAQ-based smart response bots and automated workflow bots. It also integrates with mainstream AI platforms (such as ChatGPT and DeepSeek) to further enhance the intelligence of its robots. In comparison, Freshchat’s chatbot capabilities are less flexible and require additional payment.

3. Multi-channel notification system to improve response speed

SaleSmartly supports various new message alerts (browser pop-ups, sounds, email, push notifications), ensuring agents respond faster. Freshchat does not offer message notifications, which can lead to delayed responses in high-traffic, high-concurrency customer service scenarios, negatively impacting customer experience.

Why Choose Freshchat?

1. Seamless Freshworks Integration

Freshchat is part of the Freshworks ecosystem, making it a great choice for businesses already using Freshdesk, Freshsales (CRM), or Freshmarketer (marketing automation). If a business is already using Freshworks ecosystem products, choosing Freshchat can reduce system-switching costs and improve end-to-end collaboration efficiency.

2. Built-In Twitter & LinkedIn Support

Freshchat offers official API integrations with Twitter & LinkedIn, which can be useful for businesses relying on these platforms for customer interactions. Freshworks is the recommended customer service solution for cross-border operations.

Further reading

Enhancing Conversational Commerce: SaleSmartly Now Offers Free Real-TimeTranslation!

AdsPower x SaleSmartly: Revolutionizing Social Media Account Operations

Al-Powered Automation: SaleSmartly's NewIntent Recognition Feature

WhatsApp + SaleSmartly Automation: Check What Benefits You Can Get