5 steps to provide email support: Step 4 - Build the customer experience

This week, on May 20 our Zendesk team hosted the fourth episode in the “5 Steps to providing email support” series, focusing on Step 4: Build the customer experience. With the expertise of our Customer Success team- Ray Roth and Paddy Meleady- we explored how email remains as an essential, trusted channel for customer support, even in today’s AI-driven world.

Highlights include

• Email is essential: it provides clear, documented interactions for thoughtful, step-by-step support.
• Smart email setup: with automated email templates and addresses, this process streamlines notifications while boosting both agent efficiency and customer satisfaction.
• Custom branding: isn’t just about looks—it’s about creating consistent, trustworthy communication that strengthens your brand.
• Automations: like “Bump Bump Solve” can significantly reduce ticket backlog and keep your support queues tidy without manual follow-up.
• CSAT surveys: are easy to implement and a quick, simple way to capture valuable feedback—and soon more detailed analytics will help you dig even deeper into customer opinions.

What we learned

Our session provided a deep dive into how you can enhance your email support workflows by focusing on four essential components:

• Setting up dedicated support email addresses: to ensure tickets are routed efficiently and customers have clear contact points this makes ticket routing and categorization more efficient and enhances customer satisfaction.
• Managing email notifications through triggers and automations: We learned how Zendesk uses triggers and automations to send proactive, timely notifications to both agents and customers—keeping everyone informed and engaged and demonstrating how to deactivate or customize them when needed, to reduce noise or suit your team’s workflow.
• Customizing email templates for consistent branding: We explored how to tailor email templates (both HTML and plain text) to reflect your brand's identity consistently. From adding logos and social links to customizing colors and removing elements like the delimiter, these tweaks ensure your messages feel professional and engaging.
• Collecting customer feedback using CSAT surveys: We reviewed how to activate, customize, and automate customer satisfaction surveys via email, to gain actionable insights to continuously improve support quality.

In the Q&A, we shared some handy tips and exciting news. Soon, you’ll be able to get detailed reports on 1-5 scale CSAT scores to better understand customer feedback. We also tackled common issues like the “email already in use” error when adding external support addresses, plus best practices like keeping triggers simple and disabling rather than deleting them. If you’re managing multiple brands, it’s smarter to customize triggers per brand instead of changing the global email template. And remember, only one CSAT survey works per ticket, but customers can update their rating if you resend the link. Easy wins to keep your email support running smoothly!

Next Steps

Be sure to catch the final episode of this insightful series! Stay tuned for more opportunities to elevate your email support strategy. RSVP here

Webinar resources

[Webinar recording] 5 steps to provide email support - Step 4: Building the customer experience

[Presentation deck] 5 steps to provide email support - Step 4: Building the customer experience

Zendesk essentials Youtube playlist

Zendesk essentials: Live tutorials series page

Useful Resources

To further assist you in your Zendesk journey, feel free to leverage these helpful resources:

• Workflow recipe: Sending automated ticket reminders to customers
• Sending a CSAT survey to your customers
• Using the email template with multiple brands
• Troubleshooting email deliverability
• About the standard ticket triggers
• About the standard Support automations