Issue Tracking Software

The key to improving the quality of customer service is resolving customer issues as quickly as you can. And for that, your business can turn to specialized tools, including an issue tracking solution. Issue tracking tools provide complete visibility into the process, from issue capturing, to task assignment, to ticket closing. 

In this buyers guide, we’ll elaborate on the key features of issue tracking software and how such a tool can help your business manage customer service more effectively. 

Here’s what we’ll cover:

• What is issue tracking software?

• What are the deployment options for issue tracking software?

• What are the common features of issue tracking software?

What is issue tracking software?

Issue tracking software is software used to capture, store, categorize, and track the resolution of customer requests and complaints. These tools serve as the central platform to track all communication with customers, beginning from the time an issue is recorded to its final resolution.  

What are the deployment options for issue tracking software?

Issue tracking solutions typically come with one of two types of deployment options: cloud-based or on-premise. Here’s a quick summary of the key differences between these deployment choices and the pros and cons of each.

• Cloud-based: You pay a monthly or annual subscription fee for use of the tool. The vendor takes care of software updates, maintenance, and data backup. The software hosting is managed by the vendor, so your business data will reside on the vendor’s servers or with a third-party cloud service provider.   

• On-premise: You’ll purchase the tool for a one-time license fee (this could be a recurring cost in some cases where the vendor limits the license usage term to a year or two). Since the software is hosted on your own servers, you’ll have complete control over your data but will have to manage data storage and bug fixes internally.  

Key questions to ask cloud vendors:

• What security measures do you have in place for preventing data loss in case of cyberattacks?

Key questions to ask on-premise solution vendors:

• What is the typical time needed to onboard with your tool?

• Are there any software installation or training costs?

What are some common features of issue tracking software?

Issue tracking software comes with a range of features, such as ticket management, knowledge base, and task management. Below are the most common features of these solutions.

Ticket management: Allow users (customers or internal agents) to raise tickets and leave a description of the issue along with details such as the name/email of the user who raised the request, the agent the ticket is assigned to, and the type of issue.

Ticket management in Freshdesk 

Task management: View the status of issues as a task list, to view the number of in-progress, open, and closed tickets. Track the owner of a ticket, severity of issue, escalations if any, and other details.

Task management in Zoho BugTracker 

Reporting dashboard: Analyze the performance of your support team based on the number of tickets they worked on and their statuses in a given time period.

Reporting dashboard in TeamSupport  

Assignment management: Ensure tickets are assigned to the right agent, based on expertise and availability. Add comments explaining an issue when tagging agents.

Assignment management in Jira 

Knowledge base: Create a searchable repository of common questions and answers that can be viewed by customers and/or agents to find quick resolutions.

Customer view of the knowledge base in Freshdesk 

Back to issue tracking software directory

Note: The applications selected in this article are examples to show a feature in context, and are not intended as endorsements or recommendations. They’re obtained from sources believed to be reliable at the time of publication.