Tikit is powered by Microsoft solutions provider, Cireson. The company was founded in 2011 and is based out of San Diego, California. It provides users with a host of Microsoft tools and services, including service management, asset management, and remote IT support. Interestingly, Cireson has a wide range of free community apps for your use – this includes a self-service portal, an incident auto-closure tool, notification management, time tracking, and more.
Tikit is the flagship Microsoft Teams integration from Cireson, designed to help you manage a service ticket’s end-to-end lifecycle without leaving the Microsoft Teams interface. It makes use of Teams’ conversational interface to simplify how tickets are created, shared, resolved, and closed. As a Microsoft Gold Partner, Cireson is well-positioned to support the implementation of Tikit for mid-sized to large enterprises.
- Halp for Microsoft Teams Review: Optimise and Automate Ticket Resolution through Conversations
- Jira Cloud for Microsoft Teams Review: Improve Ticket Resolution Through Collaborative Workflows
Let us review the key features of the Tikit app in more detail.
Inside Tikit for Microsoft Teams
Tikit was launched in 2020 to help address the growing demand for remote IT support during the pandemic. Cireson utilised artificial intelligence (AI) to first build a ticketing platform that could integrate with Microsoft Teams. The results were overwhelming and the company was inspired to create a native Teams application that was purpose-built for the Microsoft ecosystem without requiring an additional platform.
Tikit for Microsoft Teams is available for download in the Microsoft app store. After a free trial, you may have to invest in further upgrades.
Here are the key features you can expect:
- The Tikit HelpBot – The HelpBot feature is how users primarily interact with the Tikit app. Whenever a Teams user submits a service request using Tikit, the HelpBot notifies IT administrators about the query. They will see the query as an active ticket and will have the option to assign the ticket to someone else or respond to it immediately. Users can also ask the HelpBot to list all the requests they have made and tell them about a request’s current status.
- Conversational ticketing – The Tikit app allows you to resolve tickets using Teams’ conversational interface. For example, if someone created a ticket reporting that their Outlook email service isn’t working, you will be able to reply to the request directly and ask the user to check if Outlook mode is set to online. The user can then mark the answer as “yes, helpful,” or “no,” and go on to add further details about the problem. You could continue this conversation right from within Teams until the issue is resolved.
- Message-to-ticket conversion – The Tikit app also comes with a messaging extension that lets you create tickets from any chat or channel message sent via Teams. When someone sends a relevant message mentioning an issue, you can hover over the message body to reveal the “More actions” menu and choose “Create a Ticket.” This allows you to consolidate service requests from multiple places, even if an employee hasn’t used Tikit to communicate the problem or doesn’t have access to the app.
- Ticket tags and prioritisation – With Tikit, you can organise your service requests more effectively using tags, and prioritisation. The app lets you choose from three prioritisation levels – 1 (low), 2 (medium), and 3 (high). You can also add custom tags to your tickets, making them easier to find, sort, classify, and delegate.
- Ticket deflection using AI – This feature utilises Tikit’s AI capabilities to reduce workloads for IT administrators. You can preconfigure your response to common service requests. For example, you might want to redirect requests for password resets to an existing website link. As a result, the average request volume faced by IT administrators reduces dramatically, and they are freed up to attend to only the most unique and pressing issues.
- Adding requests on behalf of a user – This feature allows Teams users to comment on a message and make requests on behalf of someone else. For example, if an employee has asked for an upgrade to their workstation, their manager can append a request, mentioning the specific device upgrade required.
Why the Tikit App Makes a Difference
Tikit’s biggest differentiator is that it initiates and closes a ticket’s lifecycle in Teams without requiring a separate platform. This is a big plus for small teams and young organisations looking to formalise their support functions without heavy investments.
What We Think
Tikit is available at an extremely affordable $50 per month (unlimited users and support agents).
You can download it here.
