Social and business single sign-on

Plan requirement

Subscription Any plan
Access Admin

Letting people sign in with an account they already have. Mostly for customers, and it removes a real barrier.

Turn it on

  1. Open the authentication settings in Admin Center.
  2. Enable the providers you want to offer.
  3. Decide whether Zendesk passwords stay available alongside.
  4. Test the sign-in as a customer.

Why it helps

Every password you ask a customer to create is people who leave instead. Signing in with an account they already have removes that step entirely.

For a help centre where customers must sign in to see their tickets, this is often the difference between a portal being used and ignored.

Two or three providers, not six

A row of buttons is a decision the customer has to make before they can get help. Offer the ones your customers actually use.

Watch what it does to records

Somebody signing in with a different address from the one they email from creates a second record. Their tickets then split across two identities.

Worth checking for duplicates after enabling this.

For business accounts

Where customers all work at companies using the same provider, business sign-in is smoother than social and keeps the work address as the identity.

Keep a fallback

If a provider is unavailable, or a customer no longer has that account, they need another way in. Removing all alternatives is a decision to lock some people out permanently.

Staff are a separate question

This is about customers. For agents, proper single sign-on through your own identity provider is the better arrangement.

See also

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