Second Insight - Let's talk Layouts

The Wheels of Ticketing - Desk Stories

Let's talk Layouts

What are layouts?

Layouts refer to the arrangement or design of elements in a space, whether on a physical surface, like a room or a piece of furniture, or in digital contexts, such as web pages or graphic designs. 

User interface layout: In software design, various interface elements, such as buttons, forms, and menus, are arranged to create an efficient and user-friendly experience. 

Layouts control how fields and related sections are organized on a department's module page. Each department can have its own design, which includes a combination of default and custom fields. These layouts dictate which fields are visible, read-only, and required.

 

Customer support agents need specific information to handle tickets for different products or processes effectively. As a result, help desks frequently incorporate multiple custom fields into the ticket forms that customers complete. This may lead to customers facing irrelevant fields that don't apply to their specific issues. The most effective solution to this confusion is to create and use an appropriate layout.

How can you benefit from using layouts?

Layouts are used in a wide range of software applications and platforms to enhance communication and user experience.

 

In Zoho Desk, you can use layouts to tailor the fields on module pages like Tickets and Tasks. The drag-and-drop feature enables you to add new fields easily, remove unnecessary ones, and rearrange fields to match your preferences. 

Key functions of a layout: 

• Visual hierarchy: Clarifies the significance of various elements and directs the viewer's attention to the essential information.
• Readability: Enhances the clarity and legibility of text and images, making it easier for the audience to digest the content.
• Aesthetic appeal: Creates an attractive design that engages users and encourages them to interact with the content.
• Consistency: This ensures a uniform look and feel across different pages or sections, which helps with branding and recognition.
• Navigation: Facilitates user navigation by organizing content logically and allowing users to find information quickly and intuitively.
• Functionality: Supports the intended function of the design, whether to inform, persuade, entertain, or provide a service.
  

A well-designed layout is crucial for effective communication and user engagement in any visual medium. 

A story for better interpretation of layouts

The Perfect Layout - A Tech Story

At Heaven Solutions, a bustling tech company, they proudly call their help desk software 'Heaven Desk'. It was the go-to place for agents facing tech troubles, but the overall situation was chaotic. The desks were cluttered, information was scattered, and the agent teams were overwhelmed with requests.

 

Ross, a bright and passionate senior tech support, was part of the help desk team. He loved helping others but often found himself frustrated when navigating through heaps of information to assist his team. One day, while dealing with a particularly perplexing issue, he had a revelation: the team needed structure to tame the chaos!

 

Inspired, Ross gathered his team for a brainstorming session. “What if we redesigned our help desk layout?” he suggested. The team was intrigued but skeptical. “How can a layout make a difference?” one seasoned tech support asked. 

 

Ross smiled and began to explain: “Let’s think of it this way: a well-organized layout can guide users to find solutions quickly. It can reduce confusion, streamline processes, and enhance productivity.” 

 

The team's curiosity was piqued, and they experimented with Ross's idea. They mapped out ideas on a whiteboard and discussed different elements of a successful help desk layout. 

• Categorization: They categorized issues into clear sections—hardware, software, network, and general inquiries. This way, users could quickly find the category relevant to their problem. 
  

• Search functionality: Ross proposed implementing a robust search feature on their help desk platform. Users could type in keywords or phrases, making finding solutions more manageable.
  

• Visible layout: The team agreed that a cleaner, visually appealing design would help declutter the experience. They envisioned a layout with ample white space, easy navigation buttons, and tabs representing different categories.
  

• FAQ guides: Recognizing that many questions were often repeated, they created an easily accessible FAQ section and a library of troubleshooting guides. This would empower agents to solve minor issues independently.
  

• Quick feedback: They incorporated a feedback mechanism where users could rate their experience after each interaction, allowing continuous improvement based on user input.
  

Excited about their ideas, the team presented the new layout to their manager. To their delight, he loved the vision and approved the redesign. With everyone's input, they built the new Heaven help desk. When they launched the redesigned help desk, it was like transforming a maze into a designated path.

On the first day after the launch, Ross was buzzing with anticipation. As employees began using the new layout, he watched their faces light up. Help desk requests decreased as many users could now find what they needed through the FAQs and guides. The search functionality quickly became a hit, with colleagues excited about how quickly they could resolve issues.

 

Because of their collaborative effort, the help desk now serves as a support system and empowers employees to help themselves. The structured layout improved efficiency and user satisfaction, proving that a thoughtful design could transform chaos into clarity.

 

In the end, the purpose of layouts became clear: they weren't merely about aesthetics; they were powerful tools that guided users, reduced frustration, and ensured a seamless experience. Through Ross's idea and the team's collaboration, Heaven Desk became a model help desk, demonstrating that a little structure could lead to immense success.

Takeaway

A well-designed layout organizes information and resources in a coherent way and makes the system intuitive and easy to use, which reduces frustration and improves user satisfaction. It ensures that users can find what they need quickly and efficiently, whether it involves accessing a knowledge base, submitting a ticket, or tracking the status of their request. 

Please stay tuned for more Desk Module stories.

 

Cheers,

Kavya Rao

The Zoho Desk Team

Also read: 

•  First Insight - Find your Fields
  

• Topic Participants

• Kavya Rao Addepalli

  

• Recent Topics

• Hotmail is blocking the zoho mail IP

  Greetings, Since last Tuesday (5 days ago today) I wrote to Zoho support and I still haven't received a single response (Ticket ID: 2056917). Is this how you treat people who pay for your email service? I am making this public so that those who want to

• Zoho Bookings and Survey Integration through Flow

  I am trying to set up flows where once an appointment is marked as completed in Zoho Bookings, the applicable survey form would be sent to the customer. Problem is, I cannot customise flows wherein if Consultation A is completed, Survey Form A would be

• Zoho CRM Community Digest - December 2025 | Part 2

  Hello Everyone! During the final weeks of December, Zoho CRM introduced updates that not only enhanced product capabilities but also offered deeper guidance through Kaizen posts. This section highlights what was released and shared in the last two weeks

• CRUD actions for Resources via API

  Hello, is it possible to perform CRUD actions through the API for Resources? We want to create a sync from Zoho CRM Car record to Bookings resources to create availabilities for Car bookings. For Test drives, not only the sales person needs to be available,

• Kaizen #186 : Client Script Support for Subforms

  Hello everyone! Welcome back to another exciting Kaizen post on Client Script! In this edition, we’re taking a closer look at Client Script Support for Subforms with the help of the following scenario. " Zylker, a manufacturing company, uses the "Orders"

• Unable to Assign Multiple Categories to a Single Product in Zoho Commerce

  Hello Zoho Commerce Support Team, I am facing an issue while assigning categories to products in Zoho Commerce. I want to assign multiple categories to a single product, but in the Item edit page, the Category field allows selecting only one category

• オンライン勉強会のお知らせ Zoho ワークアウト （2/19 参加無料）

  ユーザーの皆さま、こんにちは。コミュニティチームの中野です。 2月開催のZoho ワークアウトについてお知らせします。 今回はZoomにて、オンライン開催します。 ▶︎参加登録はこちら（無料） https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/6AyVUxp6QDmMQiDGXGkxPA ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Zoho ワークアウトとは？ Zoho ユーザー同士で交流しながら、サービスに関する疑問や不明点の解消を目指すイベント「Zoho

• doubts about customer happiness in zoho desk

  Good afternoon, Desk community. The reason for my message is that I have a question regarding the customer satisfaction surveys we can ask our clients to rate our service. I know that in Desk, you can activate Customer Happiness to send a survey to the

• COQL API in JS Widget only pulling 200 records

  Hello! We've been building a custom homepage widget using the Zoho JS SDK, and it seems that this https://help.zwidgets.com/help/latest/ZOHO.CRM.API.html#.coql only allows 200 records. I thought the limit was 2000 for COQL queries, but am I mistaken?

• Standard Description Field - Can I change label or add dd tooltip

  Is there a way fo you guys to allow the customer to change the label name for the description field in the customer portal when submitting tickets. Or at least allow us to add a tooltip to clarify what description we need from them. I know I can create my own separate multi line description field but if I do that, it doesn't have the nice toolbar with Bold, Italic, Underline, color, font, indent, etc. Can you please allow us to add a tooltip to the zoho standard description field?

• Introducing parent-child ticketing in Zoho Desk [Early access]

  Hello Zoho Desk users! We have introduced the parent-child ticketing system to help customer service teams ensure efficient resolution of issues involving multiple, related tickets. You can now combine repetitive and interconnected tickets into parent-child

• Ability to CC on a mass email

  Ability to CC someone on a mass email.

• Different Task Layouts for Subtasks

  I was wondering how it would be possible for a subtask to have a different task layout to the parent task.

• Shift Question

  Can someone explain why it says weekend during Monday-Friday? Manager set Zoho up and has handed over to me and I can't get figured out how to change this.

• Compensation | Salary Packages - Hourly Wage Needed

  The US Bureau of Labor Statistics says 55.7% of all workers in the US are paid by the hour. I don't know how that compares to the rest of the world, but I would think that this alone would justify the need for having an hourly-based salary package option.

• Customizing Helpcenter texts

  I’m customizing the Zoho Desk Help Center and I’d like to change the wording of the standard widgets – for example, the text in the “Submit Ticket” banner that appears in the footer, or other built-in widget labels and messages. So far, I haven’t found

• Ability to Edit Ticket Subject when Splitting a Ticket

  Often someone will make an additional or new request within an existing ticket that requires we split the ticket. The annoying part is that the new ticket maintains the subject of the original ticket after the split so when the new ticket email notification

• Automatically Update Form Attachment Service with Newly added Fields

  Hi, When I have a Form Setup and connected to a 3rd Party Service such as OneDrive for Form Attachments, when I later add a new Upload Field I have to remove and redo the entire 3rd Party Setup from scratch. This needs to be improved, such as when new

• Reopen ticket on specific date/time

  Is there a way that we can close a ticket and setup a reopen of that ticket on a specific date and time? (without using the "on hold" ticket option)

• API credit COQL COUNT

  The docs describe API credits in COQL from the LIMIT perspective: https://www.zoho.com/crm/developer/docs/api/v8/COQL-Overview.html When using aggregate functions such as `COUNT` or `SUM`, is that billed as 1 API credit?

• Weekly Tips : Save Time with Saved Search

  Let's assume your work requires you to regularly check emails from important clients that have attachments and were sent within a specific time period. Instead of entering the same conditions every time—like sender, date range, and attachments included—you

• Remove 'This is an automated mail from Zoho Sign' in footer

  Hi there, Is it possible to remove or change the text under the e-mail templates? I can't figure out how to do that: Would love to hear from you. Kind regards, Tristan

• Organize and manage PDFs with Zoho PDF Editor's dashboard

  Hello users, Zoho PDF Editor's dashboard is a one-stop place to upload, sort, share PDF files, and more. This article will explore the various capabilities that Zoho PDF Editor's dashboard offers. A few highlights of Zoho PDF Editor's dashboard: Upload

• Custom function return type

  Hi, How do I create a custom deluge function in Zoho CRM that returns a string? e.g. Setup->Workflow->Custom Functions->Configure->Write own During create or edit of the function I don't see a way to change the default 'void' to anything else. Adding

• Passing Info from Function to Client Script

  Hello, I have recently started making use of client script for buttons, allowing me to give the user information or warnings before they proceed. This is great. However, I have never quite managed to pass back any extra information from the function to

• Drag 'n' Drop Fields to a Sub-Form and "Move Field To" Option

  Hi, I would like to be able to move fields from the Main Page to a Sub-Form or from a Sub-Form to either the Main Page or another Sub-Form. Today if you change the design you have to delete and recreate every field, not just move them. Would be nice to

• Zoho Payroll for Canada

  Is anyone else having problems getting setup for Canada?

• Passing the CRM

  Hi, I am hoping someone can help. I have a zoho form that has a CRM lookup field. I was hoping to send this to my publicly to clients via a text message and the form then attaches the signed form back to the custom module. This work absolutely fine when

• One Contact with Multiple Accounts with Portal enabled

  I have a contact that manages different accounts, so he needs to see the invoices of all the companies he manage in Portal but I found it not possible.. any idea? I tried to set different customers with the same email contact with the portal enabled and

• User Automation: User based workflow rules & webhooks

  User management is an undeniable part of project management and requires adequate monitoring. As teams grow and projects multiply, manual coordination for updating users & permissions becomes difficult and can give way to errors. User automation in Zoho

• Disable Zoho Contacts

  We don't want to use this app... How can we disable it?

• Default Ticket View - Table?

  Guys, We mostly use the table view to queue tickets. Maybe I am missing it - but how can I set that view as 'default" for all our agents? Thanks JV

• Zoho One IS BUGGY

  Here are some things that just don't work: - Disabling applications from certain Spaces - Adding users (probably only for me) - Renaming applications in Zoho One Portal (fixed by now) - Reordering applications in Spaces When I try to reorder: It feels

• Paid Support Plans with Automated Billing

  We (like many others, I'm sure) are designing or have paid support plans. Our design involves a given number of support hours in each plan. Here are my questions: 1) Are there any plans to add time-based plans in the Zoho Desk Support Plans feature? The

• Merge Fields that previously worked are now giving an Error!

  Saving a URL Link button on the Deal module. The below fields used to save without issue at all, but now produce an error of "URL contains unsupported merge field!" ${Contacts.Mailing Street} ${Contacts.Mailing City} ${Contacts.Mailing State} ${Contacts.Mailing

• Clarification on Zoho Forms 1-User Plan: Multiple Submitters and Approvers

  Question Content (Copy–Paste Ready) Hello Zoho Team, I would like clarification regarding Zoho Forms pricing and user limits. I am planning to subscribe to the ₹700/month (1 user) plan. My use case is as follows: Only 1 person (myself) will create and

• CRM Cadences recognise auto-responses

  I have leads in a Cadence. I get an auto-responder reply "I'm out of the office..." Normally Cadences seems to know that isn't a real reply and keeps the lead enrolled in the cadence. However, today, Cadences has UNENROLLED a Lead who sent an auto-reponse

• App for Mac OS X please!

  It would be awesome to have a mail app for Mac OS X that included all the cool features such as steams, calendar, tasks, contacts, etc. Most people prefer native apps, rather than running it through a web browser. I know that we can use the IMAP, CalDAV,

• Facing Issues with Sites Mobile font sizes

  my page renediaz.com is facing issues mobile view, when i try to lower font sizes in home page, instead of changing the size, it changes the line space

• Zoho Books Payroll

  How am I supposed to do payroll and pay my employees with Zoho Books? I think it's pretty strange that an accounting software doesn't have the ability to perform one of the most common functions in business; paying your employees. Am I missing something,

• Next Page