Don't Think Down Support: How to Realize the Hidden Features of Your Support



    Almost any organization, one way or another connected with the sale of software, requires a support line. Support is associated with help in product development and solving various kinds of customer problems, usually of a technical nature. These functions really form the basis of the work of support teams, although there are many hidden “goodies” that Support can give a business if its potential is used to its full potential. We’ll talk about them under the cut.

    Support can become a multifunctional tool that solves important tasks both within the company and in the “client” direction. Let's try to highlight several roles that support can play on the stage of any IT business.

    1. Support psychologist




    Support’s most obvious additional function related to customer service.
    From a psychological point of view, a person who successfully helps to solve a problem is automatically recorded in a friend or buddy. It is easier for such a person to turn for help again, counting on support. Clients sometimes perceive the “supporters” as their personal psychotherapists / psychologists and take the opportunity to speak out, because the communication code does not imply denial of service (of course, a decent level of professionalism of a support agent is an important condition).

    The role of a psychologist usually calls for trust - clients who are satisfied with the result of psychotherapy sessions begin to respect the company with great respect, their loyalty increases. In particularly successful cases of continuous support from Customer, a customer can become a voluntary product evangelist on their team.

    In our support practice at Wrike, we found examples of excellent customer relationships that we support. The existing relations in some cases have become warm and friendly, largely due to repeated interaction with a “happy outcome”. Such customers will always say a word for us - for example, when cross-selling a product to other departments or when communicating with other users in our Community. A fresh example: recently we learned about the transition of one of the most active clients in communicating with Support to another company. One of the conditions for this transition was the use of Wrike as a tool for project planning. This news in a friendly conversation the customer himself told us with the words "I'm a Wriker to the end!", Which could not but please the whole team!

    2. Support fireman




    Imagine a situation - you had a global incident (a massive problem, a critical bug, God forbid downtime), and the authorized engineers / administrators have not yet realized that "everything is bad," or they realized, but are busy urgently resolving the consequences. Meanwhile, there are probably already a large number of dissatisfied users who urgently need to get a comment. A support firefighter comes to the rescue, who will calm everyone down, explain everything, and then bring the information that is necessary to identify the problem to the engineers.

    It is worth noting that in this case, with the right approach, you can achieve the result that is predicted by psychologists - people whose problems are well and quickly solved with the right communication, as a result, are more satisfied than those who did not encounter problems at all. Support in such emergency cases also serves as an excellent indicator of problems - often the user is the first to notice something is wrong, which is immediately notified by Support. With a well-established internal communication system, the problem can be eliminated even in the bud, and this is largely due to Support, who transmitted information on time.

    The Wrike support team has developed a certain practice of interacting with engineers in critical situations. We try to sensitively respond to any messages from customers who may report a potential problem, collect a maximum of information and inform the duty engineers. A similar scheme of work is used to detect critical bugs, where the QA department is immediately involved in cooperation (the third level of our support, see the post about how it works in detail here ). Sapport’s quick response has helped to prevent more dramatic events.

    3. Support communicator




    This role of the support team has a pronounced effect on product development. Support is of great benefit to any PMA, as it has a sacred knowledge about what the client wants.

    What help can support support for product development? Transferring feedback from the user directly to the grocery department is one of the alternatives. For example, our Support team captures feedback from users in the Wrike Community and submits reports to product managers on a regular basis. No one will understand the customer better than the support representative, therefore it is useful to give the interpretation of any feedback to Support.

    Another approach is to use a common understanding of the client’s needs and “relay” them to other teams. Support Wrike is a frequent guest at the events of Scrum teams - we listen to our opinion, because we represent the interests of the client and are an important stakeholder.

    The communicative function works in the opposite direction - PMs or engineers may ask Support to collect information or statistics on a topic of interest, convey information to the client, etc. It is important to note that this function should be used wisely and carefully - Support is floating in the ocean of customer data, and the biggest problem is how to systematize this data and draw the right conclusions, which are not distracting.

    4. Support forge of quality personnel




    Another indisputable “hidden” function of Support is its personnel potential.
    The universality of skills and knowledge, a comprehensive understanding of the product and wide experience in communication with customers make Sapport people welcome in any customer and product departments (marketing, sales, consulting, etc.). If the Support team is also multilingual (and covers several time zones / geographical locations), its internal culture also contributes to the additional development of communication skills, which is converted into usefulness for any client-oriented work.

    Support Wrike, for example, operates from Western and Eastern Europe, Russia, North and South America; we speak Russian, Ukrainian, English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese (and, by the way, we help with localization of the product in this regard). The team’s linguistic potential is not exhausted on this - knowledge of some less common languages ​​(Estonian, Swedish, Tibetan (!) Is rarely used in work, but it is a pleasant bonus for any native speaker of a rare language who has glanced at our support chat.

    If your support is technical-oriented, then the experts have a direct road to QA or even to development (with coding skills) - understanding the product from the client can be very useful both in testing and creating new features. Support agents are usually very hardworking and persistent guys. They get to the bottom of the matter, help you figure it out, they are used to working quickly and scrupulously, because the solid lines of incoming mail or calls train army reaction and concentration. Such skills are welcome in any job! In addition, these are people with different educational / professional backgrounds - you never know a specialist in what area can be found in the Support department (there are philologists, marketers, teachers, as well as candidates and doctors of science in Wrike Support).

    Postscriptum


    The four support roles listed above, of course, are not a comprehensive classification for defining its functions. In each individual organization, the product / service support department may have its own distinctive features. Probably the most important thing to keep in mind is that Support should not be regarded as a department, useful exclusively for solving customer problems, help with a product or service. Bring your support agents to other interesting tasks, and maybe you will reveal new potential for the development of the business / team as a whole!

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