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Support Match – Twitter vs Google

July 27, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

Twitter vs Google

From Twitter:

We are sorry. Many of you came to Twitter earlier today expecting, well, Twitter. Instead, between around 8:20am and 9:00am PT, users around the world got zilch from us. By about 10:25am PT, people who came to Twitter finally got what they expected: Twitter.

From Google:

“Google has recently confirmed that it still has in its possession a small portion of … data collected by our Street View vehicles in the UK… Google apologises for this error.”

Two wildly different approaches here.

Twitter goes down for a good chunk of time.  Millions of people scream bloody murder because they can’t tweet about Twitter being down.  But it’s only for a short time.  Twitter comes back up pretty quick and the team is working to make sure it doesn’t ever happen again. It was pure bad luck with both parallel systems going down.

On the flip side, Google’s Street View cars collected personal data (like emails) while mapping out Britain and other countries way back in 2010.  Years later, it still has that data.  Way bigger screwup than Twitter’s short downtime.

And when it comes to a response, you get two radically different approaches. Obviously, Twitter has won in this little head-to-head support match.  But here’s why they won.

1) Say sorry first.

Right off the bat, they lead with “we are sorry”.  It’s much more personable than “Google apologizes for this error” that we get from the lawyer.  Saying the word “sorry” makes it seem like you really are.

2) Don’t let the lawyer write it.

They’ll say something dumb like Google’s lawyer with his apologies. The best part of Twitter’s response is that it’s readable and written by the VP from the Engineering team.  I know he knows what he’s talking about because he leads the team.  And I know he’s going to fix it to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

3) Fix it.

Twitter states up front what happened and how they’re going to fix it. Google’s response? Well, they said they’d fix it back in 2012 but I’m not holding my breath from that.

Winner: Twitter

Again, Twitter obviously wins on this one. I’m still impressed by Twitter’s response and even found myself going back over it several times just to learn from it.

So what did you think of Twitter’s outage post?

Grade Yo Self

July 26, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

This is part of the Lessons from the Classroom series. Read more articles in the series.

Rate My Reply

My college degree’s in education so grading is just part of it. You might roll your eyes with thoughts of past exams flashing through your mind.  But I think it’s an important part of getting better not only for you but for your team.

We use so many words for it:

  • Rating
  • Grading
  • Evaluating
  • Feedback
  • Commentary

Whatever term you want to use, feel free (well, within reason). Just make sure you’re checking yo self out.

What do I mean by that?

Every time you interact with a customer, you should know how you did. Here at 37signals, we have Smiley for that. Each person I talk with can select from three choices – “It was great”, “It was ok”, or “It wasn’t good”. We include the link at the end of every email so you have a chance to see how things are going each time. After you click on the rating, there’s also a chance to describe how things are going more in-depth.

While there’s a huge upside to your own version of Smiley, here’s the big two:

1) The customer knows you’re listening.

Time after time, my customers tell me that they’re glad I listened to them. I wasn’t some automated robot or a soul-less person just going through the motions. I helped solve the problem and then asked to know how they feel now. It’s a way for them to express exactly what they’re thinking without any anxiety or huge survey to fill out.

2) You know how each and every customer feels.

With Smiley, I can see the trends in how customers are reacting to me. Sometimes, it’s a heavy feature request day and I see a row of frowns. That means my wording’s off and I need a better way to express what I’m trying to say about their ideas. Other times, everything’s jiving, the customer feels the support love and wants us to know about it. Seeing those rows of green Smiley’s proves to be an awesome boost and lets you know you’re doing a great job.

Start One

If you don’t have some sort of feedback loop in place, start one right now. And keep it as simple as possible. Three choices (rather than a billion like most surveys) and a simple text box in case they want to let you know why they picked that choice. Your customers will love being able to talk about their experience and you’ll love seeing how your customers think you’re doing.

Are you using any type of system to grade yourself?  Tell me about it in the comments!

Smiley Wait Time

July 25, 2012 By Chase Clemons 2 Comments

Smiley Wait Time

We do a lot of tracking with support at 37signals and one of the numbers we look at is wait time.  If a customer puts in a ticket right now, what’s the average wait time look like?

It’s not a particularly new idea.  You see estimated wait times for amusement park rides, heavy highways, and even emergency rooms now.  In the support field, it’s not something most people offer up though, probably because the wait time is atrocious.

We put the average wait time right on the Smiley page so you know exactly what to expect.  You can see what our average score is like and how long the wait is.  If you’re a customer, these two simple pieces of data go a long way in helping relieve that anxiety feeling people get when contacting support.

How good is the team? Well, the last 92 people out of the last 100 that we talked to said great.

How long will I have to wait?  Only about 9 minutes right now.

It’s a short and simple addition to the support page that goes a long way with customers.

What’s the average wait time been for your support team?

The Word “Feedback”

July 24, 2012 By Chase Clemons 1 Comment

I’ve touched on the power of words before briefly. Since our word choice is vitally important, I wanted to give you another example that I didn’t even think of before listening to Sarah Hatter’s Founder’s Talk interview.

Feedback. The word pops up all over the place.

“We truly value your feedback.”

“We’d love to know your thoughts and feedback.”

“Can I get your feedback on this one?”

Add “feedback” to our never, ever, ever use list. As Sarah puts it, feedback comes from a microphone in a very… unpleasant manner. On top of that, it’s on every corporate lingo/buzzword bingo board you’ll ever find. When you talk about a person’s ideas, don’t call it feedback.

If you’re writing a support email, the common place this appears is when responding to a feature request email.

Ticket:

Hi Team,

I’m really loving your app so far. One question – have you thought about adding in a camera component to it?”

– Bob

 

Bad:

Hello,

Thanks for your feedback! We’re not working on that at the moment. I’ll make sure to pitch your idea to the team and see if it’s something we can get in the next update.

– You

 

Good:

 Hi Bob!

Thanks for sharing how you’re using our app! We’re not working on that at the moment. I’ll make sure to pitch your idea to the team and see if it’s something we can get in the next update.

– You

I only switched the first sentence but see how much better that works and sounds? The good email stands out from every other feature request email they’ll get. And it shows that you’re actually listening to your customers and how they’re using your app.

Feedback is from a microphone so kill it off in favor of a better word.

What other words and phrases should we add to our list to never, ever use?

Smiley

July 23, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

support-ops-logo

Ever wonder about the yellow, happy face guy that floats around Support Ops?  He’s the latest in a long lineage of smiley emojis, emoticons, buttons, posters, and who knows what else.  There’s actually a pretty cool story behind the creation of the iconic smiley face.

Get to know Smiley here.

Welcome to Support Ops!

July 19, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

Customer support is not a hard concept.  Someone has a question/problem and it’s your job to fix it and make them happy.  Not just satisfied but happy.  And yet so many companies and people out there get that fundamental concept wrong.

Support Ops is my effort to help out.  Here, you’ll find articles on customer support and customer service.  Two different concepts but they’re intertwined around you and your customer.  If you ever interact with another customer (both inside and outside your company), you’re in the right spot.

If you’re new, check out the options for keeping up with everything. There’s RSS feeds, Twitter feeds, and all sorts of goodies to make sure you don’t miss anything.  For you avid social fans, Twitter’s going with Facebook and maybe even Google+ happening later.  For now, make sure to follow us on Twitter so we can get to know you.  And here’s a great place to start.

In the coming weeks, I’ll be rolling out new articles, a few series in the works, possibly a podcast, and even an e-book to help out with your support emails.  All I can say is that it’s been a blast getting prepped for Support Ops and there’s even more ahead!

Side note: If you’re interested in getting an article of your own published, check out our guest post page for details on how to make that happen.

Top Articles So Far

July 9, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

It’s vacation time but I didn’t want to leave you hanging while I was gone. So here’s the top articles so far this year.  Oh, and I threw in one of my all-time favorites as a surprise.

Lessons From a Restaurant

I spent a good chunk of my life in restaurants.  Here’s what I learned.

Watch Your Words

We joke about sticks and stones but there’s some serious truth to the power of words.

A Simple Tweak: Real Life A/B Testing

An alternate title could’ve been “I Got Bored in an Airport”.

Try Helping Differently

Don’t do the same things that’s always been done. No one gets better if you do that.

Too Lazy and Don’t Respect

On how I hate TLDR and what it’s done to serious writing.

Bad Writing

Short and sweet with this little gem of a find.

5 Sites You Need to Read

July 5, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

I’m an avid reader, especially when it comes to other blogs.  My Reeder app has some two hundred feeds that I comb through at the start of each day.  Out of all those, here’s the five best that you should be reading, especially in the customer support field.

UserVoice

http://www.uservoice.com/blog/

A lot of times, a support tool will have a decent blog to go with it.  UserVoice actually kicks it up and has a stellar blog along with their support app.  Lots of great insight when it comes to supporting your customers.

Zengage

http://www.zendesk.com/blog

Another one from an online support tool that’s again top-notch.

CoSupport

http://cosupport.us/blog/

Sarah’s been doing support for a while and knows it like the back of her hand. When she talks, make sure you’re listening.

Sweating Commas

http://sweatingcommas.com/blog/

You’re a writer and Jason helps you get better at it.  It’s really that simple.

Brains on Fire

http://www.brainsonfire.com/blog/

The team at Brains on Fire just gets customers.  They’re a marketing company but I put them on this list because you need to think about customers outside of your support interactions too.

 

The Canned Email Reply

June 29, 2012 By Chase Clemons Leave a Comment

The infamous canned email reply.  You have a huge problem, send in a support email about it, and you get back a standardized email asking you to check the power cord running to the computer.  The support team didn’t even read your email and now they’ve wasted your time, their time, and killed a tree along the way (or a byte I guess since it’s an email).

That’s the horrible downside to canned replies.  It’s impersonal.  It takes away the trust the customer has with you.  It breaks an already fragile relationship.  They’re in the midst of a crisis and you didn’t even read their email.

Rule number one: Never use an automatic canned responses.

They don’t work, never worked, and sure as hell won’t ever work.

But like all good math rules, there’s a corollary to that.

You CAN use pre-set snippets to help speed up your responses.

For instance, we don’t have templates in the new Basecamp yet.  It’s something we’re working on rolling out.  But I see 15-20 emails every day asking about templates.  Sure, I could retype each and every email to a customer.  But that’s wasting the customer’s time and my time.  They just want an answer.

I use Text Expander to plug-in the bulk of a reply quickly to them.  I still take the time to customize it with their name, anything that catches my eye (cheering for my fellow Auburn fans that write us), and such.  By using a snippet, I can get them detailed information without having to spend time retyping everything with each new email.

The Big Difference

With canned automatic emails, no one but the computer ever reads them.  That’s wrong… so utterly wrong.

But with snippets, a person actually reads the email, understands what’s going on, and then replies back quicker than having to compose that email from scratch.

Kill off your canned responses and let snippets reign in their place.

Customer Support Fail

June 25, 2012 By Chase Clemons 2 Comments

Internet Satellite

Once upon a time (because all great stories start with once upon a time), I moved to the country and picked Exede/Wild Blue for my Internet. And I say picked but really, it was the only choice out there.

I was happy in the beginning. The satellite Internet worked great, the speed was awesome for satellite (12 mbps download speeds), and all was right in the land.

Then, something happened to my modem. It’d be fine at times but then randomly shut off for 5 to 10 minutes. So I called the Exede/Wild Blue support team.

And then it began.

It was quickly established I had a faulty modem. No big deal – in an ideal world, a tech would come out, swap the modem, and all’s right again. Should take 10 minutes.

The support agent set up a service call two days ahead. Not ideal but again, I can understand being busy so two days was okay. The day of the service call comes and no one shows up. Turns out I was never really scheduled according to the new support agent. They were apologetic (I’m sorry for the inconvenience type of crap) and rescheduled.

Service call number 2 – no one shows up.

I’m now at seven days with intermittent Internet. I call back and get support agent number three (why can’t I just have one person?) who says that it still wasn’t entered correctly but he’s got me all set now. Lovely.

Service call number 3 – no one shows up.

I’m furious at this point but still polite with the newest support agent – number four. I explain what happened, how I have to be online to do my job, and just want a quick service call to swap out the modem. Again, the agent is apologetic and says the next available tech visit possible is July 5th.

 Two weeks out.

I was silent to the point that he asked if I was still on the line. I demanded a sooner date since at this point, my modem has completely failed. The agent says that’s the first open slot. I ask to speak to the next tier of support. Surprise, they’re all gone for the day. Along with a few choice words, I say they’ve got 24 hours to call me back and then hang up.

I get a call roughly ten hours later with the new tier 2 agent. Again, lots of apologies (at least this time with “I’m sorry. I know it’s a huge frustration and hassle.”). Still, there’s nothing open before July 5th although he’s trying to get me in an earlier date.

And that’s where I sit. No Internet at the house with no real hope of it until July 5th. And it’s a total nightmare experience from which I don’t’ have any real choice since it’s the only real satellite Internet out here.

So what do we learn from these types horrible support experiences?

1) Say You’re Sorry

It shouldn’t take four different support agents for me to hear the words “I’m sorry”. It just shouldn’t.

2) Be Prepared

This new high-speed satellite Internet was poised to be huge. People where I live were hungry for those fast speeds (10x faster than the closest competitor Hughes Net). So Exede/Wild Blue knew it was going to be big.

And they weren’t ready with their staff. If you ever utter the phrase “It’ll be two weeks before I can have a tech at your house”, hire more people. That’s far too long to have a customer wait.

3) Have An Alternate Plan

I know my modem’s busted. Have it where you can mail me a replacement one. FedEx it over to my house with some return postage for the bad one. If it fixes it, you’ve saved a tech call and some money while providing a quick solution to your customer.

4) Have Direct Lines to your Agents

I had to explain my story to four different agents. That ties up my time and yours. Just give direct lines to your support agents so I can talk to the same one each time. I don’t mind waiting for them to start their shift if it saves me ten minutes of telling the same story a billion times.

Fewer Customers Cartoon

Bad customer support happens because the agents don’t care. There was no empathy, no promises of a quick resolution, no indication that they would change their busted methods. Don’t let yourself fail your customers like this. Because at some point, no matter how great your product is, they’ll find the frustration too high and simply go elsewhere.

As for Exede/Wild Blue, I’ll let you know how it goes… in two weeks.

Speaking of worst support experiences, lay them on me. What’s the worst you ever experienced?

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