"Do not think about support down": how to realize the hidden features of your support service

Practically any organization, one way or another connected with the sale of software, needs a support line. A support is associated with the help in mastering the product and solving various kinds of customer problems, as a rule, of a technical nature. These functions really form the basis of the work of the support teams, although there are also many hidden "buns" that the Support can give to the business if its potential is used at full capacity. About them, and will go under the cut.

A 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.
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1. Support psychologist

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

The role of the psychologist usually appeals to trust - clients, satisfied with the results of psychotherapy sessions, with great respect begin to relate to the company itself, their loyalty rises. In particularly successful cases of continuous support from Sapport, a client may become a voluntary product evangelist in his team.

In our support practice at Wrike, there were examples of excellent customer relations we support. In some cases, the existing relations became warm and friendly, largely due to the repeated interaction with the “happy outcome”. Such customers will always put in a good word for us - for example, when cross-selling a product to other departments or communicating with other users in our Community . A fresh example: we recently learned about the transition of one of the most active clients in communicating with Support Clients 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 was told to us by the client himself with the words “I'm a Wriker to the end!”, Which could not fail to please the whole team!

2. Support-fire

Imagine a situation - you had a certain global incident (massive problem, critical bug, God forbid downtime), and authorized engineers / administrators have not yet realized that “everything is bad”, or realized, but they are busy urgently eliminating the consequences. Meanwhile, for sure there are already a large number of dissatisfied users who urgently need to get a comment. The support fireman comes to the rescue, who calms everyone down, explains everything, and then brings the information needed to identify the problem to the engineers.

It is worth noting that in this case, with the right approach, it is possible to achieve a result that is predicted by psychologists - people whose problems are well and efficiently solved with proper communication, in the end, are more satisfied than those who have not encountered any 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 was wrong, which immediately notifies Support. With a well-established system of internal communication, the problem can be eradicated as early as the germ, and this is largely due to the support of the Supporter who transmitted information in time.

The Wrike support team has developed a certain practice of interacting with engineers when critical situations arise. We try to sensitively respond to any customer reports that may indicate a potential problem, collect as much information as possible and inform the engineers on duty. A similar scheme of work is used in the detection of 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 ). The rapid response of Sapport more than once helped prevent more dramatic developments.

3. Support Communicator

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

What kind of help can a support product have for product development? Transfer of feedback from the user directly to the grocery department is one of the alternatives. For example, our Support team records feedback from users in the Wrike Community and reports to product managers on a regular basis. No one will understand the client better than the support representative, so it is useful to give the interpretation of any feedback to the 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 Scrum team events - 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 can 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 cautiously - the support is floating in the ocean of customer data, and the biggest problem is how to systematize this data and draw the right conclusions that are not misleading.

4. Support forge quality staff

Another undisputed "hidden" function of the Support is its human potential.
The versatility of skills and knowledge, a comprehensive understanding of the product and extensive experience in communication with customers make immigrants from the Support team desirable in any customer and product departments (marketing, sales, consulting, etc.). If the Support team is also multilingual (and covers several time zones / geographic locations), its internal culture also contributes to the additional development of communication skills, which is converted into usefulness for any client-oriented work.

The 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, in this regard we help with the localization of the product). The language potential of the team is not exhausted at this point - knowledge of some less common languages ​​(Estonian, Swedish, Tibetan (!) Rarely finds application in the work, but it is a pleasant bonus for any speaker of a rare language who has looked into our Support Chat.

If your support differs from the technical direction, then the specialists will have direct access to QA or even to development (if they have coding skills) - customer understanding of the product can be very useful both in testing and in creating new features. Support agents, as a rule, are very hardworking and persistent guys. They will get to the bottom of the essence, they will help you to figure it out, got used to work quickly and scrupulously, because solid lines of incoming correspondence or calls train army reaction and concentration. Such skills are welcome for any job! In addition, these are people with different educational / professional backgrounds - you never know in what area you can find a specialist in the Support Department (there are philologists, marketers, teachers, and PhDs in Wrike Support).

Postscriptum

The four roles of Sapport 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 solely for solving customer problems, help with a product or service. Attract your support agents to other interesting tasks, and perhaps you will discover a new potential for the development of the business / team as a whole!