This short article isn’t about optimal user support channels, technologies or even AI, even though these are all vital tactics. It’s about strategy, mindset and most importantly how the support and technical communications functions are integral parts of every successful organisation.
There’s right and wrong ways to run a support helpline. Obviously the worst are to keep customers on hold for ridiculously long periods, and to fail to solve their issues. Another fail is to send expectations underground with dire warnings of how abuse to support staff will not be tolerated. One of my least favourite is to repeatedly inform callers that they can find all the support they need on the organisation’s website, at blah blah blah forward slash support forward slash go_away (I once suffered this approximately every 30 seconds, for around 30 minutes, for a query which absolutely needed human interaction). Chatbots stuck in endless loops requesting the same information the user is asking for… And last, but not least, “We’re currently experiencing high call volumes…”, where 'currently' == &always. Such passive hostility, a bane of our modern age, reinforces customers’ impressions that the organisation regards customers simply as an unwelcome impediment to profits.
I could turn this blog post into a novel by collecting and collating support horror stories such as a recent one about a budget airline refusing a booking refund unless they could speak to the original booker, the caller’s recently deceased husband, but I won’t; I’ll just give one personal example of atrocious support.
The dead mouse
Several years ago I bought an expensive mouse from a well-regarded company, not so much for its over-the-top features, buttons, software and wheels, but for its comfortable shape and size.
Fast-forward to current year, and after charging, the ‘move cursor’ function, a fairly important one, suddenly stopped working. Flumoxed, I turned to the manufacturer’s chat support, where, having finally managed to move on from an artificially-dumb chatbot, I managed to communicate with a human being.
The human being in question first misunderstood my stated problem, referring me to irrelevant online help, and suggestions to switch it off then on again, then requested serial number and receipt, and finally, after 30 minutes or so, regretfully informed me that my dead mouse was out-of-warranty toast, offering me a small discount on a new one.
Almost at the point of giving up, I searched online for a solution, quickly finding this to be a common problem with a simple solution: dissasemble and slightly loosen two internal screws on a button I’d never even used.
Was it beyond the resources of this technology giant to find this solution and inform me? Does it regard its customers as incabable of using a screwdriver? Or is it simply persuing built-in obsolescence as a deliberate business model?
As the company states prominently on its website under a top link, ‘Planet’, ‘DESIGNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY MEANS QUESTIONING EVERYTHING.‘ Indeed.
Sustainability: the ability to maintain or support a process, system, or activity over a long period of time without depleting natural resources or causing significant harm to the environment, society, or the economy.
An opportunity, not a cost
Support is not just a cost: it is an investment and an opportunity. When managed correctly, it is an integral part of every organisation and its product or service design process. Successful development teams invest hugely in product/UI design and a plethora of testing methodologies. But just as no military plan survives first contact with the enemy, in-house pre-launch testing, however thorough, can never come close to real-life market testing by thousands of end-users.
So why invest hundreds of thousands for specialist testing teams, then regard customer support as a burden or necessary evil, to be provided reluctantly, as cheaply and poorly as possible?
This is where another ‘cinderella’ function is crucial: Technical Communication. By analysing support tickets and those ubiquitous feedback surveys, technical authors can provide both direct and relevant material for end-users – lessening demand on support – and also focussed and prioritised feedback for product development teams, helping improve product design and UI. It’s not rocket surgery; it’s a straightforward paradigm shift. By implementing such a strategy, organisations don’t just end up with great documentation and better products; they gain enhanced reputation, goodwill, function, sales and profits.
Customers, instead of overloading support helplines or ploughing through reams of irrelevant Reddit forums and YouTube videos, come to rely on the organisation’s own well-structured material. The support team, instead of laboriously dealing with waves of frustrated users and similar issues, is able to deal with and identify smaller and smaller rough edges, thus honing products through an iterative process of continual customer-centric improvement. It’s a win-win.
Result: We’re currently experiencing low call volumes: ‘How can I help you?’