How to Implement a Help Desk Platform
If your business is just getting started, you have already learned the most important lesson: be prepared to adapt. In customer service, you focus first on attracting more customers and then on dealing with customer complaints. An inbox shared by a group of people is a good, flexible solution for quick fixes on a small number of requests. Due to fewer clients, it's easier to personalize responses. What should you do when your company grows and wins more customers?
Providing more features or products makes things more complex. As a result, you receive more support requests, which are also more complex. What should you do? Implement a help desk system. There are many help desk systems but Freshdesk is recommended for starters. There might be Freshdesk Alternatives but I think that you should use this software if you are just getting started.
Email customer support may appear to work at first, but you soon learn that it has numerous disadvantages. It makes you think about migrating from email to a help desk, which is more efficient than shared inbox support.
Why Move from Email to a Help Desk Platform?
Managing customer support requests easily is a major reason for using help desk software. Email is better than a ticketing system if:
- It's easy to lose or forget support requests.
- Your team spends a lot of time and effort handling requests, but some may slip through the cracks. In order to resolve problems, clients send relevant follow-up emails. Nevertheless, it is impossible to determine which issues have been addressed and which remain pending. It's because your company lacks a system to identify pending requests and order them. Support agents send out duplicate responses as a result.
- Two support representatives giving the same answer makes your clients confused, and puts your brand credibility in jeopardy. The worst case is when your agents give you different information, leading to more questions than answers. Hurried support representatives often reply without tagging them previously. While most help desk tools include shared inboxes, they also include agents colliding with each other. Clients have to wait for answers.
- As your deals scale, you will have to work hard to keep track of the increasing requests and answers. It is likely that support agents keep all the necessary information in a spreadsheet. However, copying, pasting, and double-checking the sheet takes a considerable amount of time. Support reps' productivity is low because of this, which also affects customer loyalty. Your response time drops as a result.
- It is valuable to perform efficiently and high performance is expected. Nevertheless, without the necessary tools, your support agents are incapable of handling client inquiries. Receiving the same requests and providing the same answers can be frustrating for them. On the other hand, customers with more urgent problems must wait. Support teams that are overworked and overstressed perform worse and burn out faster. Customer service teams crave customer communication history.
Today, customers choose which communication channels to use, not the ones you offer so should be aware of productivity hacks. For example, they may tweet you a request and then later email you further information. This makes it difficult for your agents to provide a seamless experience or provide a quick answer.
What Are the Benefits and Setbacks of a Shared Inbox
Shared inboxes in Outlook or Gmail offer the following benefits:
- Simple to use. Using a shared email is similar to using various personal email applications. In the end, email is a part of everyday life, and everyone knows how to deal with it. Nevertheless, tracking time should be done by checking receive/sent times.
- Collaboration is easy. In contrast to personal inboxes, shared inboxes are used by everyone on a support team. You can also assign tasks to team members.
- Actions are based on historical data. To keep the conversation flowing, support agents use previous interactions with the customer.
There are several drawbacks to a shared inbox, including:
- Missing client details. In Gmail, for example, shared inboxes (without extensions and add-ons) do not offer customer profiles. As a result, customer queries are not resolved as quickly.
- Responses were mixed. Because your support agents communicate with clients all the time, agent collisions are quite common. It is caused by missed tags or notes, along with a human factor: inattentiveness.
- Owning. Customers may feel that there is no accountability or ownership when everyone has access to inbox at the same time. Counting tickets becomes more difficult as there are more of them. No one takes "orphan" emails seriously, since it is expected that someone on the team will handle this inquiry. The result is poor customer service.
Why Move from Gmail, Outlook, or Another Email Provider
Among the most important reasons to switch email are the following:
- Integration capabilities are limited.
- Shared inboxes serve as email management tools. They are not sufficient for scaling up. In order to increase the efficiency of customer support workflow, you need an upgradeable, adaptable tool. Software for help desks integrates with CRM, ERP, collaboration and communication tools, shopping carts, and more. Streamlines interaction and routine. Advanced automation.
- There are some email providers that have a particular process. Often, you need to buy some add-ons or plugins to see any difference. It's possible to automate workflows with help desk solutions, but you have to set everything up. With workflow automation, your agents can focus on providing more accurate service faster because of predefined triggers. It is sometimes easier to hire an agency to tune everything up.
- Analytics & reporting. Continuous performance analysis and improvement ensure error-free, quick support service. From determining peak hours to evaluating agent skills, the help desk software collects important metrics related to overarching goals. The visualization of customer data in a set of dashboards allows you to identify problem areas and work out short- and long-term solutions.
Nowadays, customer support goes further than email, phone support, live chat, social media message, or chatbot. It mixes each and every into the flow. Customer chooses and the business adjusts or loses its audience. A shared inbox strives to enable all the necessary options. But often fails to identify duplication of customer requests. That leads to poor response times or even orphan emails. Most of the help desk systems have built-in omnichannel support and give your team a unified view of every customer interaction. These days, the speed and quality of brand response matter a lot.
Help Desk Software: Pros and Cons List
You can find the following advantages of help desk software:
- Ticketing centralized. Support agents can oversee customer inquiries more efficiently using the ticketing system.
- Responsibility. The support representative handles each customer's request or issue. There is a stronger sense of ownership among agents when they are assigned to tickets.
- Input. The help desk software stores customer interactions and performance information regarding tickets and support representatives. Reports help identify typical client problems, improve support strategy and workflow, and provide tips for making changes.
- Mobility should be improved. SaaS help desk apps are not only trendy, but also practical. You can provide support around the clock. The customer support team isn't enticed to work in the office, and you can scale customer support as you see fit by outsourcing it.
- Portals for self-service. Gathering complaints is one of the most important features of good help desk software. Afterwards, users can consult FAQs compiled from these complaints. This way, similar complaints can be directed to the FAQs section. This frees up agents' time and allows them to attend to other pressing matters.
- Features for collaboration. Software that facilitates communication among support teams should be built into help desk software. The use of chat features and delegation functions for managers can help you achieve effective collaboration.
The help desk software has the following major drawbacks:
- Concerns about costs. Help desk solutions are more expensive than shared email. Prices increase as you get more features. Vendors typically charge per seat on a monthly or annual basis.
- The learning curve. Prepare your team and run some training sessions for them before you implement a help desk system.
Drawing a Line
It may be time to move from email to help desk software if you struggle with some email-related issues. Compared with a shared inbox, customer support tools offer more opportunities:
- An appropriate structure for daily operations
- A customer service hub for the entire company
- All data is stored in one place
- Automating routine, manual tasks
- Transparency in processes
- Customer service and experience improved.
No matter if you're planning a small Zendesk import or a full-scale Freshdesk migration, you'll need to do a lot of preparation. However, if time is of the essence, and bothering your team with a migration is not an option, our experts can assist you.
