Hints and Tips | | Published February 25, 2016

What Makes a Successful Help Desk Software?

When companies are just starting out, customer service is a top priority. Not only does an engaged support team serve as a valuable resource for businesses to gain insights for improvement, these staff members play a vital role in customer retention. However, at the beginning stages of a new business, funds are often low and the customer service offering is typically limited to a handful of knowledgeable employees and a variety of manual processes for tracking client concerns.

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Businesses must invest in help desk software that grows and adapts along with them.

That being said, it makes sense that companies, especially those operating in the business-to-business (B2B) space, face challenges in delivering the same exceptional, personalized customer service they did in the beginning stages of their development. Often there is no customer support software at all, or a mediocre “entry level” solution is used due to budget restraints. To retain customers and deliver a positive experience, businesses must invest in help desk software that grows alongside them and adapts to their needs as their companies evolve. It’s like the old adage “dress for the job you want, not the job you have”. In B2B customer support this means implementing tools to support the business you’ll have in a few years, not just the one you have now.

Achieving long-term personalized support
In the early stages of a business, personalized customer experiences are the norm. For example, Bob Stringer from Fast Company surveyed 23 startup CEOs to determine how much time they spent interacting with customers. According to his findings, the average CEO spent 45 percent of his or her time each week directly engaging with clients. While this approach is vital to the success of a business at the beginning of its development, it is not feasible for a CEO to be in charge of customer support and relations as more clients are acquired.

Instead, businesses need to invest in agile, collaborative customer support software that empowers agents on the frontline and provides staff with the information they need to give clients the same experience and level of expertise they would have received at the beginning of their relationship with the company.

Digital services require advanced software

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Agile help desk software is crucial for companies operating in the digital or technology space.

Help desk software that grows at the same pace as the businesses is crucial for companies operating in the digital space. According to Accenture's Digital Transformation in the Age of the Consumer study, "improving the customer experience" was labeled as a No. 1 priority by 21 percent of respondents. Further, 63 percent plan to enhance their overall online experience.

As a business's client base and customers' technological needs grow, SaaS companies must improve how they approach the customer experience. Successful software companies have a reputation for being agile and willing to change as their customers' needs change. In order to make evolution possible, investing in flexible customer service software is also necessary.

Out with the old, in with the new
Rapidly growing companies that make the leap from their old structures to advanced customer support software experience massive benefits. It is not uncommon for businesses to become more departmentalized, or “silo’d” as they grow, but it is also not the best environment for creating an exceptional customer experience. By eliminating manual processes that operate in a silo, companies can rest assured their customer experience won't suffer as the business grows. Instead, businesses that tap into this software enjoy:

  • Increased customer satisfaction: By increasing efficiency and using a centralized system to keep track of customer interactions, growing businesses show their customers that they are important and their time is valuable. For B2B providers especially it is essential to understand the customer at a company level and have full visibility into the entire relationship.
  • Reduced duplication: Often times, growing businesses deal with unnecessary confusion when customer tickets are routed through multiple channels and systems. Likewise using multiple systems means different people are entering the same information into different places. As an alternative, B2B help desk software allows support teams to manage tickets and customers in a single system, which makes higher volume a much simpler challenge to tackle.
  • Effective ticket management: Customer service software enables help desk agents to automatically route client concerns to the appropriate party, such as the tech team or CEO, and track the progress of that ticket. This translates to faster and better customer care and even provides development teams with more transparent access to information on how to improve the product.
  • Omnichannel support: With advanced software, emails, phone calls and live chats from customers are integrated into one single system, accommodating the varied needs of different clients while keeping operations efficient and ensuring no information is lost.
  • Seamless integration: Companies want to offer seamless experiences to their clients, and one way to enhance their tools while also accommodating growth is to invest in a customer support tool that integrates with other software and features, such as CRM software or development software used in their daily business.

For a business to be successful, customer service should be top of mind. Companies operating in the B2B space are more often than not forming profitable partnerships that help their clients achieve long-term success. For sustained success to be mutual, it is necessary to invest in customer service software that can adapt to growth, no matter the pace.

Want more? Watch our video to learn how TeamSupport helps you understand your B2B customers better: