The shape and color of the Cloud formations have a dark tinge out at the farther edges. The market for Software As A Service applications seems headed into a commoditized future. As more and more software companies offer SaaS products, the swelling competition will exert ever-growing pressure on pricing. Sound familiar? It should, for increasing power and availability of choices coupled with decreasing price has been the reality of the PC market for many years. But that dark future is not inevitable for SaaS. Consider the example of a company that still consistently gets premium prices for a premium product family in the midst of the PC sameness. Even better, a company who enjoys continuing levels of customer loyalty its competitors can only helplessly envy. SaaS vendors who want more than subsistence, take note: Who will be the Apple of the SaaS community?
I’ve been a Mac user for nearly 20 years. My iPod handles the music that is a constant companion, and my iPhone goes everywhere with me. (I wish that I had far more than the few shares of APPL in my IRA holdings.) I enjoy my trips to the Apple store, and the thought that maybe there might be cheaper prices to be found elsewhere holds no allure. While I’ve only had to call for Support a bare handful of times over the years, each occasion has been effective and pleasant. 
Saying “it just works” is only the beginning part of the reason I keep buying from Apple. There is a consistent experience of delight inherent in the products themselves, in their use, and in interacting with the people of the company that is not accidental; it’s all the result of the company’s relentless insistence on excellence of design and execution. That insistence works for the company as well as the customers.
The single source for all of the product’s components is a key aspect that SaaS vendors wishing to emulate Apple’s success need to recognize. The seamless linkage between my computer, phone and music player wouldn’t be possible if all three came from different vendors and the burden of tying them together was on me. I have no interest in learning about technology, I just want to use it. I realize that Apple doesn’t make all of the components of their products themselves — but I have only one number to call when I have a question. And I almost never need to call that number.
Despite the huge impact that the shift to the Cloud has brought to the software industry, companies are still struggling to understand and to adapt to some key aspects of the change. This is especially true in the profession and practice of Customer Support. The SaaS & Support Project was initiated to analyze both the current-state and to identify best practices and concepts for a sustainable Future-State for Customer Support in the SaaS/Cloud era. In this Briefing, we will talk about the Process of providing effective customer support, and respond to a variety of questions.
Shared Struggles; Common Questions
For SaaS vendors and traditional companies beginning the transition to the Cloud, the usual beginning inquiry is: What are other SaaS/Cloud companies doing about Customer Support? Other questions quickly follow:
- Where and how should we properly set the customers’ expectations about Support responsiveness and quality?
- Do we need to offer 24X7 support service?
- What access channels or points should we provide for support interactions?
- How should the access channels be set up for most effective usage?
- When do SaaS customers tend to make the most support requests?
- What are the best practices in categorizing support case records?
- What classes of support requests are other SaaS vendors receiving?
- How are cases being resolved?
- What metrics should be used for the support contract center?
The essential question is: What should your company be doing? The answer to it, however, largely depends upon the strategic decisions that Senior Management makes about the business as a whole. Those foundational issues will be discussed in the Strategy Briefing.
Table of Contents:
This Briefing will present the findings and recommendations from the Project research as regards the Process or operation of a SaaS customer support group. It is not intended as an absolute, for both the research and the development of the SaaS/Cloud industry sector are far from complete. The intent is that material herein be the continuance of a conversation. To read the Briefing, click on the link to the next section at the bottom of this page, or you may use the direct links (in blue) below to go directly to any specific page. From the table below, links will open in a new window. From any of those pages you can move forward or backward in the same window.
If you want to ask a question about any page, please click the Comment button at either the top or the bottom of the particular page.
- Definition: The Process of Support
- Setting Appropriate Expectations For Support
- Hours of Operation
- Customer Usage of Support
- Access Channels
- Categorization of Service Requests
- Volume of Service Requests By Category
- Resolution of Service Requests
- Metrics
- Commentary
- Data, Methodology and Results
- About The SaaS & Support Project
- Mikael Blaisdell & Associates, Inc.
Definition: The Process of Support
In its essence, a customer support contact center is a knowledge inventory operation. There are access channels, various kinds of servicing actions, and knowledge repositories.
The Process of the center covers the usage of the various channels and repositories, workflow/operation of the staff, and includes such aspects as the hours of operation, categories and volumes of service requests received, and the resolution of open items. Various metrics are used to measure the process and evaluate its effectiveness.
The foundation for most of the decisions to be made about the process of the team needs to be established by the senior management team as part of the global strategy of the company.
There is a key aspect of this knowledge inventory operation that is frequently overlooked. The knowledge inventory itself requires maintenance, and that maintenance comes at a cost. Over time, the contents tend to degrade in value if they are not updated or retired when no longer useful.
Every SaaS support group should have a set of process maps showing how the various access channels function in connection with the knowledge resources. To remain accurate, and to keep the operation in alignment with its design, these maps will have to be constantly tested, validated and updated. Every day, in every type of customer contact center, many tactical decisions are made in the course of responding to customer interactions. It is all too easy for such tactical decisions to become strategic policy over time, ultimately to result in the creation of variances to the design and functioning of the center. Unless the maps are maintained, inefficiencies can creep in and sap both the productivity and the profitability of the group and company.
This Briefing contains privileged information. Access beyond this point is restricted to Research Members of The HotLine Magazine and/or the participants in The SaaS & Support Project’s Process survey. This Briefing and the contents thereof may not be republished or shared without the written permission of Mikael Blaisdell.
Setting Appropriate Expectations For Support
Revised: December 2, 2011