The following is tip #2, Offer help desks to build customer loyalty, excerpted from Chapter 7 of the book Technology and Customer Service: Profitable Relationship Building, by Paul R. Timm, published by Prentice Hall Publishing.
What you'll learn in this chapter:
- Help desks are a key component in the customer support mix.
- Help desks are specialized call centers that may serve both internal and external
customers.
- Help desks rely on a multi-level support model to provide appropriate assistance.
- Technology such as problem management systems, knowledge management
systems, and remote support undergird modern help desks.
- Automation, centralization, and outsourcing will shape tomorrow's help desk.
The role of help desks in customer support
Help desks are big business. According to IDC, a leading technology research
firm, the market for outsourced technical support and help desk services was
$13.1 billion at the end of 2001. By 2006, IDC expects the market to more
than double, with revenues reaching $28.4 billion. To these figures should
be added the value of in-house provided help desk services. In a recent InfoWorld
survey, 90 percent of the respondents operated in-house help
desks -- only 10 percent outsourced. Providing technical solutions for the
computer weary has become a major part of customer service and support.
A help desk is the generic name for an end-user support
center. Other common names for a help desk include
customer support center, information center,
information technology solutions center, resource center,
and tech support. Regardless of the name, the purpose
is the same: provide technical assistance to end users.
What's an end user? This is how information technology professionals
describe someone who is the "final" or "ultimate" user of a computer information
system, rather than someone who develops the system.
The end user works with the finished product after
it has been fully developed and installed, rather than
working with prototypes. The term "end user" often implies
someone with little computer sophistication. Someone
who is technically savvy is often categorized as a
power user.
In the late 1970s, IBM coined the term "help desk" to refer to an in-house
operation that screened incoming technical service request calls and routed
them to the appropriate customer engineer. From that narrow focus, help
desks have evolved to become a single point of contact for providing technical
customer care. Today's help desk is an integral part of the customer
support mix. In addition to answering technical questions,
help desk staff may conduct training sessions, install
new hardware and software, manage network access
and availability, perform user satisfaction surveys, and
participate in software product improvement. Modern
help desks are proactive, anticipating end-user problems
and identifying ways to prevent such problems from happening
in the first place.
Download the entire chapter for more information on building customer loyalty. This chapter includes application activities to evaluate your help desk and customer loyalty building potential.
Building customer loyalty: Four tips in four minutes
Home: Introduction
Tip 1: Use effective call centers to build customer loyalty
Tip 2: Offer help desks to build customer loyalty
Tip 3: Apply the power of CRM to build customer loyalty
Tip 4: Design Web sites that build customer loyalty
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These chapter excerpts from Technology and Customer Service: Profitable Relationship Building, by Paul R. Timm, are used by permission from Prentice Hall Publishing.
Purchase the book here |
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