The help desk is a special contact point in companies that offer support clients and employees with their various issues and concerns.
In an e- commerce retail store, a help desk is a platform that receives customer queries. Issues are organized in the form of tickets for hassle-free resolution by the various customer support agents.
So the help desk is like where a customer registers their complaint. The software sorts the tickets to the relevant customer representatives who then reach out to the client to offer solutions through avenues like live chat, phone call, email, etc.
Help desk solution can also be used for in-house purposes to address worker issues. So it retains its critical role only this time a technical support team is helping staff (with queries) instead of customers.
How it Simplifies Customer Issue Management
A help desk creates order in the issue management process thanks to its query tracking system, which follows up on each customer request using a unique ticket.
That way, you can identify common issues, and deal with them faster, put cases in categories, assign queries to specific customer support agents, give matters priorities, etc.
Stage 1 of the system responds to the commonly asked questions that can as well be found in the Frequently Asked Question and knowledgebase sections.
Queries that cannot be addressed by help desk operators at stage 1 are forwarded to stage 2 with more knowledgeable customer representatives to tackle such requests.
Depending on the size and nature of your business, you can choose to add stage 3 that deals with more senior customer support agents to address the most challenging issues.
Why Business are Increasingly Using Help Desk Solution in Customer Service
When it comes to customer service, these software solutions play one critical role for business owners– ensuring first-time contact resolution.
FCR is a customer service metric that gauges the rates of grievances and concerns from your clients (in percentage) that your support agents resolved at the first interaction.
These are issues that you support crew dealt with straight away either by live chat or through telephone— and never escalated into further discussion.
So by the end of a call or session, a customer must have found a satisfying response to their queries or problem.
A help desk system increases the chances of a first time resolution and reduces resolution time by:
- Solving common queries straight away
- Prioritizing matters for easy identification and immediate resolution
- Assigning queries to specific customer support agents for strategic resolution
- Keeping track of each request
In essence, this technology streamlines communication, which is the backbone of business-customer relationships.
Types of Help Desk Software
There are various types of help desk systems to be chosen based on the needs and size of an organization. Here are the various types:
- Basic: Most of them come in the form of Software-as-a-Service solutions that businesses can install and begin using ASAP. They include a ticketing system that helps in addressing client issues. You can also include more features e.g., knowledgebase, chatting solutions, and more, but for an additional fee. They are best for SMBs because they both economical and easy to install and run.
- On-premise solutions: Built for brands looking to stay on top of their help desk system. A business hosts its on-premise solution, maintains it, and runs it.
- Web-based: This is a cloud-based and SaaS solution that is appropriate for firms looking to cut spending.
- Enterprise systems: Such solutions have way more elements than the basic type (in #1), and works to solve both customer and technical in-house matters. With it, you get more perks like hosting more users, faster resolution-time, a more comprehensive knowledgebase, and more.
- Open source: This type of help desk gives a business the freedom to personalize it and add extra features and processes. However, the designer must carry special software development skills to understand the coding system used. So providers usually offer such services at a fee to give businesses a custom-made help desk solution with more elements.
When picking, choose based on the size and needs of your organization. And your budget, of course!
Must-have Features For Your Help Desk System
As with any other piece of tech, help desks have been getting better as developers strive to adapt to the changing needs of software users.
So here are some of the must-have features for your business’s help desk solution.
1. User-friendly interface.
Its interface must be designed to give staff an easy time adapting with its ins and outs. It should be user-friendly, pages should be understandable and with no clutter. All buttons that matter should be placed strategically.
All these will determine whether the tool you pick streamlines query management or causes confusion among operators.
The best tools allow operators to solve queries through different communication avenues like active live chat, telephone, social platforms.
This reduces the hassle of shifting from one platform to the next increasing efficiency.
2. Knowledgebase.
A knowledgebase is vital to this system because it stores pre-written solutions to common customer queries.
Preparing well-thought-out solutions to known problems that you can always solve straight away, reducing workload for your customer representatives, allowing them to focus on more critical and technical issues.
3. Self-help.
Customers are okay with finding solutions on their own, so a self-help feature is a must-have these days. Common queries such as password resets should be handled through self-service, which now includes a password generator. It is also a hassle-free way to stay active round-the-clock.
4. Well-organized Ticket Management.
Without a well-organized ticket management system, you miss the entire purpose of installing a help desk in your premises.
It should enable easy ticket organizing and monitoring so that you can tell which queries to reassign, track volumes, and respond by calling in more agents or streamlining customer service ops.
5. Mobile Help Desk Support.
We can never underestimate the power and flexibility of mobile phones to add to our workplace efficiency.
Your help desk should allow agents to offer mobile on-the-go support. This is an excellent way to stay on top of queries and avoid ticket backlogs.
6. Customer Review or Feedback.
Because experience matters in every stage of the e-commerce process, you want a help desk solution that will gather customer feedback and give quick insights into workflow efficiency and operator performance.
7. Agent Pooling.
Your help desk solution should allow you to categorize staff into teams, departments, etc. which you can do based on things like skill and seniority.
Agent pooling streamlines ticket management because you can refer specific issues to the right agent
Final Words
Before choosing a help desk solution, analyze the needs of your business and customers, ease of use, your budget, and the features that matter to you most. And, of course, implement scalably.
