How many cloud and infrastructure providers tout technical support as the main and only reason to sign up with them? You’ve read it a hundred times and a hundred different ways. They all say the same thing: “we offer great support.” And I’m sure many of them do, but that’s not really my point.
Recently, I was in a management meeting and our team was discussing this very concept. It really surprises us how much focus support gets in the marketplace, when it’s only one part of the experience. A meaningful part, but only part nonetheless.
See providing quality tech support is not easy. But once you’ve hired the right people, given them the right tools, and empowered them to help customers, it’s not that hard. As long as you can give the right answers, solve the technical problems, and be empathetic, you can offer good quality technical support.
But what about service? How does that support experience jive with the overall experience your company gives customers? When does a customer stop getting support and start getting service?
Many folks don’t realize this, but Support and Service are two different things. For us, Service starts BEFORE you are a customer – it starts when we first speak for the very first time.
What does this mean? It means being transparent, being upfront; a no-BS approach to the sales process. It means never underselling just to meet your budget or overselling just because we can – finding the best fit is important.
And while we’re talking about best fit, some companies seem to think that a “Best Fit” is all about infrastructure choices. It’s not. It’s about a best organizational fit, the best service fit, the best experience fit.
Ever wonder why some customers are happy with one level of service that others are not? It’s the same infrastructure; it’s just not a good fit for other reasons. That’s important if you think about it. At a high level, service fit is the real definition of a best fit. Best fit is the overall experience matches what the customer wants, not what the provider wants to provide.