In the last few years, WordPress has become\u00a0the most popular CMS platform,\u00a0on which\u00a023% of all published websites are built.<\/p>\n
With this level of popularity, the number of\u00a0businesses within the\u00a0WordPress ecosystem continues to grow\u00a0and we are seeing\u00a0plenty of WordPress Premium product providers.<\/p>\n
Many of these companies are top quality providers with a large number of people that use their products or services (themes, plugins, hosting etc.).<\/p>\n
Customer support represents the most important link between a company and its users because it’s where they come into direct contact with each other.<\/p>\n
Customers\u00a0need someone to help them solve issues.\u00a0They are struggling for help\u00a0in a river of technical issues or confusion, and customer support is the bridge that helps them get safely to the other side where they feel happy and satisfied with your product<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Smart companies that realize the importance of keeping customers’ happiness at a\u00a0high level, and who care about their customers, are looking\u00a0to employ the best candidates for support\u00a0positions.<\/p>\n They are right to do this. Providing\u00a0top quality customer support makes the difference in whether\u00a0customers have a positive or negative perception of\u00a0your company.<\/p>\n In fact, providing\u00a0quality customer support\u00a0is\u00a0a powerful marketing tool for your company. Satisfied users will recommend your services and will spread a positive vibe about\u00a0your brand<\/strong>. Upset\u00a0users will, on the other hand, perpetuate\u00a0a negative image about your services, which could be\u00a0difficult to repair.<\/p>\n When looking for great WordPress Support Specialists, here are a few habits and characteristics that companies should not only look for, but should actively encourage and invest in for their support staff.<\/p>\n Although it’s not necessary to be fully fledged\u00a0programmer, it’s very important to have an\u00a0understanding of the technical fundamentals of how the product works<\/strong>, whether it’s a theme or a plugin, \u00a0in addition to understanding how WordPress works.<\/p>\n The more that a support specialist can understand about\u00a0HTML5\/CSS\/JS, PHP\/MySQL, Server Administration etc.\u00a0the easier it will be for them to solve problems.<\/p>\n So an emphasis on ongoing\u00a0learning and education\u00a0is\u00a0necessary. The support specialist should be willing to continue expanding their knowledge and the company should be willing to invest in that education by allowing their employee the time to do this.<\/p>\n Here at WP Rocket, support engineers are encouraged to read, to request books that will be educational and to take online courses in PHP etc to improve our knowledge. This ultimately will improve the quality of support.<\/p>\n To assist in the educational process, the developers of the product will have to make themselves available to answer questions and assist where necessary<\/strong>. Again, we are lucky at WP Rocket that all the developers are very available, even though we work remotely and always willing to explain how things work.<\/p>\n I mentioned that quality support is the\u00a0bridge between a company’s product and its users.<\/p>\n A\u00a0great\u00a0support specialist is\u00a0able to explain complicated technical terminology to non-technical people. Good communication will save time on\u00a0both sides, and having someone on the team who is able to communicate on both technical and non-technical levels easily will raise productivity to\u00a0a\u00a0higher level.<\/p>\n Conveying\u00a0a positive attitude in solving complicated problems through communication with users is something that will make customers\u00a0happy.<\/p>\n Good support engineers always have in mind that their\u00a0approach will affect a user’s perception of company<\/strong>, and in order to create a positive impage\u00a0, they will maintain a\u00a0high level of communication.<\/p>\n We use HelpScout as ticket system at WP Rocket. But we do not solve tickets.\u00a0We solve problems.<\/p>\n We communicate with users as humans – not ticket numbers – who expect us to resolve their issues.<\/p>\n Whenever we receive more than one report of an issue or question, we create a new documentation post in our Knowledge Base that explains how to solve this issue.<\/p>\n We believe in providing educational information for our customers so that they can find their own solutions if they choose, and so that they can develop a better understanding of how our plugin works. When responding to tickets we always take the time to explain to our customers how we resolved the issue<\/strong>. Education = empowerment.<\/p>\n This approach keeps\u00a0our customers happy and it also allows us to be efficient with our time. By having a lot of documentation that we can refer customers to, we ensure that we provide consistent information and make less mistakes.<\/p>\n Productivity is not just about responding to tickets quickly, but providing high quality answers that address the heart of the problem and provide the needed information. The quicker we can get the customer the info they need, the happier they are.<\/p>\n Great support specialists are focused on truly addressing a customer’s issues, not just trying to close the ticket.<\/p>\n Of course, there are situations when\u00a0it’s not so easy to find a solution.<\/p>\n It’s important to keep communicating and to be honest in crisis situations. I have spotted one bad characteristic of support staff in my career:\u00a0ignorance. Tickets stay unanswered for a long time, because you are not sure how to solve the issue.\u00a0This is bad!<\/p>\n Users will\u00a0always\u00a0<\/strong>(or at least in most cases) appreciate your honesty. So, if you need to ask for an additional explanation of their issue, don’t hesitate to do that. If you are not sure how to solve it, ask the developers in your team. Do anything that will lead to the resolution\u00a0of the issue, just don’t ignore it.<\/p>\n Having top quality customer support these days is a must, especially if you want to maintain a good reputation for your\u00a0product in the\u00a0community. That means there is a lot of space for people who would like to focus on this niche inside the WordPress ecosystem.<\/p>\n Being a WordPress Support Specialist is a\u00a0rewarding\u00a0job, especially if you like to help people.<\/strong><\/p>\n Would you like to share your opinion or experience with us? Don’t hesitate to leave a comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Providing professional customer support is crucial if you want to keep your product on high level. We have expressed our view on importance of providing top quality customer support in this blog post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4720,"featured_media":406,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"kia_subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inside-wp-rocket"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nKnowledge & Education<\/h3>\n
Communication Skills<\/h3>\n
Problem Solving, Not Ticket Solving<\/h3>\n
Crisis Management Skills<\/h3>\n
Conclusion<\/h2>\n