Since high-level customer service is so critical to the success of our brand, and because it represents such a valuable opportunity to stand apart from our competition, we need to focus on making it exceptional at ALL customer touch points and not just on the telephone. Our customers (not all of them, but many), have shown their desire to use social media for customer service, so we need to serve them there, as best able.

Everything we do online in the public eye in the way of customer service can either enhance or damage our brand reputation. So we HAVE to perform well in the social care arena, to the extent we are able.

Additionally, we cannot say one thing and do another (i.e. "We provide 24/7 customer care.") As a global Internet company, I believe it is imperative that we do provide 24/7 care. We do currently provide 24/7 phone care. But, we are not currently covered on social media in the late evening hours. So, the ideal scenario would be to correct this. That, or make what we Do and Do Not provide in the way of CS-related service/hours more visible to our customers.

Options include:

1. Hire a full time CS agent to provide evening social care coverage

a. Pros - We get the cover age we need with a trained, empathetic professional

b. Cons -

i. We absorb the costs (salary, benefits, etc.) of a full-time non-income generating employee ($40-50K?)

ii. We absorb these costs, even while relative activity/volume is low

c. Thoughts - This is obviously the most expensive option. However, effective CS is fast-becoming the most critical factor to our long-term success. Can we afford not to whatever it takes in CS? While activity during evening hours may be low, this employee would still be performing a critical full-time role by providing monitoring. Something to consider: Could this role potentially be outsourced?

2. Ask current evening Tech Support Employees to add this duty to their responsibilities

i. Techs seem to have the time in the evenings

ii. We get the coverage we need

iii. Techs are best suited to solve the most challenging technical problems

iv. Costs are (potentially) free, if we simply mandate that they do it.

b. Cons - Techs may resist

i. This is not the job they signed up for

ii. Their daytime peers do not have to do this

iii. This is not the role they are trained for

iv. They may be less-than sympathetic with customers, which may result in equally bad, or worse customer experience, resulting in no gain/not achieving goal

v. Happy employees are as critical as happy customers.

vi. It is unusual to ask Tech Support to serve as front line CS support, and a bit of a bait-and-switch in their job description.

c. Thoughts / Potential Solutions - Explain the situation to the Tech Team, expressing the thoughts above regarding the importance of great CS and full coverage to our Team. Tell them that this is part of the natural evolution of business and social media as a means of CS communications. Reassure them that we understand their concerns and regret having to ask them to serve in this capacity, but need to ask them to do so AND to request that they do it well (with empathy and patience).

Since we would be asking our employees to take on additional responsibilities, it would only be fair to compensate them, accordingly. This would probably also be necessary to keep their morale high. I'd recommend offering $50 per night to (1) Tech Support employee to monitor our social streams. At minimum, they would be required to check Twitter every half-hour; Facebook, every hour. We could ask for a volunteer under this arrangement, or the Tech Team could split it up according to their normal scheduling rotation(s). This would potentially give (1) person the ability to earn approx. $13,000 or more in salary, annually, or give multiple members the ability to take home a few hundred dollars more per month than they do now. Web.com would get full coverage and save the costs of hiring a new full-time representative.

For future evening Tech Support hires, this would become an upfront, stated part of their job description - (i.e. Tech / Social Care Support) with an explanation that late night volume is generally low; that they will be asked to monitor during these times; but will also be compensated for it.

3. Make it better known that we DO provide 24/7 support, BUT with conditions - We DO offer 24/7 phone support (and online form), but DO NOT provide 24/7 social care support, which is restricted to the hours of 8 AM - 7 PM ET. This is actually already reflected in our Facebook Community Guidelines, but could potentially be made more visible by adding a new tab for SUPPORT.

On TWITTER, we could add the same information to our profile. We would also need to make sure this was reflected on our corporate websites.

ii. Our Techs stay happy and continue to perform the roles they are prepared to

iii. We provide clear messaging regarding our support policies to customers, without sacrificing "24/7" customer care

b. Cons -

i. We wouldn't provide our customers with 24/7 social care

ii. It would not represent the best we can do I like options #2, #1 and #3, in that order.


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