Support Ops Podcast: Recent Episodes
Support Ops
Customer support is not a hard concept. Someone has a problem and it’s your job to fix it and make them happy. Not just satisfied but happy. Here's how.
This week I talk with Thanh Pham from Asian Efficiency. We look at how to prepare for a product launch when your team is still pretty small. Thanh also shares with us how his team is scaling their support while still providing a very personable customer experience.
This week I talk with Diana Potter from Customer.io. She's the first and so far only support pro on the team. We talk about how she provides a solid customer support experience despite being a solo support pro.
This week I talk with Ashley Verrill from Customer Service Investigator. We talk about the trends she's seeing from other company's customer service teams. We also touch on self-service support and how companies can get better at it.
This week I interview Micah Bennett from Zapier. We talk about how they keep a complex idea like Zapier super easy to use for customers. We also touch on how he does support as the sole support pro along with what his team thought of live chat.
This week I interview Robert Gregory from Media Temple. We talk about the acquisition of Media Temple by GoDaddy along with how the support team fielded the flood of opinions on it. Then we move into the world of gamification with examples of how Robert successfully uses it with his support team.
This week on the show, I interview Josh Pigford from Sabotage. We talk about Temper, how teams can use it to see what the customer is thinking, and how customer surveys should work in general.
This week Rachel Andrew from Perch is on the show. We talk about designing support requests out of your product. We also take a look at the data she tracks to help plan for future customer growth and how that ties back into those support cases.
Joseph Rooks is on the show this week. We talk about his experience with tech support at Virginia Tech, crafting better error messages, and how screencasts can be your best friend to help customers.
Ian Landsman and Andrey Butvo are on the show this week. It's a special join podcast with the very awesome Bootsrapped.fm. We talk customer support from the bootstrapper's perspective along with what works, what doesn't, and more.
Justin Jackson is on the show this week. We talk about designing for support while building out your product. You can’t have a great product without a great support experience.
Jon Lane is on the show this week. He's part of the fantastic support team at Harvest and probably the most remote worker I've ever talked to. Hint - he takes a boat to get from his home office to town.
We also talk about Hurricane Sandy and how it affected the Harvest team. With power outages throughout the city, the Harvest team worked around the clock to keep their app up and running.
Nick Francis is on the show this week. As one of the co-founders of Help Scout, customer support is literally his entire business. We cover Help Scout's first online class, how to make whole company support work, and what it's like to look for your first full time support person.
Carl Holscher is on the show this week. We talk about tech support inside a more traditional institution like the National Institute of Health. He's supporting some of the best scientists in the world as they work to solve cancer. Pretty cool, right?
Carl shares some of the tips tricks he has for keeping a variety of computers and operating systems running their best. It's in-person support every day of the week for everything from Mac to Windows to Linux. He's even working with machines that need Windows 95 to run!
Mike Wong from Wufoo is on the show this week. We talk about Wufoo's distinct personality and how that comes across in their support emails. Oh, and his fan club. You've got to hear about his fan club.
I've got Evan Hamilton on the show this week. We talk about keeping customers happy, engaging with the community around your product, and how different teams inside your company should work together.
Part two of the interview with Adam Stacoviak from Pure Charity. He's looking to hire his first dedicated support person. We talk about what to look for in a person and how to get them started with the team. It's a two-part interview that you don't want to miss.
Adam Stacoviak from Pure Charity is on the show this week. He's looking to hire his first dedicated support person. We talk about what to look for in a person and how to get them started with the team. It's a two-part interview that you don't want to miss.
Jeff Vincent from Wistia is on the show this week. We talk about hiring new people, how programmers can work with the support team, and what happened when they started downplaying their phone support.
Carolyn Kopprasch from Buffer is on the show this week. We talk about what makes Buffer's customer support team rock. She gives out some great advice on apps they use and how to get work done in beastmode.
This week's episode ranges from the uproar over remote working to FedEx shipping marijuana to the wrong person. And then they gave out the address so the "right" person could pick it up. Being a gamer, there's talk of SimCity's missteps. Then United Airlines finally gets something right for a customer.
Chase Livingston is back for this episode. We're trying something a little different with this episode. From phone support to Twitter hacks, we look at different articles and news from the customer support world. It's a different kind of episode but I think you'll like it. So hit that play button already!
Jason Rehmus is on the show this week. We talk about his new business Sweating Commas along with the importance of editing your writing in general. While his business focuses on writers more than customer reps, he still has lots of great advice for editing all those customer emails you send every day.
Ian Landsman from UserScape is our guest on this episode. He gives us an inside look at designing a customer support tool a little different from others out there today. Instead of a straight SAAS model, his HelpSpot app is managed by the company itself. Enjoy!
We're back from winter break with Sarah Stealey on this episode. She talks about consulting with companies to train their customer contact teams. It's not just about keeping customers happy, it's about keeping teams happy too.
Since it's the holidays, I'm throwing in an extra surprise with this one. We have not one but two great guests on this show with TJ Stein and Sara Carter from Media Temple.
My favorite part? I learn that web hosting signups is a lot like gym membership signups. Oh, and people are using Google Plus.
Christa Collins from Squarespace is on the show this week. We talk about her early days at Nordstrom and Gap then move into the fun part with her team at Squarespace. She's leading a pretty big team there so she's full of advice on what does work and doesn't work.
Your app is going to go down at some point. In this episode, we talk about what to do when that happens. And believe me, it'll happen. No matter how good your team is, it's inevitable.
I cover ideas for a solid response, the importance of practicing your plan, and ways to learn from those times your app does crash.
Let's talk hiring. If your product does well, you're going to get more customers. More customers mean more support emails, tweets, and general requests for help. More of those means you need to hire some more support reps. But what do you look for when you go to hire someone? In this episode, I talk about five things that you need to be watching for.
In this episode of Support Ops, Chase and Chase, coolest named duo ever, look at how support is run over at Ubuntu One. He gives us the ins and outs of supporting everyone from people new to Ubuntu to battle hardened Linux users.
This is the very first episode of the Support Ops podcast. It's short and sweet because I wanted for us both to test the waters here. I know you trust me enough to read through an article or check out a link.