We run several businesses, and are considering consolidating the support from each service to a central domain that identifies its purpose.

These are facts about the situation:

The support domain is easily understood as being a support web site (Not currently in use). We would have the logos of all services on the main page and a brief description about what the domain is about.

All of the services content on their support pages be changed to point to the new support locations and a terse mention about the change.

All of the services have a helpdesk, and a forum.

The idea is to use one forum, one helpdesk for all of the different sites.

The products that compete with one another would be stripped from one that competes with another, and mentioning why this is happening.

Use your vast knowledge and think about if you have seen this before, its effectiveness in unifying the support channel, and if it has inherent problems.

Please this be your opinions with examples you are specifically aware of and make your opinion based on that.

I've seen business sites in network do this before and it doesn't sound like a bad idea. How is it going to work with a forum though? Won't people be coming to the forum from completely different areas and topic settings?

Well I already have it function on the mbshost forums, sighost users get along with mbshost users, so they are already accustomed to being with a different level of user.

The products (Services) are different enough that they won't compete with each other, in fact they might just bolster each other. The boards are getting about 20 signups a day, sighost alone gets between 30 and 60 signups a day so there is enough new people to help others understand etc

Essentially

Image Hosting Customers (Free and Paid)
Single Domain Customers
Reseller Customers
Dedicated Customers
Domain Registration Customers
Secure Cert customers
Design and Backend customers

These are the types of individual types of customers that would share the same board.

Ive thought about partnering with some long time vendors as well unifying it even more but the thread isn't about those issues just yet. The customers would all be served under an LLS, and all businesses would be under DBAs'

This is a very good question, and is something I have considered for a long time.

We also operate several hosting brands, as well as sell different software products and services, etc..

Having to setup, manage, and then pay support staff for all the different sites is a real pain. It would be great if we could consolidate all the support to one helpdesk and set of forums.

The only problem is that I personally feel it isn't really that "professional" unless it is done very well. In other words, customers might think that the company is just a hodge-podge of little websites all thrown together into one place.

I hope that makes sense.

As a consumer, if I purchase something from WEBSITE XYZ.. then I would expect to go to WEBSITE XYZ for support and help. If I am redirected to WEBSITE ZZZ and see a forum for eight other websites with various other products and services... then I would lose confidence in the company.

But one thing I was wondering is if it is possible to have one helpdesk back-end with multiple different front-ends? So this way, the support tickets from all the websites go into one system, which is able to "track" what website it came from and maintain that brand throughout the ticket cycle.

This way, I could at least consolidate the helpdesks into one system and then just train our staff on all the products, etc.. instead of having to train them on multiple systems as well.

Exactly, shadowed resources, seperate front ends, no connection is a possibility with todays software, and I'm kicking around the possibilities of it (You've nailed one of the alternatives along this route).

Originally posted by Samuel
Exactly, shadowed resources, seperate front ends, no connection is a possibility with todays software, and I'm kicking around the possibilities of it (You've nailed one of the alternatives along this route).
If you find good software, please post a link to it :)

For a while, I thought the author of support-logic.com helpdesk was going to develop a "multiple front-end / single backend" system, but apparently this work has been delayed or cancelled.

Originally posted by gxhosting
If you find good software, please post a link to it :)

Sure will, I'm still considering a modified Kayako, I like that software and I'm sure there is a convention that can be figured out.

If you want to do this, I would highly suggest forming a new corporation or LLC to own all these other "sub-entities". This way, customers can relate to the fact that you have one consolidated support domain by understanding that, legally, all these business are connected with each other. From a legal and customer standpoint, this would be optimal IMO.

Otherwise, it may be questionable to setup one domain as a central support center. I don't know about you, but if for some odd reason one business goes under, I wouldn't want customers to necessarily be able to make that connection visibly and easily. ;)

EDIT: Kayako eSupport is great software. We use it and it's perfect for most uses. However for extremely complex solutions I would code my own or have it professionally done.