Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Running a Web Hosting Business : User support

[sameev29]

Is user support(email ticket support,phone support,live chat support) necessary after providing video tutorials?

[larwilliams]

Obviously yes. Customers will still want to speak to someone when they are having a problem and need it resolved.

[spykee]

Definitely and that would be better if you can make (at least one of those, eg. email) it 24/7.

[Jim K]

Think about it. You have a website. Website goes down , it is 2AM , you email or request a live chat your company, and get a reply after 2 or 3 hours.

You will not be happy. So yeah it is important

[KekzHost]

Certainly it is. There is no way that host provider won't offer at least ticket support. No matter how good your tutorials are, no matter how great your server is and no matter how awesome your client's tools are - there will always be problems that will have to be fixed. Always, no exception in that

The better support you offer, the better for your clients.

[ResellerWebHost]

YES, and it is not only needed but should be your top priority! You could offer the cheapest packages with the best server performance but, if you don;t offer good support your ship will sink quickly. It only takes a few bad reviews to ruin a host!

[SkyNetHosting]

Originally Posted by sameev29

Is user support(email ticket support,phone support,live chat support) necessary after providing video tutorials?

Its a must! You should at least have email / help desk support for a start.

[sameev29]

How is email support,is live chat really that important?

[Evan H]

Originally Posted by sameev29

How is email support,is live chat really that important?

It's so important because there is no way you will really think of every single problem that might come up and make a tutorial and knowledgebase entry for it. Not only problems clients might have but errors you might make. An error that you might take months to eventually notice might bug clients instantly and make them switch - it's essential that clients can contact someone.

Imagine if you accidentally disabled something like MySQL databases when you were setting up Feature Sets in WHM. You might not have any idea why clients never stay with you, and only after weeks or months, you discover that stupid error. You'd probably have bad reviews and have lost tons of potential customers. On the other hand, if you offer live chat and email support, clients will contact you about this and you can quickly resolve it without problems.

Just think about it from a client's point of view, if you started renting a dedi and there was no support whatsoever from the company whenever something didn't work right, how likely would you be to stay with them?

[sameev29]

Originally Posted by Evan H

It's so important because there is no way you will really think of every single problem that might come up and make a tutorial and knowledgebase entry for it. Not only problems clients might have but errors you might make. An error that you might take months to eventually notice might bug clients instantly and make them switch - it's essential that clients can contact someone.

Imagine if you accidentally disabled something like MySQL databases when you were setting up Feature Sets in WHM. You might not have any idea why clients never stay with you, and only after weeks or months, you discover that stupid error. You'd probably have bad reviews and have lost tons of potential customers. On the other hand, if you offer live chat and email support, clients will contact you about this and you can quickly resolve it without problems.

Just think about it from a client's point of view, if you started renting a dedi and there was no support whatsoever from the company whenever something didn't work right, how likely would you be to stay with them?

Thank you very much for your reply.You see I was thinking of providing email support but I can't provide live chat.Even if I can I can't do it for 24 hours a day.Is it okay with email support?

[TimothyH]

Originally Posted by sameev29

Thank you very much for your reply.You see I was thinking of providing email support but I can't provide live chat.Even if I can I can't do it for 24 hours a day.Is it okay with email support?

A lot of company's provide email support as their primary way of supporting clients. As long as you provide a quick response time, there shouldn't be any trouble. You can still provide live chat even if you can't operate it 24/7, just have the offline button open a form so clients can send you an email when you're not available. You can then respond to them as soon as possible.

[SkyNetHosting]

Originally Posted by sameev29

How is email support,is live chat really that important?

You would probably lose 50 - 75% of the new sales if you don't have Live Chat, if you cant provide Live Chat you must at least consider a good help desk support over just email would not going to help much. Is there any specific reason that you are not willing to offer Live Chat support?

[FRH Dave]

You may want to consider outsourcing support during the hours when you're unable to provide it. Many support companies also can handle your live chat (for an additional fee), and some even offer phone support. As with everything else, you get what you pay for, so choosing the "cheapest" provider you find may actually hurt your reputation and bottom line.

[StarWebHosting]

If you are just starting out why not setup a reseller account with a provider that offers end user support like ezpzhosting?

The response times may be a bit slower but somebody will always be there to offer help etc.

[SkyNetHosting]

You may want to consider outsourcing support during the hours when you're unable to provide it. Many support companies also can handle your live chat (for an additional fee), and some even offer phone support.

If you are just starting out why not setup a reseller account with a provider that offers end user support like ezpzhosting?

If you are new and just starting out I think your business will become more successful if you run it with your personal touch however if its impossible I think it would be much cheaper to go with a host that offer end user support rather than hiring a 3rd party company to outsource support.