Web Hosting Talk : Other Forums : Web Hosting Lounge : Instant Messaging for Supporting Clients

[velvetgold]

Who uses instant messaging for support for their clients?
Even though I don't officially provide this support, I've had great feedback when I actually 'gave' 5 mins of my time using trillian to offer support. It answered the questions much faster than email ping pong.
I use trillian due to my numerous siblings preferring ICQ, MSN and Yahoo (1 for each), but I found that Trillian is really good because it keeps chat logs... I was going to look at Gaim but time wouldn't allow it - anyone else have recommendations/feedback?

Here's one annoyance, I thought it was pretty trivial - the ICQ servers don't like me...

On Trillian after several attempts to logon to ICQ.

"Error logging into ICQ: Error code 29: We think this means the AIM/ICQ servers are sick of seeing connections from your IP address. Wait a few minutes and try again."

[achost_ca]

We offer AIM for support issues, a few clients use it, and even some others who were asking questions about our services. Too bad most of the messages we get are trying to sell us features (yesterday had a guy try to sell me a ASP based FAQ script even though it clearly shows on our site we don't use ASP)

[velvetgold]

I'm currently training a support bot for my site - just for a little bit of 'wow' factor.
I've been training her/him/it for weeks with new patterns and conversation outcomes whenever I got a little bored.
I feel like I'm talking to myself sometimes...

I think it's a derivative of the alice bot... if anyone can tell me how I can make my own flash lip synching support graphics, or point me to a few links (I've already seen the odd flash site on this).
Maybe someone's done this before?

[VH-Robert]

Originally posted by achost_ca
We offer AIM for support issues, a few clients use it, and even some others who were asking questions about our services. Too bad most of the messages we get are trying to sell us features (yesterday had a guy try to sell me a ASP based FAQ script even though it clearly shows on our site we don't use ASP)

We get the same.. here are some examples:

Session Start (AIM - VeroHST:FlUiD2112): Thu May 08 19:27:23 2003
FlUiD2112: hey
VeroHst: Hello
FlUiD2112: I have a question for you
VeroHst: how can I help you?
VeroHst: sure
FlUiD2112: Are you looking for a billing system?
VeroHst: No, I'm sorry
VeroHst: we already have one
FlUiD2112: oh ok
FlUiD2112: thanks
FlUiD2112: anyways
Session Close (FlUiD2112): Thu May 08 19:28:21 2003

Session Start (AIM - VeroHST:HckMaster772): Thu May 29 14:57:26 2003
HckMaster772: Hey
VeroHst: Hello
VeroHst: How can I help you today?
HckMaster772: Im a Graphic/Banner/Style/vB/Hack manager. I work on alot of vB's. I was wondering if I could interest you in some FREE graphics and Styles for a Domain name?
VeroHst: No Thank You -
Session Close (HckMaster772): Thu May 29 14:58:44 2003

Session Start (AIM - VeroHST:illuzhen777): Mon Jun 23 19:05:45 2003
illuzhen777: Would you be interested in buying a leased vbulletin license from me, thats only $70...
VeroHst: Nope
Session Close (illuzhen777): Mon Jun 23 19:05:56 2003

Session Start (AIM - VeroHST:JCRMsupport): Fri Apr 18 22:09:18 2003
JCRMsupport: r u busy?
VeroHst: Never Am
VeroHst: How can I help you?
JCRMsupport: I saw your ID on webhostingtalk
and wanted 2 offer u a partnership

JCRMsupport: We provide live help support services and we currently have a promotion for webhosters
and i was just checking if u r interested

Session Start (AIM - VeroHST:nycrosi): Sat May 10 12:02:09 2003
nycrosi: Hello
VeroHst: Hello
VeroHst: How can I help you?
nycrosi: Do you need a design?
VeroHst: No
Session Close (nycrosi): Sat May 10 12:02:49 2003

Because of this, we are thinking of not providing support via AIM because we frequently get such messages

[Jim_UK]

No instant messenger here for a couple of main reasons:

1. There are times that support issues need to be put into an order of priority (not necessarily submission time). For example, if Apache has just tripped up on one server then an IM window pops open with someone asking about how to change the quota of an email account it's obvious which needs sorting first. All support requests are important but they need putting in order.

2. Some tickets cannot be handled in a matter of minutes and may even need referring to someone else (if you have started it and then finish shift when someone else comes on). It helps greatly if there is an online record in the ticket desk of what has happened so far in a ticket.

3. The image of the support IM being offline when in fact the person taking care of it is only 2 minutes away may suggest that no support is available when this isn't the case.

4. In emergency cases (eg server offline) we want to be getting on with fixing it (after putting a quick announcement in the forum) - it would probably make things pretty difficult if there are X hundred IM's all coming in at the same time from clients.


In a couple of the cases above (1 and 4) it would probably lead to the IM support person having to log off the IM just so they can deal with the issue at hand - this doesn't create a good image at all (Complaint: "I wanted to know what was wrong and they just logged off").

Overall I suppose it depends on your number of clients, servers and staff but I think there comes a time when it becomes near impossible to maintain.

[velvetgold]

Why it works for me...

1. I only give my clients the contact details - not publicly available from my website. I think it would make my service look a little bit dodgy if I published msn, yahoo, aim and icq etc. on my website.

2. Corporate Clients don't use it - they use the phone. When something goes wrong I email them to tell them, before they have a chance to complain - at least they know that we are onto it.

3. If I'm not available, the away message is enough for people to know that I need to be left alone. My away message will tell them that I am not available and that they can email me, post on the forum or put in a support ticket.

4. My FAQs usually answer most questions and I give my clients secure access to setup tutorials for email etc for features on their hosting account.

5. The chat logs are great because you can see what you have been chatting about previously for each person individually.

On another note...
Who uses chat to converse with business partners?
I'm sure it's probably more popular in this area...

[Kerry Jones]

We offer the following support methods.

- AoL Instant Messenger
- MSN Instant Messenger
- ICQ(Coming Soon!)
- Yahoo IM
- E-mail
- Chat (Coming Soon)
- Phone (LD on us)

Those are going to be the ways people can contact us if they are having problems.

[fog]

Heh, gaim does keep logs. On Linux they're ~/.gaim/logs, Windows is wherever the equivalent of your home directory is, /.gaim/logs/ (I run gaim on Windows and Linux )

My old host used to offer it, and I personally liked it. But I agree with other posts that I'd think "Where the heck were they?!" if they weren't on 24/7.

If you mention that AIM isn't an 'official' method of support, but give them a SN anyway, it might work out nicely.

[Nymix-CB]

We use MSN and it's good, but not with everybody. For example, I got a 15 years old customer who always start asking me questions about what is my favorite car etc...

This is running me crazy when I try to work

[Cirtex]

Originally posted by Kerry Jones
We offer the following support methods.

- AoL Instant Messenger
- MSN Instant Messenger
- ICQ(Coming Soon!)
- Yahoo IM
- E-mail
- Chat (Coming Soon)
- Phone (LD on us)

Those are going to be the ways people can contact us if they are having problems.

Just get Trillian
It has AIM + MSN + YAHOO + ICQ all included in 1

Email is a must, a forum would be nice, and a PHP Chat Script(Helpful) along with Phone Support

[achost_ca]

Yep. We just added a support forum at the start of this week when we released the new version of the site. Should prove to be useful esp on Monday when one of our servers is being moved to the new colocation facility.