Setting up a help desk for your business requires time for adjustment—especially if this is your first time. You will need the right tools and strategies to make sure that the transition goes smoothly. This also entails sufficient planning before the actual implementation. Otherwise, you risk investing in an ineffective and inefficient system.
With so many options available, you might find yourself overwhelmed in finding the ideal help desk procedures in a company. While there is no such thing as a “perfect” way, you can implement some best practices to successfully introduce a help desk to your business.
With that, here are some of the best help desk procedures and things to consider.
1. Choose the right software
A help desk software helps optimize your workflows and ensure you remain relevant and competitive in the market. There are a variety of options available. Each one offers different sets of functions and features for your help desk. Hence, you should first select and compare help desk software to find out which one is right for you.
To guide you in your selection, you must first identify what your business needs for its help desk. This means taking into account the issues and bottlenecks you wish to resolve with your current process. You should consider the average number of clients you handle in a day, the number of helpdesk agents you wish to employ, and your budget. With the right software, integrating help desk into your workflows will go a lot smoother.
2. Take advantage of automation
According to Deloitte, 73% of organizations have begun incorporating automations into their help desk processes. There are several benefits to using such a tool. For one, it can reduce cost in running a help desk. Likewise, it lessens workload on your customer service representatives, allowing them to focus on cultivating deeper relationships with your customers.
However, one of the common concerns with help desk automation is the risk of losing personalization. Fortunately, automation nowadays is smarter and more sophisticated. You can customize responses to tailor-fit what each of your customers needs. With artificial intelligence and machine learning, automated responses can be more human-like and flexible.
Likewise, there are other forms of automations aside from automated responses. An example would be using automation to boost your ticket handling best practices. It will help you track each customer and ensure that nobody gets ignored in the process.
3. Create knowledge portals
Your help desk can come in different forms. Aside from the typical one-on-one interactions, you should also consider creating a knowledge hub or self-service portals for your clients. This can be a platform, channel, or webpage where they can simply search for the answers to their questions on their own. In fact, a study by Statista shows that 88% of customers worldwide expect brands to offer self-service support in the coming years.
With self-service portals, customers can have instant solutions to their problems. They can use it to avoid the lengthy back-and-forth messaging or phone calls with an agent or chatbot. This also helps you save time, cost, and effort in maintaining your help desk. You simply need to create a database for frequently asked questions (FAQs) and essential information about your products/services. Make it accessible to your clients. And make sure to update its content regularly.
4. Hire great agents to support your help desk
A software is not enough to support your entire help desk. No matter how sophisticated its engine is, it will still have its own limitations. Thus, you should still have human representatives available to accommodate your help desk. They can take over a particular conversation if your software hits a wall with a customer. Your software will then connect your customers to the right representative to finish the job.
Just like with a software, you should also be meticulous when hiring a help desk agent. After all, they will be your first line of defense when it comes to your customer service. You would want someone who can properly represent your company. Hence, you should look out for these essential traits when hiring a desk agent.
5. Build a transparent workflow
You can’t just implement new tools and strategies into your workflows without bothering to monitor and evaluate its impact to your business. It’s the same when you decide to set up a help desk in your business. You need to keep a close eye on how it is affecting your relationship with your customers and your business growth.
To ensure smooth and seamless customer support, you need to build a transparent workflow in your help desk. You can achieve this by investing in a software that allows a collaborative and integrated approach in operating a help desk.
One good example is Halo Service Desk. It provides a centralized dashboard where your teams can work together. Such a feature allows more visibility and better communication in the process.
6. Integrate with other solutions
As businesses strive towards digital transformation, having two or more solutions is only normal. However, juggling several all at once can be disruptive and inefficient in the long run. Can you imagine shifting from one tab to another in your computer just to complete a single customer request? This can affect your agents’ productivity and prolong your customers’ waiting time.
For a more seamless experience, you should consider integrating your help desk with your other solutions. For example, your marketing and sales might be using a customer relationship management (CRM) system for their operations. You can connect your help desk software to their CRM so that you can easily pull up any customer information during your interactions with them. You can also consider aligning your help desk with your ITIL (Information Technology Infrastructure Library) process. This can help you optimize and streamline service delivery for your customers.
7. Leverage data and analytics
Using a data-driven approach on your help desk implementation can help minimize negative impacts in case something does not work well. By leveraging data and analytics, you can weigh in different scenarios and its corresponding results before the actual introduction of a new software, tool, or strategy. It also helps you identify the major function of help desk and give you a better understanding of how it can help your business.
There are several ways you can gather data. For one, you can ask for clients’ feedback to help you determine specific aspects of your help desk that needs improving. You can also use the data gathered by your help desk software or other customer service solutions to see how it is impacting your workflows. With the right data, you can create smarter decisions on how you can operate your help desk.
Setting up an effective help desk
Customer service plays a critical role in business growth. Your clients will form their first impressions on your brand based on how well you can accommodate their demands. Thus, you must ensure seamless customer experience through your help desk.
Setting up an effective help desk requires proper planning and strategizing. You need to choose the right tools, software, and people to support its operation. So keep these tips in mind and explore what technology has to offer for your help desk. You can check out software like Halo Service Desk to find out how it can boost your customer service.