Your Source for Providing a Better Customer Service and Customer Support Experience

Quick Tips from Organizations that Have Brought Customers to the Forefront

Earlier this month at ParaFest, the panel was asked to give one parting tip. Both Tammy and Jon focused on the knowledgebase. Tammy advised using the knowledgebase to create a valuable internal resource for your own team. Jon said don’t underestimate the power of integrating video, screen shots, and tutorials into the knowledgebase to account for different preferences. Doug stressed the importance of continually evaluating your system: touch base with your CRSs regularly to get a reality check on your configurations. Along those lines, Scott stressed the importance of planning and talking to your team before implementing anything new. Hugh also stressed the importance of planning – for instance, looking at keywords for Facebook carefully when deciding what to monitor.

Please share your quick tips on what your organization does or that you think organizations should do to differentiate their customer support.

John Moore - HP using social support communities to co-create value

John Moore spends a lot of time studying how companies implement ’social CRM’. Currently CTO of consulting firm Swimfish, and an avid blogger (johnfmoore.wordpress.com), John has spent a lot of years as a senior engineer for SaaS apps. Last week John spoke at ParaFest and shared some of his observations about how some ‘name brand’ companies are approaching social support communities.  Take HP. With 2.5 million customers visiting the site every month and 150,000 registered users in the community, John says Hewlett Packard realized early on they needed to treat social support communities in a truly strategic fashion.  They made a solid business case as to how the community would work, the ROI expected, and got very detailed with their plan to bring people into the community. They defined internal experts and trained them on how to interact within the community, even bringing in Microsoft experts as well. Essentially, they use the community to “co-create value”, encouraging a steady stream of feedback from customers – feature requests, bugs noted, you name it.  The head of the support community reviews feature requests weekly, feeding them directly into the product development pipeline.  Read more »

ParaFest Panel: Support as a Differentiator - Bringing Customers to the Forefront

This morning ParaFest ‘10 started off with a strong line-up of customer panelists weighing in on everything from how to best integrate Chat into your support mix to establishing a “customer happiness index.”

Panelists Tammy Woodruff (Coremetrics, and one of this year’s Legend Maker award winners), Scott Montgomery (e-MDs), Doug Young, (finalsite), Hugh Ujhazy (Hitachi Data System) and Jon Landau (Huddle.net) offered plenty of practical advice and predictions.

As far as making customer support a competitive differentiator, Doug Young probably said it best: “In our business there are lots of lower-priced options, but our support is a big selling point and justifies our price point. For us, customer support is not a cost, but a real part of the product.”

The session wrapped up with each panelist asked to give just one parting piece of advice for fellow Paraturians. Some good stuff we’ll share in a future post.

Keynoter Doug Lipp at ParaFest Says Customer Service is no Magic Act

Doug Lipp, author and internationally-acclaimed expert  on leadership, customer service and change management, just completed his keynote at ParaFest ’10 this evening.

Formerly the Head of Training at Disney’s Corporate Headquarters, Doug provided the famous Disney University “Traditions” program and developed leadership courses for Disney executives. Read more »

Parature CEO Opens ParaFest '10 with General Session Welcome Address

Parature CEO, Tim Davenport delivered the conference welcome address during general session of ParaFest ‘10, the company’s sixth and largest annual users’ conference. ParaFest ‘10 began Tuesday, May 4 and will continue through Thursday, May 6, 2010 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas. This customer focused conference is enabling Parature users from around the world to gain invaluable knowledge from industry experts and thought leaders, while networking with colleagues and peers.

Mr. Davenport’s dynamic and compelling welcome address began with highlights of Parature success in 2009, then continued to set the stage for 2010 and what to expect from this year’s conference. Specifically, he spoke to the value of social media channels as they relate to the customer experience and with it, the unveiling of Parature for Facebook™. Read more »

Parature for Facebook

The 6^th Annual ParaFest kicked off at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas this afternoon with a record-setting 170-plus in attendance. CEO Tim Davenport set the stage for the event and a big announcement, describing Parature’s commitment to “extending the customer support perimeter” in this era of social media.  It came through loud and clear.  The new mantra for Parature is “be where your customers are.” And clearly social media is redefining where our customers are.

Founder and Chief Strategy Officer Duke Chung then introduced the new offering that “will revolutionize the way you’ll provide support in Facebook.”  Parature for Facebook enables customers to be where their customers are (400 million of them), engage in conversation and deliver quality support right from your company’s Facebook fan page. Parature is first in the industry to bring this functionality to the market. Watch video of the announcement.

Parature customers can monitor Facebook wall conversations, posts and comments in real time and create a new ticket for any post in just one click. Read more »

Early Registration Rate - $550 until 1/31/10

We invite you to visit the conference website to view the agenda for this year’s engaging program. ParaFest ‘10 will feature hands-on training, a diverse mix of customer service & support best practices sessions, the ParaFest Zone for opportunities to meet with the Professional Services team and our sponsors, special events and more!

Being held at the hip, rock-n-roll Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas ParaFest ‘10 has something to offer every attendee. Read more »

Doug Lipp - Keynote Speaker - ParaFest '10

Doug Lipp, respected author and speaker on international leadership, customer service and change management will be the keynote speaker at ParaFest ’10, our company’s sixth annual users’ conference. ParaFest ’10 will be held May 4-6, 2010 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas. This customer focused conference will allow Parature users from across the world to gain valuable knowledge from industry experts and thought leaders, while networking with colleagues and peers.

Mr. Lipp has over thirty years of experience working from the front lines to the board rooms of many American, Asian, European and Latin American multinational corporations. He motivates and challenges audiences around the globe to examine their respective management styles and business strategies, then determines the effectiveness of each as seen from a variety of customer and cultural perspectives. Mr. Lipp is the author of numerous articles and seven books on leadership, customer service and international business, including his two most popular: “The Changing Face of Today’s Customer: How to Attract and Retain a Diverse Customer and Employee Base” which addresses how businesses can thrive in this era of cultural diversity and global competitiveness, and “Even Monkeys Fall from Trees: The Art and Science of Outstanding Customer Service” which focuses on a balanced approach to service, leadership and teamwork. At the Walt Disney Company, Mr. Lipp was the head of the training department at the world-renowned Disney University and was also on the start-up team for the highly successful Tokyo Disneyland in Japan. Read more »

ParaFest '10 - Call for Speakers

Speaking at ParaFest ‘10, being held at the hip, rock-n-roll Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas, is a great way of sharing your passion and expertise with industry peers and colleagues. Parature is seeking customer service experts and industry thought leaders who want to share their Parature Customer Service™ software and industry knowledge with users attending the conference. All session speakers will be entitled to one (1) complimentary conference registration OR one (1) night complimentary guest room.

Sessions

ParaFest ‘10 will feature both industry and product specific sessions. We invite presenters to submit proposals on Best Practices in Customer Service & Support Using Parature Customer Service™ Software. Read more »

ParaFest '10 - May 4-6, 2010 - Las Vegas

We announced today that our sixth annual users’ conference, ParaFest ’10 will be held May 4 - 6, 2010 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas. This customer focused conference will allow Parature users from around the world to gain invaluable knowledge from industry experts and thought leaders, while networking with colleagues and peers.

ParaFest ’10 will feature hands-on training sessions led by the Parature Professional Services team and a diverse mix of customer service and support best practices sessions led by Parature customers as well as other industry experts. Attendees will have a unique opportunity to exchange ideas, share industry insights and trends, and network with their peers as well as Parature executives and staff. The popular ParaFest Zone will be available for participants to meet with Parature experts and partners, experience new product features and learn tips and techniques on how to further strengthen their investment in Parature Customer Service™ software. Read more »