By N-able Guest Blog 2

With so many managed service providers (MSPs) viewing the help desk as a cost that they must minimize, the flip side is that the majority of their business customers see it as an essential part of end user productivity. The truth is, help desk may be the most important MSP driver for business growth with existing customers. How can you get the most out of it? Take a look at these nine tips:

1. Make your first impression count

“User experience” and making a positive first impression with your customers is what help desk is all about. When it comes right down to it, customers don’t necessarily care how much you do for them. It is their perception of what you are doing for them that counts. If your help desk is consistently providing quality service, you will find that your relationships with your customers and your retention of those customers will improve greatly.

2. Streamline problem resolution

Today your customers are more connected than ever, and it is very easy for them to share a help desk experience to hundreds or thousands of people online. A bad review or online comment can severely impact your brand, and it will take several positive reports to erase the damage done by just one negative impression. That’s why it’s important to make sure your help desk is set up to quickly and completely address your customers’ IT concerns and issues. It’s not only worth keeping that customer’s business, but it’s also critical to avoid any negative exposure. What is a good response time to shoot for? With our Help Desk Manager offering, we aim to empower our partners to strive for 92% of service tickets resolved within 8 minutes.

3. Keep it consistent

After signing the SLA, many customers will forget the specifics of response times. To them, every major issue impacting their business should be your top priority. When you have more than one major issue going on, sometimes you have to prioritize. However, it is critical that your help desk team responds to each customer to let it know that the help desk understands their situation and is working to resolve it. If you have been consistently delivering great support in this way, many customers will forgive you for occasionally taking longer on an issue.

4. Recycle expertise

Using an online knowledge base can greatly reduce the number of support calls, and it allows you to more easily share the wealth of knowledge that your most senior technicians possess. If you are experiencing a large volume of calls on any particular issue, it’s time to create a knowledge base article for that issue. Doing so is worth the effort: According to a recent survey, 91% of customers say they would use an online knowledge base if it were available. By empowering customers to perform self help and resolve an issue themselves by quickly finding a solution online, it saves everyone’s time and allows you to focus on providing quality service.

5. Increase performance, decrease costs

While you are on your journey toward delivering the ultimate help desk experience, it is important to make sure that costs remain in check. This does not mean squeezing every last drop of efficiency out of every technician, but rather evaluating how you do things and seeing if there are any ways to streamline your approach. Beyond an online knowledge base, work on implementing other end user self-help services, and consider adding a help desk dashboard so that your team can save time by getting a better, more organized picture of issues that are in play across your customer base.

6. Stay ahead of the curve

Think of your help desk as an early warning system for major business issues. If 10 customers are complaining about the same issue, then it’s likely there are actually many more, as well. If you pay attention to these trends and proactively solve them, you have a chance to delight your customers by solving a problem the majority of them had but never told you about.

7. Go the extra mile

Always take the opportunity to ask your customer if there is more you can do. If you are genuine and friendly, then you are going to uncover more issues that the customer may have been reluctant to mention at first. Going the extra mile to help customers overcome their technical or business challenges will drive satisfaction through the roof, meaning higher retention and more referrals.

8. Develop customer loyalty

No one needs to tell you how important your customers are to your business. Your current customers keep the lights on, and holding onto their business is a top priority. Every interaction should leave the customer with a good experience. Even if at the beginning of a call they are upset about their issue, they can leave a call feeling like you care and are prioritizing their needs. Provide a consistently high level of service by using your help desk tools to full advantage, and by keeping a constant eye on the user experience, and you’ll have a powerful way to hold onto your customers.

9. Build your reputation

Customer feedback is one of the most valuable things to running a successful business. Make sure that above and beyond the initial support you provide you are able to gather useful information from your customers. You could be missing out on major issues that customers have but are staying silent on. Once you have collected feedback, good or bad, make sure you have systems in place to report on the specifics of what customers like and don’t like about your service.

The importance of help desk can never be underestimated–to your business or to your customers. It’s a service that your customers rely on and your business shouldn’t be without.

As channel manager for N-able by SolarWinds, David Weeks works closely with the company’s top-tier partners and major accounts worldwide to understand their needs, provide insight into current market conditions, and offer strategic sales and marketing recommendations. A regular presenter at N-able’s global and regional summits, David is passionate about ensuring the success of N-able’s partner base.