The Best Part of Customer Support: Shock and Awe

I started my professional career in non-profit, so it’s no surprise that I am strongly motivated by helping others. My path naturally led to me managing the customer support for my current employer — Import2, where I still enjoy helping people every minute of every day.

But help can be subjective. We’ve all been there, where we’ve drafted the perfect reply and believe we’ve resolved the customer’s question, only to find out that we missed the mark. Help is also varied. I provide help to the customer who just needed a quick status update, and to the one who has a highly complex inquiry which will take a 30-minute team meeting to sort through.

It isn’t helping in general which motivates me day in and day out, because this is just too vast to quantify. The real validation and inspiration for me comes from the customers who are surprised at the level of service they receive from us. I love the reactions of shock or disbelief that our product is as great as we claim, or that our support team is so dedicated to them. We all know this internally as a team, but it lights up my day when we get customer feedback that validates every ounce of hard work we put in to ensure this type of experience.

“The support and skill from your staff is incredible. No idea where you found these guys, but I wish we had people like that working for us!”

It’s not the compliments themselves which keep me motivated, but knowing that our dedication as a team shines through to our customers. It wouldn’t be worth much if we all felt as a team that we do a great job, but our customers are left with an average experience.

I stay motivated and excited for work each day by knowing — without a doubt — that the work we put in will be reflected directly back to the customer in a way that is tangible and impactful for them. They leave happy, often surprised by their own reaction, and I sign off each day with a smile.

This quick piece was inspired by the Support Driven writing challenge — encouraging customer support professionals to write for fun! A special thanks to the team at Import2 as well, for making these types of customer experiences possible.