When did you join Wrike and what was customer support like back then?
It was 2009, and the best word to describe the company back then is, “small.” There were only a handful of us, and on the support side of things, our CEO Andrew was replying to a lot of cases himself. Andrew was committed to providing great support, but by this point we were acquiring new customers very rapidly, and needed to scale the support organization to keep the experience great.
What’s the philosophy behind support at Wrike?
Our philosophy is that support should be easy to reach and quick to respond.
What that means is, whether you’re a trial, free, or paid user of Wrike, you can contact support for help at any time. Our target for email support is to reply within an hour, and to get your issue resolved within one or two exchanges. For phone and chat support, we hope to get everything resolved by the end of the session.
An hour? Is that realistic?
It's important that we set aggressive goals. There are times when we are able to respond as quickly as 20 minutes. Whatever the case, we're monitoring trends and when needed, can adjust schedules to give the best coverage to the busiest times.
What kind of questions does the support team answer every day?
Most of them are “How-To” questions, like "How do I add a user?" We have a great online Help Section and so a lot of questions can be answered with links to tutorials there. Then there are more advanced questions, like “How can I use Wrike to plan a conference?” Our support agents are product experts and they will go really in depth to give suggestions and tips.
There are also technical questions, and the great thing about the Cloud is that it’s a controlled environment, so it gives us the ability to test and release fixes very quickly. In the cases where we have users writing in about a bug or a feature that seems broken, we can verify and pass directly to QA for a test and fast fix.
How can customers contact support, and what can they expect?
Our channels for support are phone, email, and live chat. When you contact us, first and foremost, expect a human. If you’re used to automated support, it’s a little surprising when a real person answers the phone. You should also expect to speak with product experts. We use homegrown talent who can give you very good, contextual help. There are no scripts, so expect a unique and empathetic experience.
What do you look for when you hire support agents?
There’s no one secret ingredient, but the biggest thing is probably attitude. We want to have a great relationship with our customers, and support agents are often the first line of contact. Interest in technology is important as well. A healthy curiosity about software is going to position an agent to dig deep to answer questions. Writing is also huge, given the amount of email and live chats we handle.
We also really like people who want to stick around and take this journey with us. I’m personally very proud that our first three support hires ever are still with the organization in leadership and training roles, and our customers also really benefit from their ownership and pride in providing a positive experience for support.
What do you see as the future of Wrike support?
We’re putting an emphasis on being more predictive with the product so that we can identify issues in our user base before people contact us. We’re also doing a lot of work with Customer Effort scoring to make sure we make support an easy experience, because we don’t want getting help to be an ordeal. As we grow, keeping our people well trained and processes tight is a priority, so we're continuously evaluating and looking for areas to improve.
How can users provide feedback on their support experience?
24 hours after the resolution of a support case, you'll receive a customer satisfaction survey. Please complete this. I review them personally, and I always want to hear your stories about how our service was great, or how it could have been better!
If you had a great experience with a specific agent, please share it with the world. Customer service is not an easy job and your tweets and social media mentions keep our team motivated!
Your business is in good hands with our service professionals. Start a free trial of Wrike today to see what sets our team apart.
