Hi Reader,

So I gathered the data, and there's no problem there. I didn't exactly want to frontload this email with a bunch of numbers, though. That's dull.

I'll roll it up for you.

Customers have always wanted quick resolutions and 24/7 support, and that hasn't changed. I doubt that's a surprise to you.

What IS changing is that customers increasingly want three additional things:

• Support on multiple channels, especially on apps like Whatsapp
• Proactive support (which I understand to mean companies reaching out about potential problems with education about how to avoid them in the first place)
• Helpful and empathetic agents

Now, data is great, but the only things we can ever truly know come from our own personal experience. So take a moment here and go find two things in your memory:

1. A great tech support experience
2. A miserable tech support experience

What was the difference? Was it in the first group of things (resolution time or availability/unavailability)? Or was it in the second (you got/didn't get support on Whatsapp; or the company did/didn't educate you ahead of time; or the person helping you was/wasn't helpful or empathetic)?

Please take a minute to share with me. It would be super helpful.

Side note which is actually the point of the rest of this email: this "empathy" thing keeps tripping me up. In my company's internal training, which I have criticized for being too strictly informational and insufficiently relational, we actually did some intense focusing on empathy. So, what did that look like? And did it have any effect?

Well, one interesting thing is that we ended up spending an enormous amount of time defining and understanding empathy in the first place. The majority of my junior colleagues live in the Philippines, and in their native language, Tagalog, there is no equivalent word to "empathy." The closest word they came up with is "pakikiramay," but that is closer to "condolences" in English, related to sharing someone's grief (which does feel like a specific kind of empathy). To this day I don't know how similar me and my colleagues' understandings of these concepts are or could eventually become.

Another piece of our empathy training (which may or may not be related to the gap in understanding I just mentioned) was that the results seem to be limited in terms of behavior change. In many cases the only difference I see is a few dozen variations on "I'm so sorry to hear that..." but when I talk to my colleagues I usually don't get the sense that they're trying to take the customer's perspective or feel what they're feeling. Most of the time I get the sense that they feel too busy to put effort into that. To me, "I'm sorry" is emphatically NOT empathy. It may be one of the observable outcomes of empathy, but that's only on the surface level. Empathy is much deeper.

Still, my own sense from my experience is that a lack of empathy isn't really the problem—despite the fact that it's what customers say they want. The thing I want to look at is a prerequisite for empathy, and I believe is the reason customers feel like they aren't getting helpful and empathetic support. What this whitepaper is about is our collective missing skill of really, deeply listening to someone and understanding what's going on. The most-frustrated customers I encounter are the ones that have to explain their issue again and again. And the customers I have the most difficulty working with are the ones I fail to understand, either because I assume I know what's going on or because I failed to get them to elaborate enough.

This whitepaper's proposed solution to customers desire for "helpful and empathetic agents" isn't to explain the importance of empathy or teach people how to empathize; it's to explain the importance of listening for understanding and to outline some basic exercises to develop that skill.

Ok, those are all of my words. No need to read on unless you like this kind of thing: below is an AI rollup of some of the most pertinent data I've gathered up to this point.

Customer Satisfaction and Expectations

Customer satisfaction is a critical metric for tech support services. According to recent surveys:

• 77% of customers say they're more loyal to businesses that offer top-notch service3.
• 50% of customers will take their business elsewhere after just one bad experience3.
• 63% of companies are prioritizing customer experiences more in recent years3.

Customers' expectations for tech support have evolved, with emphasis on:

• Quick resolutions
• Helpful and empathetic agents
• 24/7 support availability
• Ability to use preferred communication channels
• Proactive support3​

Tech Support Evaluation Metrics

When evaluating tech support effectiveness, companies often focus on:

• Overall quality of service
• Problem resolution rates
• First-contact resolution
• Phone support experience
• Online support experience
• General satisfaction with technical support1​

Industry Costs and Pricing Models

The cost of IT support can vary widely:

• Average hourly rates for IT support range from $75 to $2502.
• Monthly IT support costs typically fall between $100 to $200 per user2.
• Longer-term contracts can be up to 40% less expensive than hourly IT support2.

Factors affecting IT support costs include:

• Service Level Agreement (SLA) specifications
• Infrastructure complexity
• Location of service provision
• Frequency of maintenance and updates
• Additional services like cybersecurity measures2​

Emerging Trends in Tech Support

Several trends are shaping the future of tech support:

• Automation and AI: Interactions with automated chatbots jumped 81% in 20203.
• Social media support: 17% of consumers have received customer service via direct messages in the past three months5.
• Emphasis on empathy: Empathy from support agents is now as important to customers as 24/7 availability3.

The Human Element in Tech Support

Despite technological advancements, the human touch remains crucial:

• 68% of technical support organizations use email surveys following specific support tickets to assess customer satisfaction4.
• 50% of organizations report that over 90% of their customers are satisfied with their technical support services4.
• Companies with aligned service, sales, and marketing teams report 76% higher effectiveness in their customer service strategies5.

Sources:

1. ​https://www.questionpro.com/survey-templates/technical-support-evaluation/ (ed. not useful)
2. ​https://getprosource.com/cost-of-it-support-for-small-business/​
3. ​https://www.zendesk.com/blog/customer-service-trends/​
4. ​https://www.thinkhdi.com/~/media/HDICorp/Files/Research-Corner/RC_MeasureCSat_Oct12.pdf (ed. very useful)
5. ​https://blog.hubspot.com/service/state-of-service-report (ed. very useful)