The bar for offering customer service that doesn’t suck is extremely low these days.
Nothing can be more frustrating than needing to speak with a person, only to have to waste time talking to a chatbot. Or, after getting past the chatbot, get frustrated with the lack of attention from the support team.
In a world where AI (cough cough) is the answer for every problem, attentive customer service and human touch are what I desperately crave.
When I’m having a problem that isn’t documented in the FAQs and I reach out to support, it’s not my responsibility to know what the problem is nor how to solve it.
My impression is that customer service these days relies too much on chatbots to do the listening and comprehension part.
But the reality is that I end up repeating myself over and over, hoping the person will understand my problem and find out the right solution.
Attentive Human-Friendly Customer Service is the Solution
After having had terrible customer service experiences, I realized how fortunate I am for contacting some companies that still do it right.
What do I mean by “right”? I mean:
- having a person on the other side to help me
- feel listened to and understood by the person
- get my problem resolved
- leave the conversation with a good impression that I have their support when I need it
Here’s a list of companies with Attentive, Human-friendly Customer Service that I trust
- Transistor.fm: every time I needed help, there was a human there to help me.
- Podia: their in-depth FAQs are great and helpful. When I need to ask something specific, there’s a person there to help me.
- Namecheap
- Clearful: Timely support from real humans :)
- ConvertKit: the documentation is great, which makes me need customer support less often. The times I needed support, a real attentive human was there to help me answer my questions.
I hope to keep adding more names to this Human-friendly Customer Service list. And to see that we are using technology to help us, not hurt us.