You Asked for It!
Solving the Customer Support Dilemma
By Dave Sims
E-commerce may be the engine driving Web development these days. But no engine works without lubricant, and customer service is the lubricant of commerce. It keeps the wheels moving smoothly.
E-commerce is, of course, fairly easy to scale. If you can automate transactions, then you can handle an increasing number of transactions without having to staff up resources at the same rate. But how does customer service scale?
The customer service solutions emerging to fill this niche have their roots in several disciplines in computer science. They're enjoying a resurgence in applications including knowledge management, user-interface design, case-based reasoning, and good old-fashioned FAQ lists. Most of these solutions involve one or more of three types of technologies:
- a knowledge base with access to experts and a system to present the collected questions online;
- an email management system that can include some level of automated or assisted response;
- live chat.
For the moment, there's a swelling field of vendors in this market niche. It may be that as these companies make OEM deals with each other and with server and hosting companies, that field will narrow.
Email Management
Shopping-cart abandonment is one of the main drivers of customer service applications. It's estimated that as many two-thirds of online shoppers abandon their shopping carts before checking out. E-commerce vendors are looking for ways to step into the process and make checkout easier, in part by addressing customer questions -- preferably before the customer needs to send an email.<>
