Our customers can be unexpectedly, hilariously great sometimes. It’s not at all uncommon for one of us on the support team to post something a customer said in Campfire, because “this lady just made my day!” or “this guy was so funny and nice!”
Now, we’re empowered to do right by our customers, so that’s part of it—we can all take care of billing issues or ID merges or whatever our users need without going to a manager. (Psst: there is no manager.) When we’re able to fix a problem within a few minutes or we prove to be real people rather than robots, that tends to pleasantly surprise people, and they react accordingly. Awesomeness begets awesomeness.
Super speedy, plain and clear communication – didn’t feel like a call-centre experience – was quite obvious that Jim knew what he was talking about rather than just reading from a script. Got the exact answers and actions that I needed. Not used to this level of service – feel a bit dazed ;-)
But we don’t deserve all the credit. Our customers just tend to be savvy, and kind, and they consistently disprove the popular consensus that people on the Internet suck.
No problem. Machines don’t mess up near as often as often as people. So odds are I just didn’t save it correctly. Thank you again for your time and trying to help.
Chase answered my question quickly and completely. He also threw in “have an awesome Tuesday” which is a mildly absurd thing thing to wish someone as it is usually weekends which are “awesome”. I’m gonna run with it though and try to make this day “awesome”. I already high-fived my dog. He seemed confused.
A surprising number of folks write back just to say thank you. They don’t have to—it’s our job to help. But it’s still nice to hear and gives us warm fuzzies.
You know what Kristin, you just made my day … and restored my faith (a bit) in our species.
Sometimes they go beyond that, even. Out of gratitude or wackiness or whatever, they send us photos and videos of their pets, or links to memes.
Thank you. I attached a flying unicorn to show my appreciation.
Some of our San Francisco customers know Merissa is a huge Giants fan, and a few submitted support tickets to tell her they were excited for her during the 2012 World Series. People will sometimes write in just to say they love Basecamp, or to wish us happy holidays.
Just want to say Merry Christmas guys … we’ve been using Basecamp for many years and continue to love the service. Keep up the good work and hope to be on your service for years to come. Here’s a big thank you. Thanks to the web-based nature of work I can stay in touch while getting some awesome snow on holiday in Niseko, Hokkaido, Japan!
Those of us in support are here because we genuinely enjoy helping—but you folks make it easy. Thanks!
Neil
on 09 Feb 13I’m not one of your happy customers.
I’ve been using Highrise for years, and I’m unhappy about how 37Signals never puts any work into improving the product.
It’s a contact management system, but you can only load virtually illegible 53×53 px images of people. Many people these days work for several organisations at once, but in Highrise they can only belong to one. There is a facility to export all your data in YAML format – but not to import it. So I can’t merge two Highrise accounts and keep all my notes. There is no way to format Notes – all you can do is enter plain text. No bold, no underlining, no bulleted lists, no links, no images, no nothing [straitjacket…] There is no way to cross-post Notes. If a Note concerns three parties, I must post it separately to all three contacts. Labour intense, and means zillions of duplicate Notes in my Dashboard view. ...etc etc
It’s frustrating to see how MailChimp keeps improving their product, adding new features and making it easier and easier to use, while Highrise sits still. I’ve made all the above suggestions, and many more, to 37Signals down the years, and none have been acted on. I’m now looking for a better service.
DHH
on 09 Feb 13Neil, sorry to hear you’re unhappy with Highrise. We have a wide range of products at 37signals and we often go through cycles to improve certain ones at the time. Since the release of the new Basecamp less than a year ago, that has been our primary focus. That’s the price of being a small company.
This discussion is closed.