Yay or Nay? Requiring System Info when submitting Support Tickets

[00:00:00] Matt Cromwell: Hey Katie.

[00:00:01] Katie Keith: Hey Matt.

[00:00:02] Matt Cromwell: I’ve got a quick yay or nay for you. Ready?

[00:00:05] Katie Keith: Yep.

[00:00:06] Matt Cromwell: Requiring system info when submitting support tickets. Yay or nay?

[00:00:12] Katie Keith: Nay. What about you?

[00:00:14] Matt Cromwell: I, I think I’m a, yay. I think I’m, I’m gonna say yay. Just, just, just so we’re different, I guess. I don’t know. It’s a tough one, but Why do you, why are you a nay?

[00:00:24] Katie Keith: Because you worded it as an absolute. There are many types of support tickets, like pre-sales. Obviously, I have to say nay because it would be ridiculous to request that for pre-sales, but even post-sales, you’ve got account queries, refund queries, product knowledge queries where you don’t need to know about their environment.

[00:00:45] So really you need to, uh, what we do is we use gravity forms to really narrow it down with conditional logic, and then only if they say, I have got a problem with the plugin that I need technical support with. Do we then yay. Require their system

[00:01:02] info.

[00:01:03] Matt Cromwell: Okay. So then you’re saying when you have it narrowed down and you know with certainty that it is a technical support ticket, then you are yay.

[00:01:12] Katie Keith: Yeah.

[00:01:12] Matt Cromwell: Require the, the system info.

[00:01:15] Katie Keith: Yeah. In those circumstances only.

[00:01:17] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. So the, the art then is then being able to ensure that that’s really what’s going on.

[00:01:22] Katie Keith: Yeah. Yeah. So I’ve given a great argument for Nay justify your, yay.

[00:01:28] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I that, I mean, I, maybe the way I worded it is not the best, but I do think it’s like, it’s about, it’s about when they’re submitting support tickets, um, and, um, there are, there’s, there’s back and forth about like, when they’re submitting support tickets, they’re frustrated, you know?

[00:01:46] And they just want to get answers quickly. And the more fields you put in your support form, the longer it takes for them to just even submit the thing. So it could go lots of different ways, but my biggest yay is when I know with certainty it’s a support ticket. I want them to give us their system info because that sets up the technician to have the best actionable information to give them the best first response possible.

[00:02:12] That’s, I’m like, even if they’re saying I don’t understand this setting, um, like, just give me everything you got so that I know with certainty I can get you as close to resolution in one reply as possible. That’s why I’m like, I would hate to, to have the conversation start really simple and then down the road end up finding out that, oh, I actually really need your system info.

[00:02:36] And that just takes another interaction and it just makes everything take longer. Um, like. It’s just easier, better give us, give us everything you got upfront and then it’ll be better. Um, it sounds like we’re pretty similar, but

[00:02:49] Katie Keith: Yeah, I think we agree. Really, it’s just how you interpret the

[00:02:52] question.

[00:02:53] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. Yeah. And I think that the caveat of like how you ask it and, and making sure that you know with certainty that you’re. You’re that they are submitting the support ticket. That, that’s all a lot of the important nuance in the, in the subject. But we did do a poll on this, uh, to set up the conversation here.

[00:03:11] Um, and you know what, it was really interesting. Um, they. We do have the majority of people saying that they think the system info should be optional. So, and maybe it has something to do with the way I asked the question, but I said what would happen if you required every support ticket submission to include the site health or system info?

[00:03:31] Um. I’ve never required it, which is true. We haven’t actually required it to date, and yet so many people still provide it, like just because we ask for it. Um, but I’m very tempted to require it to improve the quality of our first responses. Um, and this is a little bit of what folks said, um. Robert DeVore says, I voted optional, because not every ticket will require that much info for you to recognize and provide a fix for the problem.

[00:03:58] So if it was a required step, that would put unnecessary burden on the customer. I think that’s really the, the heart of the nay response, right? Like putting too much burden on the customer. What, what, what’s your take on that? Does, does adding it get put too much burden on them?

[00:04:14] Katie Keith: Well think about when you submit support tickets on other plugins and themes, it’s a pain.

[00:04:20] Does your heart sink when it says system support? System status? Because mine does, especially if it’s something that doesn’t make that very easy to find and there’s tons of links you’ve gotta click to get it and, and you’ve gotta upload a file or whatever. So, um, as a customer, I would rather only do it if it was really relevant to my problem, which often it doesn’t feel.

[00:04:43] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, absolutely. I’ve been in circumstances where it wasn’t required and like I’m like, I run technical support teams. I know how to submit a support ticket, and so I, I don’t provide the system info because I don’t think it’s necessary. And then my first response I get is, Hey, can you send me your system?

[00:05:01] System info. Um, I’m like, I would have if I thought it was necessary, uh, just help me out anyway.

[00:05:09] Katie Keith: But also, you know that you are not using a really outdated version of PHP or something, which is often what we get when we receive the system info. You kind of know that, but the person you’re sending the information to doesn’t

[00:05:22] know, do they?

[00:05:22] Matt Cromwell: Yep, exactly. Yeah, and I think that’s part of the kicker. Uh, I responded to Robert. I said, sometimes the initial inquiry makes it seem like it’s not necessary. Then you dig in and things get complicated later and, you know, end up having to ask for it anyway. And that, that’s where I’m leaning is like, it might seem innocent and simple and then all of a sudden it’s not.

[00:05:42] And it’s just a pain to have to circle back and ask later. Kim Coleman from Paid Memberships Pro. I put it as optional, but I would say required if you also add a dropdown for type of issue, and this only appears if the issue type is bugged, plug in conflict. This sounds like pretty much exactly what you’re saying, right?

[00:05:59] Katie Keith: It is. That’s what we do. Yeah. Yeah. It is required if you’ve ticked those boxes.

[00:06:04] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. Nice. Um, do it for their own good. That’s, I think that’s straight and simple to the point. Hashim is great. Vova says you use Freemius and then you get customer system info automatically, right?

[00:06:17] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that is convenient. Yes. Um, I mean, it is nice when it, you have it baked into the whole system. Um, I have thought, I think I’m trying to, I think Yoast does it where you can submit support through your WordPress admin to them, and I think that way they get it automatically.

[00:06:36] I think it was Yoast. I’ve seen a couple plugins do that. I think that’s pretty smart. What’s your take on that?

[00:06:41] Katie Keith: That’s really good if you make it seamless. I like the main disadvantage we’ve talked about from the customer’s perspective is that hurdle that they’ve got to do extra work. So if you remove that extra work, then there’s no reason whatsoever.

[00:06:55] In fact, the question goes away because it’s not, is it required or not? It’s, it happens automatically, which is great.

[00:07:01] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, it’s just there.

[00:07:02] Katie Keith: Unfortunately, some of us use things like EDD and it’s not that easy.

[00:07:06] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, you definitely could like. Embed like the Help Scout Beacon into your plugin in one way or another, um, which then you could pass stuff that way.

[00:07:17] It takes some, takes some heavy lifting to make it all work that way. Um, but it’s an interesting take. Uh, Spencer, um, says the best thing you could do is add a support. Be there. Well, there we go. That’s what we were just saying. Uh, in our case, we use Help Scout and we add the support Beacon in our feed. Uh, and the feed them social plugin, uh, Spencer and his brother are the authors of that plugin.

[00:07:40] Uh, it’s displayed in the bottom right corner. Of the custom post type, anytime you have an issue, they open the beacon, it tells the problem. So it’s included with the support ticket. No must, no fuss. I think that’s pretty smart.

[00:07:52] Katie Keith: I really like that. Yeah. And.

[00:07:54] Also be, beacons can have documentation as either the first or the second tab. So it’s not just gonna put extra load on your support team to make it that easy for people to contact you. Absolutely. Yeah. They can do search documentation within the admin.

[00:08:08] Matt Cromwell: Yep. The Help Scout Beacon is really powerful overall.

[00:08:11] Um, that’s a great option. Katie. Keith chimed in. Um, and this is pretty much what you were saying earlier, right?

[00:08:18] Katie Keith: Let’s hope so.

[00:08:20] Matt Cromwell: Like between then and now, I’ve changed my,

[00:08:22] Katie Keith: it was like three weeks ago. I forgot.

[00:08:25] Matt Cromwell: Um, Derek says, as a plugin owner, I do require it. As someone submitting ticket, that’s exactly what you were saying earlier. Like as a customer, I hate it. As a plugin author, I have to require it. Um. Yeah. And, uh, AJ here optional for me would usually go there in the second response. Uh, that’s exactly what I don’t, I have to say, I have to really disagree with AJ on this one.

[00:08:47] Like, I do not wanna do a follow up asking for, uh, system info. Uh, I just, I just think it adds noise. It adds too much, uh, interactions like we’re trying to. Do as few interactions as possible to get people to resolution as quickly as possible.

[00:09:01] Katie Keith: Um, that’s true, but I’d be interested to know. I don’t suppose anyone’s got this data, what proportion of tickets? You can just give your gut response without needing all that stuff from the customer to say, oh, what you are saying sounds is normally a caching issue. Why don’t you check this? Yeah. ’cause you’re using your experience and instinct and then maybe they go away and don’t come back. So it would be interesting to know how many you can solve. On your gut and how many do require that information?

[00:09:30] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, typically, I always say if you can respon, if you can resolve it in one response, then that answer belongs in your documentation. Um, but that’s not to say that everybody reads the documentation either. So again, I guess that’s another vote for having the Help Scout Beacon in your plugin or whatnot.

[00:09:48] So they can actually get it in Docs first and then submit a ticket. Yeah, and Taco here from Yoast is saying, I’m afraid it would be too much of a barrier for many customers to require it for every support request. That is my gut too. I hate requiring it. I hate adding friction to these things, but I’ve been really surprised on the Give side and even as I’m learning on the LearnDash side, on the The Events Calendar side, that, even when it’s optional.

[00:10:12] People really are providing it more than 50% of the time. , I’ve been really surprised. , but I think that in some ways is like our ability to train our customers to, to be providing it. And the way in which these plugins also surface, system info, in their own way, that makes it really easy to just click a button and copy and it’s copied to your clipboard and can paste it in really easily.

[00:10:34] Tanner says definitely optional. Don’t add a burden requiring that if something they’re not willing to share. Right off the bat, the priority is fixing their issue and that’s not possible without site. If that’s not PO possible without Site Health, you can always reach out and ask. Yeah. Yeah. The priority is fixing their issue.

[00:10:54] And that’s exactly why I’m saying I need their site health. ’cause I can fix

[00:10:58] their,

[00:10:58] Katie Keith: but you’re contradicting yourself because you are saying it’s not required. And then you keep saying, we need it, we need it, we need to solve In

[00:11:04] the first response,

[00:11:05] Matt Cromwell: I’m on the, I’m on the fence. I’m on. We have not been requiring it.

[00:11:09] I’m thinking I need to require it. That’s, that’s, yeah. That’s why I set up the poll in the first place.

[00:11:15] Katie Keith: You’re clearly a big advocate of it.

[00:11:17] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, I have. I think I’ve become, I’m warmed up to it. And, which is interesting because if I take the majority here, they’re really saying optional, they’re doing what I’m doing.

[00:11:26] Um, but you are making it required. But I love the way in which it’s. Conditionally required. Um, you know,

[00:11:33] Katie Keith: that’s the thing that wasn’t an option. And so people are saying optional because they mean in some circumstances and not others, possibly. They might not mean it’s literally optional.

[00:11:43] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I think that’s why this forcing ourselves to say yay or nay is fun for video content.

[00:11:49] But we know that the answer’s always like nuanced.

[00:11:51] Katie Keith: It depends.

[00:11:52] Matt Cromwell: Yes. We got lots of responses here. I’m not gonna go through all of ’em, but let’s, uh, just check these last ones. Steve Jones says, we, we require it for our premium plugins and have never had pushback. Free plugins, we push all support requests to .org where it’s not required.

[00:12:06] That’s true, that’s a good point. on.org you can’t really require it. You can always ask for it, but then you’re asking them to paste relatively sensitive information, um, into a public forum, so you really don’t wanna do it there. Um, John Brown is a good old friend of mine from Southern California and um, he loves to, um, have some strong opinions about things.

[00:12:28] Most of the time it’s totally unnecessary and it’s annoying af to be required.

[00:12:34] Katie Keith: I was wondering how you were gonna read that out.

[00:12:38] Matt Cromwell: I read it just like you wrote it. So, I just want to ask how to do something because your docs are terrible. Your docs suck. Don’t make me go copy paste a whole bunch of crap. Just ask a question.

[00:12:49] He is like definitely advocating from the customer perspective here, uh, loud and clear. Like, and that is, I think that’s part of a, the big consideration here. So do you get, because you make it conditionally required under the exact right circumstances, it’s required, do you get pushback from folks saying, why in the world do you require me to do this?

[00:13:09] Um, have, have you gotten pushback?

[00:13:10] Katie Keith: No, I don’t think so. No. Because it’s only when they get to that point through the gravity forms logic. But his last sentence: "don’t auto reply asking I send it without reading it." Now, PayPal do that and that really annoys me. They will always send a really long and detailed robotic response and you have to like reply. I am normally replying in all caps at this point saying, PLEASE READ MY THING. IT DOES NOT ANSWER MY QUESTION! So yeah, that’s really annoying.

[00:13:37] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I, I guess at the bottom line is that how to be able to resolve the question as quickly as possible with the right information without annoying the customer.

[00:13:48] That’s the magic right there. If there’s any way that we can do that, it’s the best. So like in an ideal circumstance, I think. We’re talking about doing the whole like embedded support beacon kind of situation because then you get it and the customer doesn’t have to do any effort at all. I love that.

[00:14:05] Katie Keith: It’s absolutely, yeah. So the Freemius model or some custom development on your part, because then there’s just no reason not to get it because there is no friction.

[00:14:15] Matt Cromwell: Exactly. Yeah. It’s really making me rethink the whole situation where maybe rather than being super smart about our support form on the website, we really should just leapfrog into, doing a embedded support form in the plugins that just feels probably better. But I’m always nervous about that because it feels like it will just like, dramatically increase the volume of tickets.

[00:14:40] Katie Keith: Um, yeah, LearnDash has some cool stuff, um, with like, uh, documentation, search and things like that within the admin. I dunno if they’ve got support forms though.

[00:14:50] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, I’m learning these things as I’ve been, helping out on their customer experience side of things at LearnDash more and more they have said anecdotally that when they embedded the docs into the plugin, that it did reduce support tickets. So I think that’s an encouraging trend. I want to dig into the data of course and find that out more objectively . I think it’s interesting for sure.

[00:15:12] we are also moving more and more towards, trying to surface chat bots that are powered by our online documentation. With the intention that we’re gonna be monitoring the responses that people know they’re interacting with a bot that might not be correct, that they can always reach out to a real person if the bot’s not accurate. But all of that still depends on having really strong documentation that is accurate and being able to train the bot to be correct.

[00:15:39] I’d really like to see that thrive this calendar year on the Stellar side of things. But, will that actually increase our customer’s experience with support or will it just be another burden? I’m not sure. We’ll have to find out.

[00:15:52] Katie Keith: Can you think of any time that you’ve talked to a chat bot on a service you are interested in or using and it providing value to you as the customer?

[00:16:03] Matt Cromwell: I haven’t seen it on the products that I use so much to date. Um,

[00:16:07] Katie Keith: they’re like banks and things every, they’ve, all the bigger organizations have them.

[00:16:12] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. Those, to me, I don’t know that the ones that I’ve seen that do, that aren’t really like these AI bots. They’re more of just like really complex automations more or less, like choose your own adventure types, you know? Yeah. Like, is your question X or Y or Z? And if you choose one of ’em, that gives you the answer. Um, and that’s, those aren’t super intelligent. Um, but it’s a very catered way to get your response. Um, and you know that it’s gonna be accurate every time.

[00:16:39] But if they don’t cover all of your questions, then you’re kind of stuck. But I have experimented a ton with how DocsBotAI from Aaron Edwards, who we had on the show before how it is working with our GiveWP Online documentation and the answers that it’s providing. I’ll say I’ll give it a 90% or maybe 88% between 88, 90% it’s helpful information. And I know that if we spend more time training it to not give the wrong answers, that that 10% that it’ll improve. But it’s all about having the capacity and spending that time, um, to make it improve. So, um,

[00:17:17] Katie Keith: So what’s the success rate on the real people in the GIVE team, so if, um, the actual support engineers are doing live chat, their success rate probably isn’t a. So when you say 90%, you, what is that compared to a real person?

[00:17:32] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. No, 90 per 90% correct answers from the chat bot. Yeah. Um, but we’re not providing technical support via chats yet.

[00:17:42] Um, okay. We’re doing chat, live chat, mostly just for presales questions, generally speaking. But, The Events Calendar in particular does live chat for, um, it is for presales purposes, but they do get a lot of support questions there as well. And their happiness ratings in live chat are very high. Um, people tend to really like the support they get and the answers they get in live chat.

[00:18:05] So, um, it’s, it’s a good one. I just, I do feel like. I don’t know. There’s still some things I gotta beat up there in terms of the benefits of can an AI chat bot reduce the number of support tickets that the people get? ’cause that’s the, that’s the hope. That’s the dream that we’ll just get. It’ll be a good first interaction that will prevent new tickets from being created.

[00:18:29] Mm-Hmm. Um, versus just having the human spend the time, um, and. Have that be high quality time. Um, it’s hard to say what’s best there. Yeah, we kind of meandered in this in this episode, which is

[00:18:44] fun.

[00:18:44] Katie Keith: We’re well off topic. This has nothing to do with system status reports.

[00:18:48] Matt Cromwell: Uh, I think we can probably talk about, uh, customer support.

[00:18:52] I could talk about customer support for forever. Um, but anybody who’s a business owner like yourself, Katie, I think is always passionate about helping their customers. So, good subject. So. Tell us in the comment, um, yay or nay, what’s your take on system info? Um, and uh, Katie, thanks so much.

[00:19:12] Katie Keith: Yeah, bye

[00:19:13] Matt Cromwell: bye.

[00:19:15]