I’m sure you’ve heard of the saying,
“You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.”
The idea is that when you have a good attitude, you treat people with respect, and you’re nice to them, they’re going to respond better.
This is exactly the kind of approach you should have whenever you have to contact tech support when you have a problem—no matter what!
Tech Support
I’ve always tried to have this approach (the exception being a few Twitter complaints/rants–nobody’s perfect?). The results from doing this whenever I’ve contacted web hosts, phone companies and domain registrars, has always been good. Having a “know-it-all” attitude or simple grouchiness is never a good idea–ever!
Take last night, for example (as that’s what prompted this post):
This time I was on the other end. I was providing some tech support for my premium WordPress theme for live events and video streaming, Live Theme, when someone contacted me with a problem via Zendesk. The customer was gracious and direct and I replied with my solution.
He had just upgraded to the Support License and after receiving my reply, commented that it was already worth the upgrade price for the solution I had provided. He followed up with several more questions and we went back and forth several times for the course of the evening–all of which he was a delight to help.
I Feel Good!
After everything had been taken care-of, I felt good! I hadn’t just helped someone, I hadn’t just fulfilled my duties, I felt uplifted from the entire communication experience. It was awesome!
This only reinforced to me the idea that having such a great attitude as a customer, not only makes your own experience more fruitful and fulfilling, but makes it better for tech support and other customers as well.
Besides, as Christians, our words and actions should always have some honey added.
Do you have any awesome tech support stories?
Tell us about it!
Jared M says
I’ve been on both sides of the phone on this one and it is definitely true. You almost always get faster and better service when you are gracious, especially under bad circumstances.
Eric Dye says
I’m sayin’! 😀
Penelope Persnoppleschmidt says
I’ve been on both sides of the coin and it doesn’t apply to just tech support. There are some people–some women in particular–that think the bigger the bitch they are, the more likely they’ll get what they want simply because the person “helping” them will want to get rid of them. Not so with me, if you’re going to make it difficult on me, I’m going to nitpick every little thing and make it equally difficult on you.
You get what you give. Which is why the customers that are so friendly or understanding or just downright awesome…I go above and beyond and then some for them.
Eric Dye says
Yup. True story. 🙂