Stop using your helpdesk software as an inbox

It is not a secret that every service team must have a tool to organize access to customer requests by agents. It is the essential to have the context of requests centralized, specially to allow agents to help each other in certain demands.

However, the vast majority of teams use these tools only as a shared email inbox. And this is much more common than you think. Although there are dozens (or even hundreds) of good tools, which allow uncountable optimizations and parameterizations, teams often end up having an e-mail usage of the software. as a message repository.

And this brings enormous inefficiency for the team, and also an under-utilization of the tool. The most common result of this scenario is to change the tool, which does not address the problem of misuse.

Neste artigo separamos alguns dos motivos pelos quais você não deve usar seu software de helpdesk (seja lá qual for) apenas como uma caixa de e-mail.

Demand categorization

One of the biggest advantages of having a helpdesk tool is being able to categorize and organize demands. Here are some dimensions of possible organizations:

• Categories: define the scope of a demand. It is important that they are specifically linked to the product or service. The great utility for this categorization is to understand which parts of the product or service require greater service and to focus on improvements in them;
• Type: if the ticket refers to a doubt, problem or any task that has to be performed by the team. This helps to understand how the team is being allocated on a day-to-day basis and whether more knowledge base efforts are needed (for questions) or process automation (tasks), for example;
• Group: when analyzing the distribution of tickets between teams, it is important that the team has defined groups. Service levels can also be used here, making it possible to understand the quantity of tickets or the average time for each part of the team.

This organization, in addition to facilitating prioritization and day-to-day work, is an extremely important tool for data analysis. Understanding the types of demand and the teams that have more work helps (and a lot) to define improvements that should be implemented in the service team.

Structuring data analysis

With organized data generation, the consequent structuring of data analysis becomes much simpler. Ticket exporting and data integration are available in most helpdesk tools and enable powerful analysis. With this database and a little work on an Excel spreadsheet or even BI software (PowerBI or Google DataStudio) it is possible to understand the main points for improving the process, and to define action plans increasingly focused on these points.

Many tools even provide integrated modules of dashboards and / or reports, which end up saving a lot of time for consolidating and crossing data. In more mature operations, with more frequent analisys, this type of solution can represent a considerable time gain in data analysis and in the management routine (for example, results meetings).

With this data structure, it should be possible to answer some important questions about your service operation:

• What was the biggest reason for questions from our users last month?
• How much time was spent in each of the service categories?
• What is the % of calls in each service level?

Realize that the fact of using these 3 fields effectively makes it possible to create several ways to analyse the service operation.

Queuing organization and prioritization

Another very important aspect of having your operation well structured in a helpdesk tool is the possibility of organizing the service queues and, especially, keeping them prioritized.

The first step in organizing the queues is to create visualizations or filters that allow the team to know what are the next demands must be attended. It sounds simple, but creating a prioritization structure between tickets that have to be solved is the key to having a productive service team. In a well-configured helpdesk tool, you can create, for example, a view for each service level, or even for certain more critical operations such as cancellation, logistics, bugs, among others.

In addition, it is also important to use priority features to create these views. Usually the tools have four levels of priority (Urgent, High, Normal and Low), which helps to indicate the team what must be attended to first. The definition of the degrees of priority must be done together with the team and, if possible, it must be automated (see the section Macros, Automations and Triggers).

In addition to defining the priority, a large part of the helpdesk software also includes the operationalization of the SLA (Service Level Agreement) metric. Through a good use of SLAs and the correct definition of SLA rules, it is possible to keep all demands ordered by those that are closest to expire. This will allow the team to more systematically understand the sense of urgency of customer demands.

Macros, automations and triggers

Finally, the most advanced use of helpdesk software falls on Macros, Automations and Triggers. They allow a brutal optimization of repetitive daily routines, such as screening tickets for a team or doing a follow up with customers. Although, there are some differences between the execution of these routines, and also on the possible applications.

Macros

Routines with manual triggering to speed up repetitive work. They are ideal for transfering activities such as screening tickets or sending a demand to another team (such as development teams, for example). It is common to use message templates to facilitate filling in important information for assistance.

Automations

Automatic routines that are processed from time to time (usually one hour). The great utility of Automations is, from a ticket state in time, to perform an automatic activity, such as sending follow-up e-mail to a customer or else increasing the priority level of a demand that has been without a long time with no interaction.

Triggers

They are automatic routines that are triggered as soon as a specific event occurs (such as creating or updating a ticket). Triggers are very interesting for automatic ticket categorization or priority assignment depending on the category or type, saving the agent’s time in categorizing and also maintaining the well-configured service standard.

With the use of macros, automations and triggers it is possible to reduce much of the manual and repetitive work of your agents, but it is important to make it clear that, regardless of the type of automation used, it is interesting to keep the service standard as human as possible. The feeling of mechanical customer service is often damaging to the brand, and does not necessarily help productivity. Use automations wisely, especially when it involves communication with the customer. For internal organization flow, feel free to use it as much as you want! =)

So, let’s use helpdesk effectively?

Anyway, after these points it is clear that using a helpdesk tool as an email inbox is a huge waste, and that there is probably a lot of potential for improvement in your operation today. Understanding the helpdesk as the greatest ally to have a first class service is a big step towards working on your team’s productivity culture!