Congratulations, I have no idea if this will work out longterm, but I find it to be a creative idea. Reminds me of the Heroku/AWS/GAE play on hosting apps, but applied to the customer support market.
Sarah, a quick question ( I noticed you're listening out there) . . .
Some years ago, before I became a corporate SQL grunt, I worked in an actual, honest-to-goodness telephone support center (non-technical in nature). Is your "scalability plan" to somehow identify those patterns of support for apps that require the most hand-holding (e.g., live person-to-person contact) and automate/FAQ/build some software to somehow win the 80/20 support race? Just curious, since there such a huge range of customer tech savy out there . . .
"Get 37signals style customer support for $3k/month" is a pretty compelling pitch. This type of service seems like the perfect fit for a growing startup. The founders and early hires can focus on building product value and don't need to get too bogged down in setting up quality support systems that ensure customers are taken care of and retained. If you get too big for CoSupport they have a training option that could help you move the support in house.
and (sort of related) what would be the cost of one full time customer support rep? It doesn't have to be the most technical person with a CS degree from MIT, mind you...
I started reading the three columns "Copy", "Support", and "Blog", and by the time I got to "Blog", I expected it to be another service that you'd offer (i.e. writing blog posts about the supported service). It took me a second to realize I was reading about your own blog posts.
Maybe it's just me, but I think I would relocate the blog section somewhere else.
(b) 37signals has a support team consisting of at least four actual real people: http://smiley.37signals.com/ (I'm not sure DHH counts as actual real people).
(c) Sarah Hatter can do whatever she wants without somehow contradicting 37signals. She's ventured off into her own thing. She can even write --- gasp --- Python code if she likes.
While we are talking about outsourced app support just wanted to mention http://aptfolk.com/.
While they don't have much info on their site, I've heard from friends who use them that they are pretty good. Apparently they charge somewhere around $25/hour so they are a little easier to get started with if you have a smaller budget.
I work on http://tenderapp.com, a customer support system that Aptfolk uses with a lot of their clients.
Ash Ponders, the founder of Aptfolk, was doing support for Atebits Tweetie back when I first heard about them, as well as a number of other higher profile Mac and web apps.
They've done a great job with everything I've seen and are working on extending out a number of of services like high-end screencasts and video work, as well as documentation writing (something EVERY developer hates to do).
I've been doing professional customer support for web applications for over 6 years now, not to mentions the countless moderator rolls and communities I've been involved with over the years. This is definitely a market that's been long overdue. It's probably one of the most difficult roles we have to hire for here at http://entp.com as a small company with a tech savvy user base. Not only do you have to talk the talk and be fairly tech savvy, you have to understand and adapt to different types of users and cultures.
Culture is hard to teach though, and for an independent developer to be able to offload support quickly when things grow to people who have a clue what they are doing right out of the gates, that's a huge win.
What we're seeing is the result of Sarah busting out her business with minimal overhead. Virb + Wufoo + Tumblr = She got started on almost nothing (at least as far as her web presence). She's setting a fantastic example and following the "Get something up and iterate" advice pretty well, IMO.
I think the site design is awful. It is completely off in its feel. It is something that would work for a slightly eccentric blog of a moderately self-pompous woman. I am getting very strong "Here I am, I like how I am, and you take it or leave it" vibe.
Grunge heading font, toy-ish and overly playful illustration and personified image of (presumably) the founder does NOT associate with a "team of support experts". It just does not. Moreover, not for $3K/mo.
edit: Oh, -1, lovely. I must be making uncivilized comments that do not contribute to the discussion. They are not loosing any customers with this website design after all.
Hmm, how do you plan on getting to know the product/codebase intimately to provide support? One thing people love about historious is that simple features are added by the time I reply to their support emails and that I know the entire codebase, this is lost with this sort of support scheme.
When I started in my role at developer support at Google, I was actually a remote part-time contractor with no access to internal code, mail, or tools. But, I was still able to provide decent support by being highly communicative between the engineering team and the developer world, using emails, forum posts, and weekly phone calls.
So, I do think it's possible to outsource a certain level of support without codebase access, provided that there is a good communication line setup.
It's a fantastic idea! I'm curious at how the support will work though? It seems like you'll have to get the support people to learn the inside and outside of multiple systems?
Like SEO, sales suffers from an adverse selection problem. Effective salespeople are money generators and don't really need to market themselves. There is a good chance that any salesperson who has the time and motivation to market himself to the whole world isn't strong enough to be worth it.
Sexist because it has a woman wearing a skirt? I really can't see how that's sexist at all. Should she be wearing slacks instead? Or maybe it should be a picture of a man? Maybe a few minorities to add diversity too.
i don't find it sexist at all. The illustration is of the founder and her cat and it could be part of a powerful branding concept ("we are just as personal and friendly as your own staff"), especially since they are name dropping 37 signals and the fact that the founder has worked there.
The design is not that corporate or web application-y and I like it as a contrast to all these bland conversion centric / landing page SEO designs.
However, I have to say that I am skeptical about outsourcing support. I consider it too core to outsource and, ideally, pretty much every person in your small startup - their ideal customer [1] - should be involved in it. Kinda funny how they reference Zappos, a company famous for their outstanding in-house support.
[+] [-] tom_b|15 years ago|reply
Congratulations, I have no idea if this will work out longterm, but I find it to be a creative idea. Reminds me of the Heroku/AWS/GAE play on hosting apps, but applied to the customer support market.
Sarah, a quick question ( I noticed you're listening out there) . . .
Some years ago, before I became a corporate SQL grunt, I worked in an actual, honest-to-goodness telephone support center (non-technical in nature). Is your "scalability plan" to somehow identify those patterns of support for apps that require the most hand-holding (e.g., live person-to-person contact) and automate/FAQ/build some software to somehow win the 80/20 support race? Just curious, since there such a huge range of customer tech savy out there . . .
[+] [-] KevinEldon|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] maayank|15 years ago|reply
and (sort of related) what would be the cost of one full time customer support rep? It doesn't have to be the most technical person with a CS degree from MIT, mind you...
[+] [-] pamelafox|15 years ago|reply
I started reading the three columns "Copy", "Support", and "Blog", and by the time I got to "Blog", I expected it to be another service that you'd offer (i.e. writing blog posts about the supported service). It took me a second to realize I was reading about your own blog posts.
Maybe it's just me, but I think I would relocate the blog section somewhere else.
Cool site, otherwise!
[+] [-] evandavid|15 years ago|reply
- what happens when my site is experiencing issues and you receive massive volumes of complaint/problem emails
- how do I continue to integrate support in our product/feature management workflow, to ensure that the voice of the customer is heard?
- are you hoping to introduce phone calls and other support methods?
Thanks!
[+] [-] evandavid|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Rob1979|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tptacek|15 years ago|reply
(b) 37signals has a support team consisting of at least four actual real people: http://smiley.37signals.com/ (I'm not sure DHH counts as actual real people).
(c) Sarah Hatter can do whatever she wants without somehow contradicting 37signals. She's ventured off into her own thing. She can even write --- gasp --- Python code if she likes.
[+] [-] sammcd|15 years ago|reply
While they don't have much info on their site, I've heard from friends who use them that they are pretty good. Apparently they charge somewhere around $25/hour so they are a little easier to get started with if you have a smaller budget.
[+] [-] imagetic|15 years ago|reply
I work on http://tenderapp.com, a customer support system that Aptfolk uses with a lot of their clients.
Ash Ponders, the founder of Aptfolk, was doing support for Atebits Tweetie back when I first heard about them, as well as a number of other higher profile Mac and web apps.
They've done a great job with everything I've seen and are working on extending out a number of of services like high-end screencasts and video work, as well as documentation writing (something EVERY developer hates to do).
I've been doing professional customer support for web applications for over 6 years now, not to mentions the countless moderator rolls and communities I've been involved with over the years. This is definitely a market that's been long overdue. It's probably one of the most difficult roles we have to hire for here at http://entp.com as a small company with a tech savvy user base. Not only do you have to talk the talk and be fairly tech savvy, you have to understand and adapt to different types of users and cultures.
Culture is hard to teach though, and for an independent developer to be able to offload support quickly when things grow to people who have a clue what they are doing right out of the gates, that's a huge win.
[+] [-] parfe|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jharrison|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brockf|15 years ago|reply
http://cosupport.us/blog
YIKES.
[+] [-] abcd_f|15 years ago|reply
Grunge heading font, toy-ish and overly playful illustration and personified image of (presumably) the founder does NOT associate with a "team of support experts". It just does not. Moreover, not for $3K/mo.
edit: Oh, -1, lovely. I must be making uncivilized comments that do not contribute to the discussion. They are not loosing any customers with this website design after all.
[+] [-] StavrosK|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pamelafox|15 years ago|reply
So, I do think it's possible to outsource a certain level of support without codebase access, provided that there is a good communication line setup.
[+] [-] jw84|15 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] gawker|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] izak30|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tptacek|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kawika|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stretchwithme|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dabeeeenster|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cosgroveb|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arkitaip|15 years ago|reply
The design is not that corporate or web application-y and I like it as a contrast to all these bland conversion centric / landing page SEO designs.
However, I have to say that I am skeptical about outsourcing support. I consider it too core to outsource and, ideally, pretty much every person in your small startup - their ideal customer [1] - should be involved in it. Kinda funny how they reference Zappos, a company famous for their outstanding in-house support.
[1] http://cosupport.us/about
[+] [-] biot|15 years ago|reply