Articles
What SaaS Can Teach Us About Customer Service
September 5, 2008
Click Here To Download:•Contributing Editorial: What SaaS Can Teach Us About Customer Service
By Archie Black, President and CEO, SPS Commerce
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is one of the fastest growing segments of the IT industry, as analysts and customers alike have heralded the increasing success of the SaaS model for driving down operating costs and freeing businesses to focus on their core competencies. In addition, SaaS can also result in another key benefit not often recognized or leveraged: better customer service.
In the traditional software sales model, the idea is to impress the customer in the beginning, make the sale and collect the big check. While the customer is certainly valued, this is really a model that benefits the software company. Conversely, SaaS is a recurring revenue model where vendors gain maximum value by retaining customers over the long term. With the widespread adoption of SaaS products, vendors are adjusting their compensation models and salespeople are seeing smaller, but more regular, commission payouts. As such, each transaction and interaction with the customer is critical and SaaS providers must work continuously to earn the customer's business.
In other words, in the SaaS model, the power is with the customer and vendors need to take a very different approach to both sales and service. Based on my own experience at a SaaS company with a customer satisfaction rate of 93 percent, the following list of customer service "best practices" will help to increase customer loyalty, retention and revenue for SaaS and non-SaaS providers alike.
- Be Accessible
- Be Responsive and Proactive to What Customers Need and Want
- Do It Right the First Time
- Set Expectations Early
- Escalate Issues
- Provide Well-trained and Informed Employees
- Follow Up
- Practice Courteous Persistence
- Study the Competition
•Contributing Editorial: What SaaS Can Teach Us About Customer Service
