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Alla Klein: a fake person in charge of customer support

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Re: Alla Klein: a fake person in charge of customer support

#31

Post by lurker17 »

MartinCron wrote: post #20

Back in the early 90s, I worked for a very small (12-ish people) technical graphics software company. The CEO and lead coder would help with tech support calls when we were slammed, but he would use a pseudonym to make it appear that we were a larger, more established company than we were. I think that it may have been a more appropriate facade then, but there are quite a few precedents for very small companies provi…

Interesting. Our CEO makes a point of identifying himself by name when he jumps on a support call or email. I figured he figures it makes people feel special, or he just likes being straightforward.

Re: Alla Klein: a fake person in charge of customer support

#32

Post by lurker17 »

bitwize wrote: post #24

In Boston there is a column for gay men to write anonymously to for help and advice with their medical issues (especially sexual and psychological). It's called "Ask Dr. Cox". (hurr, hurr) "Dr. Cox" is actually a pseudonym for a small group of physicians who respond to the questions. Nevertheless the idea of having a single "name" and "face" to address your concerns to seems to be working -- and it helps these doctor…

Is that known to be more effective than "Ask the Docs?"

Re: Alla Klein: a fake person in charge of customer support

#34

Post by evanhamilton »

tomkarlo wrote: post #15
evanhamilton wrote: post #4

I have to agree with martey here: the way you did support is fantastic, creating a fake persona is not. People like honesty and hate being fooled. If your customers found out about Alla, I think they would be very upset. Especially the ones who asked her out!

Using a pseudonym for customer support is a fairly accepted practice. Unfortunately, when it's your job to deal with a lot of customers you're inevitably going to have some that are unhappy with your response, no matter how well you do your job or how great your company is. If you deal with enough customers (thousands) over time, some of those unhappy customers are going to try to track you down outside of work and m…

I'd argue that a pseudonym is /very/ different from having all support responses come from a a fake person. "tomkarlo" could be a pseudonym and I'd be fine interacting with you...but if I find out that "tomkarlo" is actually 12 employees at Microsoft posting on boards across the web, I'd be very upset.

Re: Alla Klein: a fake person in charge of customer support

#35

Post by evanhamilton »

biggitybones wrote: post #10
evanhamilton wrote: post #4

I have to agree with martey here: the way you did support is fantastic, creating a fake persona is not. People like honesty and hate being fooled. If your customers found out about Alla, I think they would be very upset. Especially the ones who asked her out!

At the end of the day I don't think customers care whether it's a script, person or alien solving their problem. All that matters is a great experience and a resolved issue.

So if I told you that I wasn't a person but in fact a 15-person team who posts comments across the web, you wouldn't be weirded out? :P
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