Thursday, March 16, 2017

Research Project: Getting Feedback on Internal Support

A large chunk of my job involves providing support for co-workers - answering questions, modifying data for them, researching ways to boost efficiency, etc.

I've been curious about quantifying how I'm doing with keeping my coworkers happy. At the end of the year, I'd like to be able to say something like "I provided support to ## people with a satisfaction rating of 95%."

Is this actually valuable? I don't know. I find that as an internal support person, I would like more than a '## task completed' rating when it comes to my own personal evaluation of how I did during the past year. (Side note: I am not part of an IT department. This kind of tracking is something that I'm only curious about for my personal use. I'm sure it would be a lot more obviously beneficial for IT or a larger team.)

I started doing some research into methods of tracking 'customer satisfaction'.

Criteria:

  • Unobtrusive
  • Easy to add to my email signature
  • User friendly (goal: 1 click and done)


Here are a few of the options I found:

  • Spridz
    • 7 day free trial, one pricing plan with unlimited usage ($499/year)
    • Nifty analytics / charts and graphics
    • Integrates with help desk apps (like Zendesk)
    • From what I can tell, it seems like you use a link that then sends the recipient to a 'feedback page' where they can vote. This doesn't work with my ideal of one-click solution.
  • Customer Thermometer
    • Base plan is $29/month for 50 'credits' (one response = one credit)
    • Nifty analytics / charts and graphs
    • Lots of rating icons to choose from (custom supported too)
    • Supports creating email polls and timed notifications/reminders - I imagine this would be handy for people doing a lot of external customer support.
    • Customizable landing page based on the rating - This is a neat idea for businesses!
  • Hively
    • Free plan for up to 3 users (with some limitations), after that it's $15/month
    • Nifty analytics / charts and graphs
    • Can customize the appearance of the 'smileys'

Based on the screencaptures on their website, I prefer the interface of Spridz. But, I think it would be more valuable for a team scenario rather than an individual user.

The only option that I found that had a free 1-user plan was Hively.

I'm currently testing it out, but I'm not even sure if this method is the right one or if this kind of information will be useful to me in the future. I'm just curious.

To keep it subtle but still noticeable, I changed it from an image-based line to text.

(Hively text voting links at the bottom of my email signature)

What about you? Have you found another way to gather feedback in an unobtrusive way? Or do you feel that trying to track satisfaction when it comes to internal customer support for a single person is pointless? Leave a comment, let me know.