Understanding customer support terminology is essential for startups aiming to build strong, lasting relationships with their user base. Effective customer support can significantly impact customer satisfaction, retention, and brand reputation.
Familiarity with these terms helps founders implement efficient support systems, measure service quality, and adapt to evolving customer needs.
This knowledge enables startups to turn support interactions into opportunities for growth, gather valuable product feedback, and create brand advocates, ultimately contributing to the startup’s success and scalability.
To help entrepreneurs understand the terminologies used for Customer Service & Support, we have created an exhaustive startup glossary.
If you are wondering why we created this exhaustive startup glossary for entrepreneurs and founders, please visit here.
Glossary Map:
- Startup Funding
- Valuation & Financial Metrics
- Business Operations
- Technology & Development
- Marketing & Growth
- Legal & Regulatory
- Human Resources and Talent
- Artificial Intelligence
- Customer Service & Support
Customer Feedback
Customer feedback is information provided by customers about their experiences with a product or service. It can be solicited or unsolicited and is crucial for businesses to understand customer satisfaction, identify areas for improvement, and make informed decisions about product development and customer service strategies.
For example, a restaurant might use various methods to gather customer feedback. They could provide comment cards with the bill, encouraging diners to rate their experience and provide suggestions. The restaurant might also monitor online review platforms like Yelp or TripAdvisor, where customers can leave detailed reviews about their meals and service. Additionally, they could send follow-up emails after a customer’s visit, asking them to complete a short survey. By analyzing this feedback, the restaurant can identify common complaints (like slow service or cold food), praise (such as standout dishes or exceptional staff), and use this information to improve their operations, menu, and overall customer experience.
Help Desk
A help desk is a resource intended to provide customers or end users with information and support related to a company’s products or services. It serves as a central point of contact for users to get assistance with inquiries, issues, or technical problems they may encounter.
For instance, a software company might operate a help desk to support users of their product. When a customer encounters a problem, they can contact the help desk via phone, email, or chat. The help desk staff, equipped with knowledge bases and troubleshooting tools, can guide the user through solutions. They might help reset a forgotten password, explain how to use a specific feature, or troubleshoot a technical glitch. In more complex cases, the help desk might escalate the issue to specialized technical support teams. The help desk also typically tracks all interactions, allowing the company to identify common issues and improve their product or documentation based on user feedback.
Ticketing System
A ticketing system is a software tool used to create, manage, and track customer service requests or issues. It allows organizations to systematically handle and prioritize customer inquiries, ensuring that no request falls through the cracks and that all issues are addressed in a timely manner.
Consider an IT department in a large corporation. When an employee experiences a computer problem, they submit a ticket through the company’s internal portal. The ticketing system automatically assigns a unique ID to the request and routes it to the appropriate IT team based on the issue type. The system tracks the ticket’s progress, from initial submission through resolution, allowing managers to monitor response times and workload. The employee can check the status of their ticket at any time. Once the issue is resolved, the ticket is closed, and the solution is logged for future reference. This system ensures efficient handling of IT issues, provides accountability, and helps in identifying recurring problems that might need broader solutions.
Customer Relations Management (CRM)
Customer Relations Management (CRM) is a strategy for managing an organization’s interactions with current and potential customers. It uses data analysis about customers’ history with a company to improve business relationships, specifically focusing on customer retention and ultimately driving sales growth.
A practical example of CRM in action is a sales team using a CRM software like Salesforce. The software stores detailed information about each customer, including contact details, purchase history, and interactions with the company. When a salesperson prepares for a client meeting, they can quickly review the client’s history, including past purchases, support tickets, and preferences. This allows for personalized interactions and targeted sales pitches. The CRM also tracks the sales pipeline, reminding salespeople to follow up on leads or proposals. Marketing teams can use the CRM data to segment customers and create targeted campaigns. By centralizing customer information and interactions, CRM systems enable companies to provide more personalized and efficient customer service, leading to increased customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Satisfaction Surveys
Satisfaction surveys are tools used by businesses to measure customers’ contentment with their products, services, or overall experience. These surveys help companies gauge customer sentiment, identify areas for improvement, and track changes in customer satisfaction over time.
For example, an airline might send a satisfaction survey to passengers after each flight. The survey could ask about various aspects of the travel experience, such as the booking process, check-in procedures, in-flight service, and baggage handling. Questions might be formatted as multiple choice (e.g., “How would you rate your overall flight experience?”) or open-ended (e.g., “What could we have done to improve your journey?”). The airline can analyze this data to identify trends, such as consistently low ratings for in-flight meals or high praise for a particular route’s cabin crew. This information can then be used to make targeted improvements, like revamping the in-flight menu or recognizing high-performing staff, ultimately leading to enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty.
In-kind support
In-kind support refers to goods, services, or other non-monetary contributions provided by an organization or individual, typically to support a cause, project, or another organization. This type of support is valued for its direct utility rather than its monetary worth and can be an effective way to provide assistance when cash donations are not feasible or appropriate.
A practical example of in-kind support could be a local printing company supporting a community festival. Instead of donating money, the company might offer to print all the festival’s promotional materials – posters, flyers, and banners – free of charge. This saves the festival organizers a significant expense and allows them to allocate their budget to other areas. The printing company benefits by having its logo displayed on all materials, gaining community goodwill and exposure. Another example might be a tech company donating used but functional computers to a school, providing valuable resources to students who might not otherwise have access to such technology. In-kind support can be particularly valuable for non-profit organizations, allowing them to access resources and services that might otherwise be beyond their budgets.
End
We hope that this comprehensive and detailed Startup Glossary for Entrepreneurs Part 9: Customer Service & Support helped you to understand and decode the terms and phrases related to funding.
Here is the reason why we created this Startup Glossary For Entrepreneurs.
Here’s the previous category: Artificial Intelligence
In case you find any definition as incorrect or incomplete, or if you have any suggestions to make it better, feel free to reach out to us at info@mobisoftinfotech.com. We will surely appreciate your help and support to make this Startup Glossary as the best resource for all entrepreneurs and business owners, all across the globe.
Author's Bio
Nitin Lahoti is the Co-Founder and Director at Mobisoft Infotech. He has 15 years of experience in Design, Business Development and Startups. His expertise is in Product Ideation, UX/UI design, Startup consulting and mentoring. He prefers business readings and loves traveling.
