Tell the difference between Great Support vs Basic Support
Buying a product online is always tricky, you don’t know exactly what you get until you have it. With stock online components and elements for your projects the matter can get even trickier. Here are some pieces of advice to help you choose the best author on the market that can also provide a great support if needed.
We have talked before about the importance of support when you buy online, it does not matter the place. If support is included, it should be even greater than the product sold.
Therefore, we have some tips for you. Here is how you can differentiate between a great support and a basic one.
1. Response time
One of the most important aspects when you purchase something online is that most of the time you communicate with the authors via e-mail or on a support forum. You cannot get to them via phone, therefore the response time has to suffer.
However, a great author knows that, and they will never let you wait too long. If an author is passionate about their product, they will help you no matter what. You will get a very fast response with a prompt and descriptive solution, which of course is in your advantage because you can move on setting up your website! This is always visible on marketplaces that sell stock items in the comment sections. How active is the author? How fast does he reply? Most buyers even leave great reviews based on support alone.
A basic author will respond you too. Remember, we do not speak about bad developers, that do not provide support when the should. We are talking about those that put the minimum effort in helping their users. Therefore, there are authors that take their sweet time to answer. However, if on their website is written that the response time can reach up to 48 hours and they answer you exactly then, that’s what we call a basic support. It is perfectly fine, they announced the customers and they full-filled their task, but from a customer’s perspective, who doesn’t want to wait can be a deal breaker.
A great tip, if authors in their comment section show fast response times it means they’re in this full time. That will always be a strong indicator that, that specific author is interested in selling his product and keeping his customers happy. A happy customer is a return customer, so you can bet an actively engaged in conversations author is always a great support provider for his products.
2. Reviews / stars
Always look for reviews! You should look for reviews online even when you buy a fridge in the store. When you buy on an online market, the other people that bought the product before you are your best friends!
On Envato, as in probably some other marketplaces, there are subjects that a user can review. For example they can speak about the quality of the code, design of the product or support! Search for the support ones. See what other people have to say about the author.
If everybody is delighted with the fast response time and he ability of the author to solve problems instantly, then you have a smaller chance of having a bad time. These are also great indicators of the documentation and code quality or overall product quality that can reduce the necessity of requesting support in the first place.
3. The behaviour
You decided what product to get. You want to set up your website but the documentation is not written well and you’re stuck. Therefore, you decide to ask the developer how to solve you problem.
Great support means that the author pays an incredible amount of attention to your problem. He/she will try to explain how to solve it as easy as possible and will invest time in helping you. It is important for all sellers to acknowledge that not everybody knows how to code as well as them. Another aspect that must be understood is that the “builder” always knows his “building” better than anyone.
Albert Einstein once said that if you can not explain something to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself.
The two aspects you should look after in reviews or on forums are: the length of the response and the quality of the content.
If the response is short and on point, then the length doesn’t really matter. However, if the matter is a complex one, it should be explained correctly.
A great support provider is always patient! We do not state that some customers can understand things hardly or can’t understand them at all. But before one decides that, patience is a virtue!
4. The way authors talk
One of the most important aspect when two people build a professional relationship, such as “customer – seller/developer” is communication. If you as a customer are rude from the beginning, you should never expect the author to provide great support.
Developers are people too! They run on coffee, but they are still people. Therefore, each part should treat the other with respect. If you as a customer are polite and the author gives you a short response that doesn’t solve your problem, or just tells you to read the documentation (which he/she wrongly wrote), that is a bad or basic support.
Always look for authors that take their time to solve other people problems. They are the ones that are really passionate about their products and they know each and every line of code in there!
We hope our article will help you buy the right product and take advantage of the best support you can find!
Here at Enabled, we treat customers the way we want to be treated when we purchase a product. Response time is crucial, even if it’s a weekend, details are of the highest importance, none get skipped, as we understand customers don’t necessarily understand code as we do, and most of all, we treat each customer as an old friend. You are the reason we got here in the first place, so you can bet we’ll always give you only the best!