For global business, having tier 1 tech support specialists that share crucial tech support skills is vitally-important to top-tier troubleshooting support that enhances customer experiences (CX), leading to a comparison between two sides of a coin, offering crucial benefits: on one hand, superb CX fostered through concrete, effective troubleshooting/help desk support gives your customers/end-users the confidence to trust/find value in your global brand’s products/services – leading to the other side: strengthened brand reputation/loyalty through long-term brand ambassadorship that increases long-term sales/market success – whether you’re go-global or just offering products/services in a specific onshore market niche.

Recently, Callnovo Contact Center wrote an article on customer service principles CSRs should follow to ensure fantastic customer engagement – offering key positive CX advantages; within, they mentioned:

• Positive CX influences repeat sales – as 89% of consumers are motivated to repeat product/service purchases from the same brands.
• Positive CX heavily-impacts brand ambassadorship – leading 94% with pleasant customer satisfaction experiences to recommend the same brand(s) to others.
• 50-60% of global customers are greatly-disposed to switching to competitors when they experience negative/unsatisfactory customer experiences (CX).

Considering the above, it’s direly-important to have your technical support specialists strike a balance between hard/soft communication skills, good old-fashioned people skills, technical expertise, and product knowledge – as you’ll ensure customers receive top support that enhances CX in a way that they’ll remain long-term loyal customers, influencing others to purchase/use your same products/services – leading to a growing customer base, brand loyalty/business reputation incrementation, and a permanently-increasing competitive drive.

We’ll go through crucial tier 1 tech support skills to foster top-tier troubleshooting support that enhances CX – touching on:

• what tier 1 tech support is,
• 5 vital tier 1 tech support skills, and
• what Callnovo offers in terms of outsourced technical support and how the jack-of-all-trades outsourced call center successfully-helps global businesses meet their short-and-long-term service needs.

Tier 1 Tech Support – a Viable Explanation

Troubleshooting support is a complex service to provide – especially if your customers/end-users need beyond-standard help desk support; there are 4 levels of service desk support (L0, L1, L2, and L3) – though the 1st level functions as self-service where user-retrieved info. can be acquired – requiring your team offers technical/marketing resources that contain created & maintained product/service info. Let’s get into what tier 1 IT level support (L1) is – the main support level that you’ll be providing your consumers.

What is Tier I Technical Support?

Tier 1 tech support (L1) specialists – the first level of direct support – typically provide basic IT, help desk, and service desk support, meaning your support agents help users to quickly-solve non-complex tech issues. This channel’s name is derived from the “tier” (category/level) that service tickets fall under when on their way to resolution – so, tier I support is also known as level 1 support. Support teams follow a tiered structure to ensure customers are prioritized according to priority/urgency.

What are the Tier I Technical Support Functions?

Though tier 1 tech support teams provide only basic troubleshooting support, they handle approximately 80% of all user issues due to their expertise in such areas as:

• basic troubleshooting,
• account and/or password resets,
• call filtering,
• payment/subscription processing,
• navigation assistance,
• ticket creation, categorization, and filtering,
• email maintenance, and
• user information collection.

While they resolve general customer issues – such as usage issues, offering detailed product info. when needed, and fulfilling service desk requests that need information technology/infotech (IT) specialist support – L1 support actually handles many different functions – such as:

• record user requests,
• attend users via various communication channels – such as:
  ** inbound/outbound phone calls,
  ** emails,
  ** live web chat,
  ** SMS messaging,
  ** and/or social media,
• log/follow-up on user issues via support tickets,
• basic troubleshooting via related questionnaires,
• installing new tech software, teaching end users how to use it,
• backing up/restoring user data,
• maintaining/repairing operating systems (OS), and
• much more.

5 Vital Tier 1 Tech Support Skills to Master for Top-tier Troubleshooting Support

A 3rd party survey provided to 33,000 customers/end users states: superb technical support plays a key role in overall support service quality – up to 86%. Therefore, it’s crucial to ensure your tier 1 tech support team demonstrates vital tier 1 tech support skills that lead consumers to trust/value your products/services, leading to long-term brand growth/market success. Let’s get into 5 key L1 tech support skills your tier 1 tech support specialists should master to enhance CX.

Working Adaptability & Flexibility

Technology doesn’t sleep – tech issues can arise at any time within 24 hours; it’s crucially-important for your tier 1 tech support specialists to adapt to customer needs – which may mean working onsite, offsite, or on call at any time. Furthermore, though tech workers may need to frequently-work alone, they must also be able to escalate issues as needed, working cooperatively with other IT specialists.

Key points:

• adaptability to team & customer/end user needs,
• successful time management,
• prioritization,
• onsite and remote working capabilities,
• concrete knowledge of communications systems, and
• a passion for tech.

Stellar Communication Skills

Your technical support engineers can be the most knowledgeable experts – however, just because they “know it all” doesn’t mean your end users do; your L1 technical support staff should communicate technical issues/solutions to your consumers in a way that they understand what’s said, “dumbing down” the technical jargon/complex explanations, giving explanations in a way that they’re equally-understood by technicians and tech-challenged users. Furthermore, tier 1 tech support engineers should actively listen.

Key points:

• concrete language proficiency,
• active listening,
• concrete oral/written communication,
• interpersonal skills,
• customer-centric attitude,
• complex understanding of product/service knowledge,
• strong guidance disposition, and
• strong internal teamwork/collaboration.

Tight Problem-solving Ability

Along with stellar communication skills, problem-solving is a very-needed tier tech support skill since tier technical support engineers must know how to decipher/resolve consumers’ tech issues while clearly communicating such technical issues/solutions. This involves your tier technical support specialists carefully listening to users’ concerns, figuring out the problem, and coming up with an issue resolution plan; therefore, having creative problem-solving strategies is a must.

Strong points:

• intuitive attention to detail,
• a keen understanding of systematic issues,
• troubleshooting skills,
• determination, and
• keen inductive/deductive reasoning ability.

Sufficient Patience

Though mainly a customer service skill, patience is still a key tier 1 tech support skill because frustrated/annoyed/angry tech users are apt to escalate issues – especially if the technology used is important to keeping their lives secure/in good shape. Therefore, tier 1 tech specialists must listen patiently to customers’/users’ concerns, calmly helping them resolve their issues – which requires patience, kindness, and understanding.

Strong points:

• detail orientation,
• strong concentration,
• commitment,
• active listening,
• strong customer service skills, and
• top troubleshooting skills.

Wide Range of Hard Skills

It doesn’t take someone sharp as a marble to understand the high-importance of hard skills to troubleshooting support; hard skills are crucial to desk/service desk/troubleshooting support. Your tier 1 tech support personnel should have a base of technical knowledge and should stay up-to-date on current hardware/software.

Here’s an unexhaustive list of the most common tier 1 tech support skills:

• remote software,
• cyber security,
• backup/imaging software,
• diagnostics,
• WAN/LAN/internet connectivity,
• IT admin software,
• Network monitoring software,
• telecom.,
• electronics,
• email management,
• VoIP systems,
• mobile software,
• virus protection software,
• basic coding, scripting, and programming,
• Mac/Linux/PC/Unix OS and software,
• knowledge-based systems,
• data report maintenance,
• servers, and
• etc.

Callnovo’s Technical Support Outsourcing Solutions – Guaranteeing Top-tier CX

To compliment the above-mentioned detailed guide, Callnovo Contact Center – having worked with 1,200+ global corporations/Fortune 500 companies throughout 40+ industries for 17+ years – can support you with top-quality tech support outsourcing, ensuring top-tier customer engagement enhancement, leading to brand loyalty/business reputation incrementation and a permanently-increasing competitive drive in your specific market niche(s).

Some Callnovo technical support outsourcing advantages are:

• High-quality Expertise – ensuring quality tier 1 troubleshooting/help desk support – as they ensure personnel are skilled in:
  ** customer-centric enthusiasm/service attitude,
  ** interpersonal communication skills,
  ** logical thinking skills,
  ** management/operations skills,
  ** product/troubleshooting service experience, and
  ** a wide range of hard skills/niche service knowledge – such as:
  *** appliances,
  *** applications,
  *** B2B software,
  *** cloud-based software,
  *** consumer electronics,
  *** IPTV systems,
  *** app support,
  *** security monitoring,
  *** smart devices, and
  ***many more.
• Always-available Service – maximizing on customer satisfaction/CX by continually meeting customers’ needs without limits.
• Omnichannel Support – ensuring accessible, rapid multiple-channel contact solutions, leading to enhanced CX, influencing long-term customer brand ambassadorship/customer loyalty.
• Native Language Support – ensuring customers’ needs are efficiently-met, conforming to cultural expectations, improving customer loyalty.

Conclusion

Via a concrete understanding of tier 1 tech support – as well as encouraging your technical support team to practice the above-mentioned key tier 1 tech support skills – you can foster superb customer engagement that greatly-enhances CX, turning your customers/end-users into long-term brand ambassadors. For support, Callnovo Contact Center offers a comprehensive multilingual, omnichannel technical support outsourcing solution to help you successfully-meet consumers’ high service expectations, increasing long-term sales/market success – whether you’re go-global or only offering products/services in specific onshore market niches.