I built the Birdy and posted it on the Startup Guild forum. I immediately got some great feedback, and I thought, “Boy, this is great. How can I be sure that continues?” So the first thing I added to to my prototype was a “contact us” link to every page.
I was proud of my creation. So when I got around to making the marketing pages, I was sure to include an “about the Birdy” page that included my story and a photo of me. After a couple of weeks I noticed a trend in the analytics. People were visiting the “about us” page, and then signing up. So I moved my photo and story up to the homepage and saw an increase in sign ups.
I wanted to talk to the people signing up. An occasional email through the contact form wasn’t enough. So I installed SnapEngage, which adds a classy little “chat with us now” window to every page of your site. Nice and subtle, which is my own personal style. A few people a day would chat with me, tell me about bugs they found, or make suggestions. It was great, but SnapEngage was expensive. So after some research, I switched to Zopim, because it was cheaper, even though it wasn’t as classy. It has this big goofy “chat with us now!” speech bubble over the little window, and it says my name in big letters. Twice as many people started chatting with me.
I finally get the store proprietor analogy. I start every support email with “Hey!” because that’s how I talk, and if someone walked into a store I owned, that’s how I would greet them. I apologize when someone has trouble, and I share in their joy when they have a great experience. Even though not all the feedback I get is positive, it all helps me learn how to help better server the next person to walk through the door.