Where have all the customers gone?

On a warm spring day, a large crowd had gathered around Mr. Meyer’s store. This meant that its new advertisement must have been a full success, and it was finally paying off. With a smile on his face, Mr. Meyer unlocked the store door and welcomed the potential customers, before going behind the checkout counter. He was sure that today was going to be a good day for sales and waited patiently for those paying customers.

But these sneaked by the shop, confused by the looks. There were hardly any descriptions, information or prices for the products… From the outside, the store did not appear to be as big as it actually was and after some minutes strolling around in the shop there was still no staff to be found, who could answer their questions about particular items. “Here, I found something.”, a man said and pointed to a door with the label: Help. Fast enough, all other customers followed it into the room. They assumed that they would find the Help Center and that here they could find the answers to their questions. However, they found something else…

While the search for answers, customers looked around in astonishment. Huge shelves stood reaching the ceiling, absolutely filled with pile and piles of question and answers. The shelves did not provide any guide or direction, they were neither marked, nor there was a sign of order in the room. Even the sign hanging directly before the entrance was contradictory. As it showed that the letters A-F were on the right, but the letters D-G were to the left. If this were to be a FAQ, then it would be a terrible one. There was no overview or structure. “I suggest, we simply start looking for a solution…”, said a woman and was promptly backed up. Everybody went into different directions and soon found themselves alone in the corridors. It became terrifying once they were alone as they could not hear or see the other customers anymore. The warehouse felt enormous and despite the meter-high shelves and countless stacks of paper, the room came off as empty. As if the room had been renovated just recently. Which, by the state of it, it was also in need of an urgent renovation.

A woman, who found this particularly strange, began to look for the others and placed frightened firmly that they had actually disappeared. “Amusing… ”, she said to herself, climbed on a ladder and took a binder from the shelves. Perhaps, the other customers had just gone back into the shop? She didn’t let herself be too distracted and looked for her question about payments. The signpost at the end of the aisle had indicated that “payment methods” were in two different aisles- and so she tried her luck and started looking for it. But the first binder was completely empty, the next contained only a heading.

After some minutes she had found still nothing. “This cannot be true! ”, she said. She climbed down the ladder, shifted it a bit forward and climbed again all the way to the top. Her mood had worsened a lot, actually she had no more interest in the shop, this hall or the article, which she actually wanted to buy. When she pulled the next binder from a shelf, and it did not have a matching answer to her question, she became so irritated that she slammed it shut with all her force, making her fall from the ladder. But instead of hitting the cold hard floor of the warehouse, a large black hole opened and sucked her in. This must have happened to the other people too!

Meanwhile, Mr. Meyer sat behind the checkout counter and wondered why no customer came to the register. Could it be that all people, who had entered his shop, had soon left? After some more minutes of nothing happening, he decided to take a look around. He went around in his shop and confirmed that nobody was there anymore. He walked down the hallways feeling a bit blue until he came to the door with the “Help” sign. “But of course!”, he said to himself, “they’re using my helping room!“. The customers could not have left - he would have heard them. The shop door had a bell, which rang when going in and out too. The customers had then to be in there.

Mr. Meyer was puzzled by how dark the room was. He had not been there for a long time, as he was more focused on the saleroom and the products. He noticed that many areas were disheveled. The shelves were too overcrowded and confusing. The storage room was pure chaos. As he searched for customers, he went through the various aisles, signposts and shelves. In one corner, after some time, he actually found a customer sitting huddled in a pile of loose leaves.

“Can I help you?”, asked Mr. Meyer, and she looked up, facing him. “Thank God! Everybody else has disappeared. I saw how a man fell into a black hole… just over there” and she pointed to a desolated spot. “… I’ve been looking for hours for a document that could give me information about the manufacture of the products…”, she said desperately, and before long a hole opened beneath her, and she fell into it. Mr Meyer’s eyes widened. This could not be really happening! Just a moment ago she was sitting here after all… Frightened, he began to look for a solution to her problem, but he felt the despair of this endeavor. Soon enough a black hole opened underneath him… He fell in and… … woke up standing before his laptop. “What the…” - he stared at the screen. The help page of his own website was opened. He must have fallen asleep while trying to find out why his customers turned away from him. He clicked through the site for a while and noticed that it was very difficult and time-consuming to find a solution when you had a problem. The huge hall, which devoured dissatisfied customers in his dream, must have been his help site. In fact, it really did not allure them to buy anything.

Now he knew what had to be done: He began to investigate how to build a good help page. He quickly came across an article that called his attention: Never tired of your questions. That sounded promising! He began to inform himself about the company OMQ and found out that a great help page must be clear and that the product OMQ Help, a dynamic and auto-searching help page, is the perfect solution for it.

Customers should be given the possibility to surf the page easily and find the best solution without thorough searches. Sorting them by user behavior, which is constantly updated, also contributes to the ease of use. Just as fast, he agreed upon a demo and was pleased he got a date very soon. The automation software was implemented and helped directly after its introduction when answering the questions. Now instead of chaos there were different categories and an automatic auto-complete which provided additional support. Mr. Meyer scrolled through the FAQ with pleasure, and was enthusiastic about the fast problem solution, which had been the biggest problem a few days before.

OMQ Help - a dynamic and auto-searching help page

It goes without saying that confusing and chaotic FAQ’s and help pages do not really assist with solving problems. Many customers prefer self-service, where they can help themselves. However, if the tool available to them has to be explained and explored first, the interest disappears and the customers turn away from the company. Just like in the Scary New World story that you read before, they fall in a certain way into a black hole.

A good help page is clear and easy to navigate. Ideally, it has an autocomplete function, which makes it possible for the customer to find without at all knowing a solution, according to which it searches concretely. The subdivision of the help page into different categories is also very helpful. All of this and more are the benefits our AI-based software, that not only improves the help page, but also automates all other service channels. You can find an overview of our different products here.

OMQ Help not only provides categories and autocompletion, but it is also dynamic. This means that current changes in the customer behavior are shown directly, making it possible to arrange questions by their inquiry frequency.

Benefits of OMQ Help at glance:

• Increased customer satisfaction
• Fast and easy integration
• User-friendly operation of the help page
• Automation of support processes
• Centralize knowledge base for all service processes

Just as all of our other OMQ Products, OMQ Help is also linked to the OMQ Central Knowledge Base, which stores all the service information and distributes it to the customer services channels.

…And Mr. Meyer?

When he fell asleep on the evening of the successful implementation, he found himself back in his dream shop. This time, too, the customers gathered in front of his shop. He let them in and watched them open the door to the auxiliary room. The room was now bright, and the shelves no longer reached the ceiling. Above the shelves there were keywords such as: “return” and “delivery times”, which allowed easy orientation. The signs were now also clear.

Mr. Meyer followed his customers and noticed how a small robot grabbed them by the hand. Astonished, he looked around and saw the woman in front of him, who disappeared into the black hole in his nightmare before his eyes. She, too, was surprised about the being, but said: “Pay-”, and that was enough for the bot. It took hers immediately and only let go of the woman’s hand when she reached the right shelf, and it handed her the right file. The little bot worked as the autocompletion from OMQ Help. To a certain extent, it was also a navigator.

Satisfied with the help room, which was now no longer frightening but extremely helpful, Mr Meyer went back into the salesroom and stood behind the counter. Soon the enthusiastic customers came and bought items from his store.

Do you want to improve and brighten up your help page?

If you are interested to up-polish and thus to your customers a large favour do your assistance side a little, you can inquire [here] (https://omq.ai/landing-pages/start/) a demo or contact us [simply] (https://omq.ai/company/contact/) When you sign up for our Newsletter, so you do not miss any of our articles and pieces of news! We are looking forward to welcoming you :)