Peerside

One of the lessons I've learned over the years is that nothing creates a happy customer more than helping them solve their exact problem - after all that's why they bought your software, right?  In many cases this never happens even when your product is the solution to their problems because modern software products are developed, marketed and documented in a generic "one size fits all" model which, while attempting to be as generic as possible, documents individual features but not end to end use cases. The enterprise software market, where software suites are often large and complex, this phenomenon has made the existence of expensive consultants or paid support a fact of life.

Yesterday, while evaluating PBWiki for a personal hobby site, I signed up, created, evaluated and then deleted an online Wiki site within the space of 20 minutes ( yes - 20, imagine the same for Sharepoint). The process was everything it should be, simple, obvious and direct, but what struck me as most interesting was an email I received from the PBWiki team immediately after signing up to offer me free access to a weekly customer support session - no strings attached.

Why is this smart ? Because most software evaluators decide to buy or not based on their first impressions and experience in building a prototype/demo that proves the business case for that software. In the enterprise world Pre Sales Consultants help the customer in building that case but in the SaaS world where free or discounted self service evaluation is becoming a fact of life this isn't even a consideration so alternative ways need to be found to ensure that the customers evaluation is as stress free and successful as possible. PBWiki could offer free customer support at a significant relative cost for a product with such a low sales price. Instead they offer limited support in the form of an "open office hours" which sounds much more informal, friendly and progressive. This allows them to address common issues early users have (established customers will typically sign up for and utilise paid customer support )and to help solve the problem the evaluator is trying to solve.

If you're a StartUp and looking to convert more evaluations into registrations consider offering a "customer lounge" for early adopters where you run tutorials and run Q&A sessions. Even better provide YouTube style videos of how your product works, document common use cases in "cookbook" style documents and if possible document previous success stories from existing customers. In short, make it easy for the customer to pick you !