PRESS RELEASE

 

August 2nd, 2002				Contact: Maureeen Richey
				Phone: 510-543-3420

 

AskAnything Technologies Shows PcCrafter.com That Even Small E-Businesses Can Benefit From Customer Support Software

 

 

San Francisco, CA, August 2nd, 2002- Up until three months ago, Jason Brinkerhoff and his staff at PcCrafter, a highly trafficked arts-and-crafts website, were inundated with customer questions by both email and phone. His customer support reps were overwhelmed with the volume of questions, most of them having been asked more than once.

 

All of these questions come from the 100’s of arts-and-crafts enthusiasts that come to PcCrafter’s website on a daily basis. The company sells a wide variety of products, including digital images and programs for designing computer graphics. Like so many other small e-businesses, PcCrafter benefits from exposure through the World-Wide Web, but struggles to keep up with the volume and repetitive nature of questions from site visitors. Most questions involve trouble-shooting computer problems—customers often email when they are having trouble installing PcCrafter programs, or when they have trouble opening digital images they have downloaded. PcCrafter's customer support reps found themselves sending out emails with the same instructions over and over again. The company knew there had to be a more efficient method, but they weren't willing to sacrifice the level of support to which their customers had become accustomed.

 

Three months ago, the company began using customer support software from AskAnything Technologies. The software works as an integrated part of PcCrafter's website, enabling site visitors to easily and automatically search for frequently-asked-questions (FAQs) of interest to them, while still allowing them to contact PcCrafter if they wish. The software's key feature is its ability to automatically add individual questions and answers from emails to an online database, where they can be viewed by all customers later on. The more questions customers ask and the more answers support reps like Brinkerhoff’s staff provide, the larger the database becomes. The net result is that PcCrafter fields fewer repetitive questions, and customers have access to support at anytime.

 

AskAnything's software was designed to be customizable and to seamlessly integrate with existing websites. PcCrafter has put their own graphics and links into AskAnything's software so that the support pages match the theme of the entire site. Thus, the only noticeable change in PcCrafter's website is the added functionality provided by AskAnything.

 

AskAnything Technologies says that PcCrafter's successful experience demonstrates what the software can do for all small e-businesses. According to Brinkerhoff, since implementing the software, PcCrafter has already reduced its email load by 30 percent. This gives employers like Brinkerhoff more time and money to work on other aspects of PcCrafter's operation.

 

 

 

-END-