Bobcares.com provides outsourced hosting support to web hosting companies. Many customers come to us asking for Tier 1 or Level 1 or L1 hosting support, but the definition of “L1 support” varies from person to person.

Today, we’ll look at what L1 support is, and what you should look for when hiring a support team.

What is L1 support?

Level 1 tech support is the group of customer care professionals who initially responds to support requests, collects detailed information regarding the issue, and resolves it based on established support database. L1 support assigns priority of support based on urgency. For eg. a server down issue assumed higher priority.

If the L1 support is unable to resolve and issue, it is escalated to L2 support who goes through log files, and implements advanced solutions to resolve the issue. In case L2 support also fails at it, the issue is escalated to L3 support group who has a deep understanding of applications, operating systems, and more. This group could even apply code changes to fix an issue.

100% Bobcares techs are L1 + L2 + L3 qualified

At Bobcares, 100% of our help desk support team is formed of Computer Science engineers who routinely fix L1, L2 and L3 issues. There are no different levels.

It helps us deliver better service. Here’s how:

• Faster resolution : Customers who face complex issues do not have to wait longer to get the issue escalated and looked at.
• High accuracy in fixes : When following a template, L1 techs could wrongly diagnose an issue. Experts won’t make that mistake.
• Prevent recurring issues : When server experts see many tickets of the same kind (eg. virus in mails), they implement a permanent fix in the server, preventing more complaints. L1 techs would just call it a bad day.
• No canned responses : Experts quickly identify exactly what’s going on with a customer’s issue. So, they don’t have to rely on a template to endlessly talk about possibilities. The replies would be concise and personalized.

See how we help web hosting companies

What are the qualities of a good support team?

We started supporting web hosting companies in 2001. Our objective always was to deliver a level of support that delights the customer, not just make them happy.

Over the past 15+ years, we’ve identified 3 important qualities that consistently delivers delighted customers. Let’s take a look at those:

1. Technical expertise with a human touch

Technology is often intimidating to non-technical people. It is easy to read out complex technical jargon from a manual to a customer when a support request is received. But, it takes an expert to explain in plain English what went wrong and what has been done to fix it.

So, before you sign-up, ask for sample tickets the support team has resolved. Look for the following:

• Did they use simple English to convey the resolution?
• Did they provide pro-active suggestions to prevent such issues in the future?
• Did they identify possible other issues in the account and help them prevent it? (Eg. “I saw your backup isn’t running. Click on X in your account to fix that.”)

2. Empathy and patience

Customers remember a support interaction based on how it made them feel. Eg. Did it make them angry? happy? relived? delighted?

So, the job of a support engineer is to understand the state of mind of the customer, and channel the interaction in such a way that the customer leaves happy.

Many customers come in angry, frustrated or confused about a technical problem. At this point, it’s important to understand the emotional state of the customer, deflate the tension, and patiently interact with the customer until the issue is fully resolved.

When you look at sample tickets done by the support team, look for the following:

• Did they display empathy? (eg. “Yes, I know how frustrating it is to not get email”)
• Did they show commitment? (eg. “I’m right here to answer any questions you have, while I resolve this issue.”)
• Did they walk the customer through the solution?
• Did they look for confirmation that the issue is resolved before closing the issue?

[ You don’t have to lose your sleep to keep your customers happy. Our friendly Hosting Support Specialists are online 24/7/365 to help your customers. ]

3. Friendliness and positive attitude

When things don’t work, it is natural for tempers to fray. With no information on why a service is down, customers often assume the worst, and think that their business is going to be severely hit.

A good support engineer keeps their cool under pressure, and becomes a calming presence in the support interaction. A show of confidence, and use of positive language tells the customers that the team is actually on top of the issue, and will get their issues resolved fast.

For eg., when a service is down, a response like “Yes, it is down. We are working on it.”, does not instill confidence in customers. In contrast, a response like, “Hi Mike, Yes, the mail server had a small data corruption. It’s fixed now, and it’ll be online in 5 minutes.

Thanks for your patience. I’m here if you need anything else.” will immediately restore customer’s faith in the services.

A host of other factors like communication skills, time management skills, innovation, etc. play a role in forming the perfect support team. However, if them team you’re considering has the above three qualities, you have the necessary ingredients to deliver world-class hosting support.

While you’re here, why don’t you take a couple of minutes and check out how our Outsourced Hosting Support team helps web hosts grow?