What would happen if you had more than one Customer Support Representative working to resolve help desk issues? How would CSR-A know that CSR-B has already resolved this particular customer's issue? By having them share the same email account to receive and respond to issues? Certainly not.
How would you keep them from working on the same issue at the same time and therefore duplicate the effort? What if CSR-A solved an issue virtually identical to a support ticket from a different customer CSR-B is currently working on? How would CSR-B know this issue's already been resolved, so he could use this information to resolve his issue? Again, a fully functional support/help desk is the obvious answer.
There are plenty of help desk server side software scripts on the market. They range from free to far more than you may need or want to spend for your businesses support needs! Some work, and unfortunately some don't work so well. I know of some membership site scripts have a built in help desk system, but unfortunately these are usually the more expensive membership scripts and their built in help desk modules fall short on the features compared to a good CRM or Help Desk software.
The bottom line here is with all of the feature rich and robust support desk and CRM systems that are available online for FREE, there really is no excuse for any business, online or off line, regardless of how small, not to at least be using a support desk to provide fast and efficient customer support and service.
Customer support, no matter what your company provides is critical to customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction when combined with relationship building creates customer loyalty. The higher percentage of customer loyalty your business has, the more repeat business you'll get. Don't ever forget customer satisfaction alone will not sustain your business for the long term. It's customer loyalty that is THE crucial factor for the long term success of any business enterprise.
