# How to scope a support experience
## 👋 Introduction
A support experience should be immediate, simple, and humane. It should feel like calling up a friend or an expert, and getting your solution in a minute.
A support experience typically has 4 parts:
1. `Discovery` of Support from various pages in the product
2. `Support centre` to guide users to resolution
3. `Self-serve` content like articles and FAQs
4. `High-touch` options that involve a support agent
***
## 1️⃣ Support phases
### 👀 Discovery
Getting this right will reinforce the user’s trust in your product. If Support is hard to access in a moment of frustration for the user, you risk losing the user.
| Entry point | Purpose | Guide |
| ------------- | -------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| App level | Make Help easy to access from anywhere on your app | |
| Feature level | Surface Help CTA in features where you anticipate issues | |
###
### ❓ Support centre
Support experiences should be designed to help users find their solution as quickly as possible. Finding the most relevant content should be straightforward and intuitive.
| Feature | Purpose | Guide |
| --------------- | ---------------------------------------- | ----------- |
| Search | For user’s with a specific query | Coming soon |
| Recent activity | Activity for which you anticipate issues | Coming soon |
| Categories | To drill down to the issue gradually | Coming soon |
####
### 📖 Self-serve
Use self-serve content for simple questions that your users might have—about using the product or understanding specific features.
| Feature | Purpose | Guide |
| -------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Articles | To explain how to use different features of the product | |
| FAQs | Specific questions and answers to troubleshoot common issues. These are typically crisp paragraphs and much shorter than articles. | Coming soon |
| Chatbot |
If possible, to deflect issues with articles and FAQs. Else if the user is not satisfied, to identify the type of issue before it is assigned to an agent.
| Coming soon |
####
### 🧑🏻💻 High-touch
If a query is operations related such as a payment issue or a delivery issue, it might require a person to draw on information from multiple systems.
| Feature | Purpose | Guide |
| ----------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | ----------- |
| Tickets | Asynchronous communication for cases that are less time sensitive, or would require longer to reach a resolution. | Coming soon |
| Live agents | To connect the user to a real person through a live chat. This option is the most costly and should be reserved for issues that have real-time implications. | Coming soon |
> ☝ **Guiding principle:** High-touch support is a cost centre (i.e. it does not directly add to profit but still costs the organisation money to operate). So it’s wise to resolve as many issues as possible with `self-serve` methods, and to be discerning about when `high-touch` methods are required.
***
## 2️⃣ Map
Align with your team on a map before you start designing.
1. Identify the features mentioned above that will solve issues on your product.
2. If you’re building Support from scratch, map the ideal flow through these features.
3. If you already have a flow, identify the steps that are forming bottlenecks. You will solve for these.
**Let’s zoom in to the `chatbot` feature:**
1. If the user gives poor feedback on an `FAQ`, they enter the `chatbot` flow.
2. The `chatbot` asks questions to identify the issue.
1. If the issue can be solved by an `FAQ` , the chatbot responds with the `FAQ` content in a message.
2. If the issue requires human intervention, the `chatbot` collects information from the user that will allow the human agent to hit the ground running.
1. If the issue is time-sensitive, it is routed to a `live agent` for immediate resolution.
2. Else, a `ticket` is raised for asynchronous resolution.
***
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