© 2008 RightNow Technologies, Inc.

Product/Category Best Practices

By JD Pahre

• Do I use Products or Categories or both?• How many top level and subs do I use?• Could a question overlap several categories? • Number of Answers per each prod or cat• “Other” and “General”• Naming convention and Weight of prods/cats in searching• Questions

Where we are headed today

Products or Categories or Both?• My Motto : Less is Best• Most people are confused already

• I am not good at making decisions• I am not super confident in my navigation abilities• I am not a risk taker• I do not spend all day on the internet• I am not comfortable with lots of choices• Just show me where to go• What did you say, I am confused already…

• We can all make 1 good decision…but 2 in a row? 3?• What about Categories that change as a result of the

product I select? Is this a good option?• I like some of my Categories..get rid of them?

How many should I use?

• Less is Best (Did you forget that already?)

• If you can get 15 or less Good

• If you can get 10 or less Great

• If you can get 6 or less on level 1 PERFECT!

• Then for Subs the same holds true

• I know what you are thinking…There is no way. I have way too many products to ever get that few.

How many?..... Continued

• Then….maybe you need to think higher up, think bigger, think more broadly

• Software• Hardware• Phone

• Remember, your customers are not as smart as you wish they were. Make it so simple and short, they cannot make a bad decision

• If you have 3 levels of subs, let them know they can only go 1 deep if they need to. (Message Bases change)

• http://explorica.custhelp.com• Examples:• http://nymcu.custhelp.com • http://ceridian.custhelp.com

Overlap into several Categories• Most common problem with Categories I see• Customer has an issue, it can be categorized into many

of the existing categories.• Examples:

• Errors• Troubleshooting• Installation and Upgrades• Connection issues• Technical Support• Customer Service• Support• Billing, Account, Bill Pay• Technical Issues

• Check incoming incidents for possible high level Topics• Use incoming Incidents to see if Prod/Cats are working• Check with colleagues, test around

Examples of Overlap

• http://telstramobile.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/telstramobile.cfg/php/enduser/std_alp.php

• http://avid.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/avid.cfg/php/enduser/std_alp.php?p_sid=EBKM3H*i

• Almost..got it• http://activision.custhelp.com• http://berettausa.custhelp.com

Good Examples

• http://hargray.custhelp.com

• http://uinet.custhelp.com

• http://toyota.custhelp.com

• http://olt.custhelp.com

• http://irobot.custhelp.com

Others and General• http://remington.custhelp.com • Above is about the only effective use I have seen

• Try to avoid these if at all possible• There may be a case when you need it-be careful• Why would you choose General or Other?• What problems does this cause?

• People always use it• Reporting is a mess• It loses it’s meaning• All answers have to be associated to one of these• It becomes your worst nightmare

How many Answers should I have?

• We recommend at least 1 Answer for every Prod/Cat combination. (this is the bare minimum)

• Your Keyword Searches Report will tell you the answer to this question.

• Your agents should be telling you the answer• The number of incidents you get should tell you

Name of Prod/Cat does matter

• The Prod and Cat names are included in the search• By default each word is worth 50 points!!

• This is equal to the keywords box• Higher than the summary• 20 more than the Question• 12 times higher than the Answer itself

• In many cases you may want to exclude the name of the Product or Category

• You may also want to reduce the score of 50 to the minimum of 4

• Smart Assistant also looks at this weighting

SRCH_PROD_WEIGHT

Best Practices Review

• 1 Menu• 6 items or less level 1• 1 Answer per Prod/Cat combination• Avoid Overlap• Avoid “General” “Others” if possible• Remember the weighting

• Exclude if needed• Change weighting if needed

• Check incoming incidents for Prod/Cat relevance