We are always looking for Support Specialists!

Started by jerm, March 29, 2008, 06:53:52 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

jerm

SMF has decided to take a new approach to support. We are going to implement a new system to thank the non-Team Members who've post helpful replies to others. There are a number of you who enjoy giving support but can only do it for a few months at a time. We understand that life gets busy and that sometimes SMF has to take the back burner :(

The SMF team knows all about working for free. A lot of us have been working on this project for years. We use our free time to help move this project forward. We also understand that you are putting in your free time as well to help this project out. I hope that this program will help us to have a better relationship with you.

Your contributions have been noticed even when nobody has mentioned it to you. In order to publicly thank those who have taken the time to help us out, we have created a new membergroup that will show a temporary badge. If the SMF Team feels that you have contributed a significant amount of helpful support, you will earn a badge which will only last about a month. We will only issue a few of these each month to those who have provided the most professional and knowledgeable support.  If you continue to provide support, you may be able to keep the badge for additional months :).

The second way we want to help you out is by giving you more tools to work with. The SMF team have a number of tools that we use to help provide support in a more timely fashion. New team members that come onto the team often wonder why these tools are not offered to them beforehand. Since we do not wish to clutter up everyones forum, we will be providing a portion of these tools to you by means of a membergroup. This membergroup will be a requestable membergroup; to request entry visit your profile (Profile > Group Membership > request membership for the "Community Support Helper" membergroup).
After joining this group you will see a few new tools on your screen. If there are any problems about this you can contact JimM at any time by sending a PM.

Thanks for your continued support and we look forward to working together more closely.

Thantos


TheWrath!


Darknico

Italian SMF - Supporto Italiano per la board SMF - Ci trovate tutti li!! :)


N3RVE

Ralph "[n3rve]" Otowo
Former Marketing Co-ordinator, Simple Machines.
ralph [at] simplemachines [dot] org                       
Quote"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known." - Carl Sagan

Darknico

Italian SMF - Supporto Italiano per la board SMF - Ci trovate tutti li!! :)


Panzer-

Thanks for this, i might get active here again and consider applying.

GravuTrad

On a toujours besoin d'un plus petit que soi! (Petit!Petit!)


Think about Search function before posting.
Pensez à la fonction Recherche avant de poster.


Kender

Quote from: Panzer- on April 01, 2008, 01:31:37 AM
Thanks for this, i might get active here again and consider applying.
I think it will get the average "sandbagger" out here to be more active helping people

Perks are always a good motivator

can we nominate employees for this?  :P
I have gotten a lot of help recently from many of the regular staff, and even some from the regular joes as well
http://chucknorris2012.com  Avoid a roundhouse kick to the head!  Sign the petition

Ol' Wombat

#10
Perhaps a bit more specific? - so how many good answers (postings) are required (per day or month) to be eligible for that badge?

Not that I am personally interested but give people an idea how much effort they have to put in.

kevinhannan

I support SMF's values to the point that I was/am happy to pay the $50 charter membership fee even though I knew SMF was going to release v2 imminently (as it was less than 1 month after my sign-up).

I recognise the value of the free help I get - and I openly acknowledge my successes are built upon the shoulders of that help.

That is why I am considering giving SMF a donation for every x paying members I get to my forum. At the moment, as I have my own costs 'x' is going to be about the 50th paying member and every 100 thereafter -up to a certain point as yet undetermined.

I'm happy for SMF to determine how they use any 'extra' cash as they know their business better than me. However, I would like to see additional premium tags being given to people who give reasonable donations after the original $50. (Like Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum charter member.) I would also like to see that those people who help in a very real sense are offered free hosting (or something, maybe purchase of a top-level domain) that they would appreciate. That way costs are manageable and predictable while having real value.

My other thought was that I would very much like to help, even within my limited abilities. It would make sense to farm out the simpler queries to people like me,leaving the more experienced guys to work on more challenging queries. This way I get to develop faster and everybody gets queries that are more relevant to them. However, I understand that administering this might be more than answering the query itself.

Many thanks, Guys, you know who you are, and so do the rest of us - your work is very much appreciated and wanted.

Regards
Kevin Hannan


GliG

I'm new Community Support Helper :)

I'll want on hiatus :)
Only Develop

青山 素子

Quote from: Ol' Wombat on April 03, 2008, 02:07:56 AM
Perhaps a bit more specific? - so how many good answers (postings) are required (per day or month) to be eligible for that badge?

AFAIK, there is no bottom number for eligibility. The simple requirements are good, consistent, help. If we had a post requirement, it would encourage people to post mediocre one-line things to try and get in the running.


Quote from: kevinhannan on April 03, 2008, 10:56:12 AM
However, I would like to see additional premium tags being given to people who give reasonable donations after the original $50. (Like Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum charter member.)

We are looking into ways to recognize larger donors and our sponsors. Keep tuned for that.
Motoko-chan
Director, Simple Machines

Note: Unless otherwise stated, my posts are not representative of any official position or opinion of Simple Machines.


metallica48423

Indeed.  We are looking to get people involved, to spread knowledge around, and generally just keep things new and exciting, you know?

Like Motoko-chan stated... theres no 'minimum'.  We simply are looking to involve the community more within itself :)
Justin O'Leary
Ex-Project Manager
Ex-Lead Support Specialist

QuoteMicrosoft wants us to "Imagine life without walls"...
I say, "If there are no walls, who needs Windows?"


Useful Links:
Online Manual!
How to Help us Help you
Search
Settings Repair Tool


kevinhannan

You can call on me for the more basic stuff and increase that as my skills develop...

Over to you.

Regards
Kevin Hannan

metallica48423

Perplexed:  its an old inside joke.

We'll tell you when you're older :P  *snickers*
Justin O'Leary
Ex-Project Manager
Ex-Lead Support Specialist

QuoteMicrosoft wants us to "Imagine life without walls"...
I say, "If there are no walls, who needs Windows?"


Useful Links:
Online Manual!
How to Help us Help you
Search
Settings Repair Tool

青山 素子

Quote from: metallica48423 on April 03, 2008, 03:56:33 PM
Perplexed:  its an old inside joke.

Not really all that inside, though. I thought I'd stick the badge in my sig for fun. The "Support Creep" title came from when a member got rather upset at me and called me a creep. That was back when I wore the green badge. You can find the post in question over here.
Motoko-chan
Director, Simple Machines

Note: Unless otherwise stated, my posts are not representative of any official position or opinion of Simple Machines.


Advertisement: