Carsonified

Hi Ryan,

Thanks for the useful post. I handle most of the support emails here at FreshBooks, so that tool will definitely come in handy. I typically reply with personal responses, but I can see how it would be useful when explaining procedures step-by-step.

Now, to find a window’s equivalent…

Thanks,

-Daniel

That’s great tool Ryan, thanks for the video review too, nice little spin on the standard review.

Daniel, if you’re doing a decent volume of support emails, I definitely recommend a dedicated help desk tool. We currently use Helpspot (and love it), and could never go back to regular email.

http://www.userscape.com/products/helpspot/

This sort of app is especially useful if more than one person is handling support, which is the case for Freshview.

BTW, why not just do a screencast w/ SnapzPro or something similar? A bit easier no?

Good point - might do that next time :)

I appreciate the tip, but it’s awfully old news. I’ve been using this trick since Thunder7 in the late 80s. And why the need to use the video bandwidth for a tip that could simply be “hey, if you type something a lot, it’s a good idea to assign a macro to it!” I mean, reinventing the wheel and then making a film about it is kinda dopey.

Very, very useful, but what about us unfortunate Windows users? :(

note: think I could save a load of time by ditching my annoying PC and switching back to Mac!

http://www.app4mac.com/rapidowrite.html

Does the same for free.

It would be nice to have an update on Amigo.

Hey Christian - what did you have in mind?

Ryan, The problem with these text replacement solutions is that you have to know your shortcut or have to type a similar response for it to replace, and if it replaces it with something you don’t want you have to delete it which takes more time than typing the response.

I’m surprised no one here has mentioned this service yet, but I recommend Sproutit Mailroom: http://www.sproutit.com/mailroom

Mailroom suggests customizable replies to all your incoming email. The more you use it, the smarter the suggestions become. Just hit reply and it knows the proper response. It also automatically assigns emails to the right people, based on your past actions.

Mailroom’s provides the history of your conversation with that person. It knows how many times they talked with you, furnishes you a photo of your correspondent, and links to your Basecamp projects that involve that user. It even links emails into a conversation like Google so emails are not isolated threads.

Its’ drop dead simple, nearly automates your replies and with the newly released version is lightning fast. See the preview here: http://www.sproutit.com/articles/bigact/2417

Thanks for the tip and thanks Matt for those links to windows versions. I’ll check those out.

Andy

b4 u shell out 30 bucks on TextExpander, have a look at the original text expander for Mac OS, first released in 1989 and still going strong 18 years on!
download a free 30-day trial copy here:
http://www.typeit4me.com
It’s $27 normally and only $14 for students/teachers.

For Windows, check out activewords.com

I’ve been using TextExpander (and TextPander before that) for the last couple of years for all my SlideShowPro support. I have about 30 snippets, or conversational fragments, that can be quickly mixed together to form a complete thought. It took a while, and a lot of trial and error, to get the collection just where I needed it. But now that it’s built I can quickly reply to support emails without sounding impersonal, or typing the same thing over and over and over. Worth every penny.

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