DIY Customer Service Keeps Customers Happy

Have you ever wasted an entire afternoon on the phone (or, most likely, on hold) with a customer service representative? If you're like me, one day wasted on customer service will make you swear to never buy a certain product from a particular business ever again.

Paul English, co-founder of Kayak.com, a travel Web site that lets users search efficiently for deals on flights and hotels all over the country, apparently feels the same way about customer service. To give his customers a shorter and sweeter experience on his site, English implemented a do-it-yourself online database that routes customer feedback directly to employees.

"We fix customer problems in real-time," English says in a recent CNN.com article. "Paying an engineer to do that for 20 minutes is cheaper than outsourcing the problem."

Read on to learn more about keeping your customers happy with a DIY customer service program.