Question by Paul: What’s the best option for customer service for small online shop?
I am building an e-commerce site and I have most aspects set. But a big problem is customer service. I have a day job and can’t take calls regarding my own business at work. What service or solution can I use to address this. I need customer service and order taking but really only need one person since it will be slow at first.

I thought maybe a virtual assistant or indian call center. But those are expensive.

Any suggestions? Thank you.

Best answer:

Answer by Gravy
If your schedule is reliable, then you could have inquiries made via e-mail with a promise that someone will get back to them within a few hours to answer questions or confirm an order. With a small online shop, visitors obviously prefer but aren’t actually expecting a number to call for assistance and e-mail is sufficient. Putting an app on the site that lets them fill in a form is even better, because they don’t feel like their communication has disappeared into the ether.

Depending on the nature of your business, you might not find a virtual assistant very helpful beyond taking messages — customer queries typically fall on technical problems with the site or fit and colour if it’s clothing, etc. I’m not sure what the capabilities are of a V.A. service, but they could end up a little lost if the questions asked require a certain intimacy with your product.

Until you’ve been live for a few weeks or months and you know what kind of service queries are coming in, you can probably handle your own customer service with a Blackberry or just regular access to a computer.

Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!