Communication Best Practices

We believe that great communication is the cornerstone of great operations. This comprehensive guide will help ensure that you're getting the absolute most out of your team here at ShipCalm.

Who should I work with?

Dedicated Head of Operations

Every customer at ShipCalm has a dedicated Head of Ops. These team members work with you to get the most out of your account. They are similar to an account manager but mainly focus on project-based needs and other strategic activities that are outside of daily inbound & outbound activities. Your Head of Ops can also be a great resource when you need to escalate issues. If you're unsure who the Head of Ops is for your account you can always send an email to support@shipcalm.com and we'll be sure to connect you.

Dedicated Account Executive

Along with your head of operations and your support team, you also have a dedicated Account Executive at ShipCalm. This is the person you likely worked with when during the sales/contracting process. Our account executives are focused on the growth of your business and making sure that your contract, terms, and pricing are all in alignment.

Daily Support Teams

While the Head of Ops is great for strategic items they are often working at a slower pace consulting with customers or debugging challenges. For day-to-day tactical requests, we have real-time support teams for each of the different lanes that we operate. You can always reach out to our general support, but if you'd like faster response times you can immediately route the inquiry to the correct team from the beginning.

How should I reach out to people?

Sometimes it can be hard to know how the best communication strategy or which channel to communicate over.  The good news is that ShipCalm is accessible on a multitude of different platforms that make it easy for you to communicate the way that you like to communicate.

Slack

One of our preferred methods of communication is Slack.  If you're not familiar with Slack, we promise you'll love it.  Our preferred method of communicating over slack is via Slack Connect where we connect ShipCalm's Slack workspace with your workspace.  However, if you need to be added as a guest in our Slack instance we're open to that as well.

What does Slack work well for:

• Order administration & quick updates
• Scheduling calls and meetings
• Asking for quick help or support to understand how something works
• Urgent modifications or critical situations

What does Slack NOT work well for:

• Trying to communicate about issues where two parties are not in agreement over slack.  When this happens we recommend picking up the phone or getting on a video call.
• Complex topics that require consulting, multiple teams or thoughtful implementation.  When this happens we recommend scheduling a call with you Head of Ops or communicating over email.  Examples of this include:
  • Implementing new SOPs
  • Enabling new platforms like returns management or drop-shipping
  • Project management of large open-ended projects that require multiple status checks.

Often time if our team identifies a topic as needed more follow up from potentially multiple team members they will create a QuickCalm™ ticket to support that request.

Email

Email is a great tool and is a default for any number of activities.  Sending an email ensures that you get closure on an item.  If an email to one of the teams outlined above can't immediately be resolved with our first response it ALWAYS becomes a QuickCalm™ ticket and will end up in your support portal defined below.  There is never an issue cc'ing your Head of Ops on emails to the teams above, but you certainly don't need to include them on emails to get a resolution.

What NOT to expect with email

• We ask that you refrain from just sending bulk emails to any email address you might have as this can drastically slow down response times because different team members believe the other team member is accountable.
• Expect a same-day turnaround from any direct emails that are sent to team members directly and not to a support team.  Often our Head of Ops and other key team members will be in back-to-back meetings our out of the office leaving you frustrated that they're not getting back to you.

Phone Calls & Scheduled Video Calls

We believe that this is one of the most effective mediums to address complex issues or deal with challenges when there is a difference of opinion.  Please never hesitate to make a real-time call to our main phone line or a phone number in the signature field of our team members.  You should always be able to get ahold of a human on our main phone line, however calling a team member might result in going to their voicemail and it may take that team member 24 hours or more to get back to you.  If this is a critical pace issue ALWAY use the support team and the primary phone number of (760) 283-7307

Communication SLAs

Depending on the ShipCalm platform that you are subscribed to there are different response time expectations.  Keep in mind that all of these are simply response times for communication and not resolution times for the issue that you're working on.

QuickCalm™ - Support Ticketing System

ShipCalm has a ticketing system that is used to keep track of all our open support tickets and ensure that they get fully resolved. Not every inquiry to our support team results in a ticket being created, but when there isn't an immediate response or the request is more of a project, our team will create a ticket to make sure it's routed to the correct team so that progress can be tracked.

At any point, you can view your open support tickets by going to https://tickets.shipcalm.com/

Nobody is getting back to me... what do I do?

If you can't get a response from a specific support team, then it's great to escalate it to our general support for visibility or to call (760) 283-7307.

Next, it's time to reach out to your Head of Ops so that they can help resolve the communication issues.

Now you're starting to get frustrated because even that isn't working. It's time to contact your Account Executive to voice your frustration.

One thing that makes ShipCalm unique is that it was founded by entrepreneurs who truly understand the stress and pressure of being a business owner in a business-critical situation and feeling stuck talking to the wrong people. With that in mind we believe that every customer should be able to have direct access to our CEO when nothing else is working and you're at a boiling point. With that in mind, here is our CEOs email and cell phone number.

Greg Moser, CEO

Email: greg@shipcalm.com

Cell Phone: (760) 518-5314