Service Cloud
Cases
The main module of Service Cloud is cases: the place where the customer’s issues are captured and handled. Each case has an automatically generated case number, which starts with "ticket#" followed by the date-time. An example case number is: ticket#20191025094353420 (the date can be read as: 2019-10-25 09:43:53:420).
The case subject is used in list throughout the application, so it needs to be short and clear.
On the left, the block "Case Description" contains the status, category, a long description, the priority, related product and, if closed, the solition and close date. On the right, the block "Case Details" contain data about who owns the case, the source and the total time and cost. At the bottom, there are areas for related attachments and the knowledge base, which allows you to quickly find related knowledge base items.
At the center of the page is the "Updates" block. Each update on the case is added to this list, giving a clear overview of each action related to the case. Actions such as calls or emails can be inserted by clicking on the "Add update to this case" button, while the status change updates are recorded automatically upon changing the status of the case.
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A call/email from a client comes in. The client as an issue.
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The service agent checks the account of the client and sees in the entitlements if the client is entitled to support
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If the client is entitled to support, a new case is created, directly from the account page.
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The sales agent inserts the subject, description and priority, and optionally selects the category (which is "Problem" by default), related product and contact. Other fields, such as the case number and status, are inserted automatically.
The case owner is, by default, the person that creates the case.
If this needs to be someone else, the case creator can simple select the correct agent there.
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After that, the agent that has the case assigned can work on the case, contact the client, insert updates, etc.
Accounts
In Service Cloud accounts give a 360 degree overview of companies you are doing business with. It shows the following related data:
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Cases
A list of all cases related to the account, ordered by creation date
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Entitlements
The list of entitlements to products / services, ordered by end date
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Contacts
All contacts related to the account
The most important action in an account is creating cases. This can be done easily with the "add new record” button on top of the cases list.
Contacts
This page gives a 360 degree overview of a single contact. It shows contact data, related cases and all emails sent.
Contact data
Each account can have one or multiple contacts. They are identified by name and email, which is found under "Personal Data". Other optional personal fields include title, phone number and social media profiles. The Twitter field automatically populates the Twitter feed on the right.
The "Contact Address" block contains the account name and address, and the "Other Information" shows the contact owner (an agent), Do Not Call and Email Opt Out values and an optional long description. The sales agent has to check if an contact has opted out for calls and emails before contacting.
Related cases
The "Cases related to this Contact" block shows all cases where the contact is selected in the "Case Details" block. The list shows a summary of each case (case number, status, priority, subject, time, cost and creation date) and it’s ordered by date. The list is searchable and filterable, and allows adding new case records.
When using the "+Add new record" button to create a new case for this contact, the contact field in the "Case Details" block is automatically populated.
Entitlements
Entitlements are types of customer support, such as “Phone support” or “Email support”. You can set up entitlements in Service Cloud to help support agents determine whether a customer is eligible for support or not.
Entitlements are always related to an account and a product, and they normally have a start and end date. For example: company Green Global has acquired a software license and this entitles them to receive phone support for one year.
To facilitate the use of this module, multiple values are inserted automatically, thanks to the option of selecting an entitlement template for a product.
Products
In Service Cloud you can link a case to a product. This enables you to have a complete overview of how much service is provided for a certain product or product family. A product can be a physical product or a service.
Default fields in this module are the product code, name, category and description. You can set the entitlement template, allowing you to easily set entitlements for clients. Optionally, you can set a product photo and attach files (such as manuals).
Total time and cost
An important block is "Cases Totals". Here are calculated values that show how much support have been given to the product. The first value is time: how many hours. The second value is cost: how much money. This allows you to easily detect products that are requiring to much support, and you can act on it accordingly.
Entitlements related to the product
The "Entitlements for this product" block shows all customers that are entitled to support for this product. More info about entitlements can be found in the "Entitlements" and "Entitlement templates" chapters.
Entitlement templates
A product or service normally comes with a entitlement to support. For example, a software license may allow the client to contact you by phone when they have issues or questions. Or, when you sell hardware, you may need to offer a period of guarantee, allowing the client to contact you when the product breaks within that period.
For most products and services the entitlements will be the same, so that’s why Service Cloud offers a templates module. After creating an entitlement template, you can select it in a product. Then, when a customer acquires that product, the template will be used to prefill data such at type of entitlement and end date.
Knowledge base (KB)
To solve cases faster agents have access to a Knowledge Base (KB), either directly from within a case record, or in the Knowledge Base module.
Each KB item has an autogenerated ID, type (Solution, FAQ, Tutorial, General), title, content at category. Optionally, it can be linked to a certain product, and have files attached.
To help maintaining the quality of the KB items, Service Cloud offer the possibility to mark items as "New", "Pending Review", "Accepted", "Obsolete" or "Duplicate".
Cases with this KB Item as Solution
In a solved case you an set which KB item was used as solution (if this was the case). This gives insights in what type of KB items are most used to solve cases, and which ones are not. It also allows other service agents to easier find the correct KB item for cases they are working on, looking at previously solved similar cases.
Departments
Companies have different departments and different departments have different costs. One hour support by the service department is simply not the same as one hour support by R&D. To manage this, Service Cloud has a department module, where you can set the hourly price.
The hourly price is applied to a case update, and the total price of the case is calculated on the sum of case updates. This allows multiple departments to be involved in a single case.
When you enter the page with the lists of departments, you are presented with an overview of all total time spent and total costs, with additional charts on the right. This allows you to quickly detect what department has the heaviest load, and which department has the most impact with regard to costs.
Entering a department record you can see, and edit, the department name, the price per hour and the list of employees. Employees are users in Corteza. Other fields, such as total time and total cost, are calculated automatically.
Case updates related to the department
On the bottom is a list of case updates related to the department. It gives a good overview af all work done. The list is ordered by date, and you can order and filter to see for example the updates that took most time or costed the most. You can enter the case update by clicking on the row, or you can enter the case directly by clicking on the case title at the beginning.
Note: if you change the hourly cost of an department all new case updates will use that hourly rate. Previously created case updates won’t de recalculated, unless they are edited.
Dashboards
Dashboards in Service Cloud give a good overview of the current status of your cases in one glimpse.
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New cases per month
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Number of active entitlements
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Knowledge base articles per type
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Closed cases per month
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Average time spent per case (in hours)
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Total time spent per month (in hours)
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Total cost per case category (in $)
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Total cost per month (in $)
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Case updates per type
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Total time spent per category (in hours)
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Cases by status
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Total time spent per account (in hours)
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Total costs per account (in $)
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Time spent per product family (in hours)
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Total costs per product family (in $)
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Total time spent per department (in hours)
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Total cost per department (in $)
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KB articles created per day
Service Cloud is configurable, allowing you to create new charts and new dashboards.
Settings
In the settings page you can set multiple values that are used within Service Cloud as default values. You will need to enter this page when you have just installed Corteza and wish to use Service Cloud.
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Next number for a KB item
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Default cost per hour
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Default department for new ticket
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Default time for a case update
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Default support channel id
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Default case link
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Default case email template
Steps to follow just installed Corteza Service Cloud
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When you start using Service Cloud, you first need to enter the "Settings" module.
This is done by selecting the Settings item in the main menu.
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By default there is one line , and you need to click on the "Edit the record" button on the right.
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Select the default department
This is used in cases
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Optional: insert a support channel id.
In this channel case updates will be inserted. .. Go to Messaging .. If you don’t have a channel yet where you want to show Service Cloud updates, create the channel with the (+) button. .. Get the id of the channel.
+ This can be done by hovering with the mouse over the channel name in the list of channels.
+ For example: 117587018585788420
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Insert the default case link.
This will allow clickable links to cases from emails and messages in the channel.
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To find the link, go to the admin panel.
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Select “Pages”
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Copy the link under the “view” icon of the page: Record page for module “Case”. Normally the view icon opens the page, but we are interested in retrieving the exact location.
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The record page of a case is opened.
It will look like: https://LINK-TO-YOUR-INSTANCE/compose/ns/service-cloud/pages/117582846914252804/record/117585622083883012
You will need to copy "https://LINK-TO-YOUR-INSTANCE/compose/ns/service-cloud/pages/117582846914252804/record" (so, everything except the last "/" and number), and paste it in the Default case link field.
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And, the last step is to select the default case email template.
Other values are inserted with default values, and you can change them if you like.
Email templates
Contacts of cases can be emailed directly from the Service Cloud. Each outgoing email is recorded in the case update list. To make sending out emails easier, Service Cloud allows you to create email templates with placeholders.
Each email template has a name and description. They are for internal use. The subject and the body fields are what’s being sent to the contact.
The subject of an email template is a string. The body is a rich text area. The content can be multiple lines, and it allows basic styling, adding links and adding images.
Placeholders
In both the subject and body you can use placeholders. This allows you to easily personalise emails. The following placeholders can be used:
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{{Case.Number}} -
{{Case.Subject}} -
{{Case.Status}} -
{{Case.ContactName}} -
{{Case.ContactTitle}} -
{{Case.ContactEmail}} -
{{Case.ContactPhone}} -
{{Case.Escalated}} -
{{Case.Category}} -
{{Case.CloseDate}} -
{{Case.Priority}} -
{{Case.Description}} -
{{Case.TotalTime}} -
{{Case.TotalCost}}
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{{FirstName}} -
{{LastName}} -
{{Title}} -
{{Phone}} -
{{Email}} -
{{Twitter}} -
{{Facebook}} -
{{LinkedIn}} -
{{MailingStreet}} -
{{MailingCity}} -
{{MailingState}} -
{{MailingPostalCode}} -
{{MailingCountry}} -
{{DoNotCall}} -
{{HasOptedOutOfEmail}}