You know the feeling: you’re on a chat with a customer, and trying to explain exactly where the “Add More” button is.

This is the second post in Rhoda’s Tips from a Farmer series. Read her first post on working smarter, not harder.

Saying no to a customer is one of the toughest parts of any sales or support job. Whether you’re telling someone that your product doesn’t have the feature they’re asking for, that their refund period has expired, or that they’re not eligible for a discount, you know you’re letting them down -- which can feel like the opposite of your goal.

At Olark, we deeply value inclusion and diversity. It has recently come to our attention that our motto “Make Business Human” is anthropocentric and excludes other sapient life forms.

This article is the third in our series on Customer Service trends in the United Kingdom. In part 1, our friends at Bynder explored the rise of self-serve business data. In part 2 we discussed the looming impact of Brexit on small businesses. Today we share what small businesses see when they look to the future of customer service in the U.K.

At Olark, we love the benefits of remote work, but we also know that working remotely isn’t for everyone. Transitioning from an onsite role to a remote role can be a big adjustment. Here are five questions to ask yourself if you’re thinking about taking the #remotelife plunge.

I recently had an "angsty" conversation with one of our customers whose customer support team being overwhelmed with chats. Lucky for this customer, there are two very easy (and one more advanced) solutions to this issue. And lucky for you, the reader, I'm going to share them here.

If you're considering live chat, or just getting it up and running on your site, this is a common concern: How do I keep from being overwhelmed by customer chats?

In summer 2017, the Olark team decided to focus our brand and product development on a new use case: live chat for sales.

Question: Help!  What should I do when I get an issue I can’t resolve in chat?

In addition to my role as Olark’s Director of Customer Service, I am a farmer — well, more of a smallholder, and a fledgling one at that. When I’m not in meetings or talking to customers, I can usually be found in a padded boiler suit, up to my ears in muck and surrounded by animals and vegetables.