3 years of customer service and key account support: a retrospective 

In three years, fruggr has grown exponentially: alongside its development and the multiplication of projects, it's also its customer service that has today reached a satisfaction rate of almost 100% ! With Anne Bertolani, Head of Support, and Ronan Robe, co-founder and CPO of fruggr, we explore the key stages in this transformation. How has customer service evolved along with the product? What lessons have they learned over the past three years? And what are the challenges ahead? Answer through these two players in fruggr's customer service and in the accompaniment of key accounts in their move towards a more sober and inclusive digital world. 

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Could you look back for us on  the last 3 years of customer service at fruggr ?

Ronan Robe: Right from the launch of our software publishing project, customer satisfaction has always been a priority. Our service culture was originally more focused on projects than on the product itself. Initially, our consulting team was responsible for customer follow-up and satisfaction. This activity has since expanded to focus more on Responsible Digital Expertise. 

During our first few months, fruggr's customer service was more focused on software maintenance. Customer requests for evolution were integrated into the product, but without the reflexes of structuring, documenting and tracing requests precisely.  

With the growing number of customers, customer service was industrialized in 2022: it was structured with the arrival of Damien Lecan, our Engineering Manager, and then accelerated with the arrival of Anne. 

"Each customer needs to have a dedicated contact who will support them in using fruggr and ensure that the product meets their needs." Ronan Robe, co-founder and COO of fruggr

Anne Bertolani: When I arrived, the first challenge was to choose a tool to industrialize the traceability process for customer requests, and to manage and respect our SLAs. We deployed Zendesk to ensure better tracking of our customers' requests, and to set up a document base accessible to them, with the constant aim of enabling them to use the tool autonomously. We have also industrialized our ability to communicate directly with our customers on new product features. This represented a real leap forward. 

Ronan Robe: In 2023, Anne also became the figurehead of our CSM business, and we aim to develop this dimension further in 2024. Each customer must have a dedicated contact person who supports them in using fruggr and ensures that the product meets their needs. Difficulties are dealt with, needs are formulated and passed on to the product teams.  

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What have been the main challenges and successes over the years, alongside the development of fruggr?  

Ronan Robe: Our initial strategy was to address the very large accounts market, which implied high expectations in terms of functionality, security and compliance with current regulations, notably RGPD. At the time, however, we were a young company with limited resources. Customer service was initially handled by our teams of developers, which presented a real challenge in meeting these customers' requirements. 

"We had to provide reassurance to our customer while advancing our product to meet this new challenge. This marked our first move to scale, with the successful deployment on a very large account." - Ronan Robe, co-founder and COO of fruggr

As a start-up, we had to adapt to serve these key accounts. A major turning point came when L'Oréal joined our customer portfolio. Unlike our previous customers, L'Oréal managed a very large number of web platforms with a considerable volume of data (pages, audiences, assets...). We had to provide reassurance to our customer, while at the same time advancing our product to meet this new challenge. This marked our first move to scale, with the successful deployment on a very large account. 

Anne Bertolani: Today, we're facing a new phase with a significant increase in the number of customers. It has become imperative to scale up our processes to meet the diverse needs and different types of requests from our customers. To sustain our customer relationships, our new CSM division is essential for offering more in-depth follow-up and anticipating our customers' needs.   

What factors contributed to a customer satisfaction rate approaching 100%?  

Ronan Robe: I think the main reason is that our teams have maintained a very strong commitment to customer satisfaction. It's an integral part of our corporate culture: for us, it's crucial to our long-term future.  

Anne Bertaloni: We really understand the role of customer satisfaction as a growth driver for our product. A satisfied customer becomes an ambassador for our solution, so it's essential to maintain an excellent image in this sense. Thanks to our tools, we're able to meet our commitments and SLAs, and we're committed to finding workarounds even when we don't have an immediate solution to a given problem.  

"We really understand the role of customer satisfaction as a growth lever to evolve our product." - Anne Bertolani, CSM at fruggr

Ronan Robe: Being close to our customers is an essential part of our approach. We value a human relationship based on mutual trust, which is often rare for a software publisher. We adapt by providing high-quality support and advice, which is one of our great strengths compared to other players in the sector. The challenge for the future is to maintain this proximity as the number of customers grows. 

How did we meet customers' needs despite the complexity, for some, of their IT services when fruggr was plugged in and played?  

 
Anne Bertaloni: For all our customers, constant adaptation was essential, given the complexity of their information systems. The frequent presence of anti-bot devices posed a major challenge, as they prevented fruggr from connecting to these systems. Solving this technical problem and ensuring smooth operation was a real challenge. Today, customers like Ouest France have successfully integrated fruggr without requiring our direct intervention.  

"Each new customer brings its own set of challenges due to the specifics of their digital ecosystem, and we strive to find the best solutions for each situation." - Anne Bertolani CSM at fruggr

Another concrete example of this adaptive approach is the Functional Unit, which enables customers to debug and simplify their own tasks. We strive to provide a debugging mode so that our customers can quickly gain autonomy. Each new customer brings its own set of challenges due to the specificities of their digital ecosystem, and we strive to find the best solutions for each situation.   

What are the main objectives we've set ourselves to ensure that we remain at the top of the customer service league in the future? 

Anne Bertolani: There's still a lot of work to be done on the documentation base and e-learning content to help our customers get to grips with and understand our tool. In particular, we're working to improve the transparency of our footprint calculation methodology, as our product is extremely rich in functionalities, but the documentation is not always as rich.  

"In particular, we are working to improve the transparency of our footprint calculation methodology" - Anne Bertolani, CSM at fruggr

Ronan Robe: E-learning plays an essential role as a support pillar, because it enables customers to familiarize themselves with our tool right from the start of the project. We recognize that we haven't yet reached maturity, but we already have what it takes to satisfy even more customers tomorrow. fruggr's strength lies in the fact that, as far as I know, we are the only company with such a well-developed customer service department. We continue to explore, to respond to needs as they arise, and we look forward to further growth, particularly in our CSM division.