Here are tips that can help your customer support team handle support tickets better during the Thanksgiving Shopping Weekend. https://blog.freshdesk.com/thanksgiving-shopping-weekend/

1. Are you prepared for
Thanksgiving?

2. This means a lot of sale orders pouring in but it can also mean a lot of unhappy
customers, a pile of support requests and frustrated agents. We looked at
customer support data from 472 retailers* for last year’s Thanksgiving.
*We analyzed an anonymized sample set of 472 Retail players in US/Canada to see how they fared
59%
of Americans will be
shopping online this
Thanksgiving weekend

3. Here are the key problems the
retailers faced and how some
of them solved it.

4. Support volumes skyrocketed after Thanksgiving
The number of queries raised with
support teams peaked on the day
after Cyber Monday, and resulted in
more customer support
requests than the daily
average, and stayed high for
the next two weeks.
Thanksgiving
Cybermonday
65%
Date
No.ofTickets

5. Time taken to help a customer increased massively
Average resolution time
Date
ResolutionTime
Time taken to solve a customer’s
problem increased by over
These delayed resolutions added to
the growing list of tickets for agents
to work on and caused poor
customer experience.
50%
Thanksgiving
week

6. Number of Unhappy Customers increased
Thanksgiving
week
Date
No.ofCustomers
Unhappy customers
Happy customers
Here is the real bad news. The
number of dissatisfied customers
increased by
during the two weeks following
Thanksgiving. This increased the
risk of losing repeat business.
43%
This graph only includes customer who filled the CSAT survey

7. The two weeks after Thanksgiving are just as important as the holiday
weekend. Make sure you are prepared for the increase in ticket volume as
well as unhappy customers.
Last year, some retailers stayed ahead of the pack and still managed to
make their customers happy by using Freshdesk
12%
quicker
resolution
23%
better CSAT
scores
Key takeaway

8. So, how did these Freshdesk
customers provide better
support?

9. Occasional Agents Canned Responses
Doubled the number of occasional agents.
More hands on board meant resolution
times were lower.
160% increase in Canned Response usage.
They saved time by using pre-written
responses.

10. Solution Articles Automation
At least 15 new articles tailored
specifically for the holiday customers
deflected incoming tickets.
Average of 4 new rules added to automate
repetitive tasks. This freed up agents to
talk to customers.

11. Integrations Reporting
Lesser time spent switching between tools
enabled 10-12% quicker resolution thanks
to Apps displaying data next to tickets.
Powerful reporting features enabled teams
to identify problem points quickly and
react to them faster.

12. Prepare for this Holiday season with