Top 9 Slack Communities for Customer Service Reps
Slack is now a staple in the business world. And if you work for a tech-savvy company, you might already be using it for internal communication.
But your own co-workers aren’t the only people you can communicate with on the platform. Today, there are thousands of user-created communities on Slack, where like-minded people can get together to discuss a specific interest or topic. And customer service is no exception to this.
So if you’re looking for a new way to connect with other customer service representatives and learn from their experience, you’re in the right place. In this post, we’ll explain what Slack communities are and how to join them, followed by eight options to consider as a customer service professional.
What are Slack Communities?
The internet has made it possible for people to come together over virtually any shared interest. Groups on Facebook and LinkedIn, forums, subreddits, and even question-and-answer style sites like Quora are home to discussions about almost every topic you can imagine.
In many cases, these discussions are relatively brief, because users visit these sites with the goal of finding an answer to a single question or issue. And after they find the information they need, they might never return to that site again.
But Slack communities are different. While they’re still created around a specific topic, and designed to let users share their knowledge and insight, they’re intended to be much more conversational. And, as the name implies, they’re intended to foster communities of people with shared interests.
Members can connect with like-minded people, learn more about the topic at hand, and use their own experience to help others succeed. Plus, most communities also have channels solely for chatting about things completely unrelated to their core topic. This way, members can get to know each other through casual conversation, and have a place to share their thoughts throughout the day.
How can You Join Slack Communities?
Joining a Slack community requires an invite from the administrator. That’s why most communities have sign-up forms that prospective members can use to let administrators know that they’re interested in joining.
Most of these forms will ask for your name, email address, and a brief explanation of why you’re interested in joining. Depending on how active the administrator is, you may receive your invitation anytime within a few minutes to a few days. Then, once you accept, you can start engaging with other members immediately.
8 Slack Communities for Customer Service Professionals
Ready to start using Slack to connect with other customer service professionals? Here are eight communities to help you get started.
1. Support Driven
Support Driven is a community of over 3500 support professionals, making it one of the largest public Slack communities in existence.
Members of this community are encouraged to ask questions related to support and share their expertise with other members. They’re also welcome to use the space to discuss difficult interactions and learn how to approach them more effectively.
Beyond the knowledge-focused part of this community, Support Driven is also a great place to engage with other support professionals, many of whom are well-known within the industry. Finally, it’s a useful resource for staying up-to-date on customer experience trends and making sure that your team is equipped to adapt.
2. Buffer
The Buffer Community is another large Slack community, with over 4,000 members working in all areas of digital marketing.
If you’re unfamiliar with Buffer, the company is well-known for its focus on great customer success. So although their primary product is a browser extension for social media marketing, it’s no surprise that their Slack community often involves conversations around customer support.
The community also has channels for discussing trends, asking for advice, offering resources, and sharing resources. Plus, their moderators run regularly scheduled discussions, like weekly goal setting and challenges, making the community a very active one.
And as Alfred Lua, the company’s Community Champion, explains, “Slack is a great platform for communities who want to build close relationships among members. With conversations taking place in real-time and having a casual environment to chat, a Slack community allows members to get to know one another on a much deeper level.”
As a result, Buffer’s Slack community members are encouraged to be social — and can even get paired up for conversations in the #meet-someone-new channel.
3. Customer Retention and Happiness Slack
The Customer Retention and Happiness Slack community describes itself as a “community of people who want to retain our users, and talk about product changes, marketing techniques, and anecdotes that have led to customer retention and happiness.”
This makes it an excellent resource for customer support teams looking to improve their retention rates, or take a more proactive approach to keeping their customers happy. Members can discuss strategies for handling customer issues, learn from other members’ experiences, and even get advice from customer service and product experts.
As a relatively new community, Customer Retention and Happiness is still growing, and has fewer members than the previous two communities on our list. This means that you still have a chance to get in early, before it grows to the membership levels of Support Driven or Buffer. So if you’re looking to establish yourself as a core member of a community, this could be a great option.
4. CS Heroes
CS Heroes is a Slack community for all customer support professionals.
Members can share tips, stories, and advice related to customer support, and learn from one another’s experiences. So if you’re looking for a community with a straightforward focus, this could be the one.
5. #smallbiz
As the name implies, #smallbiz is a Slack community for small business owners and employees.
And while it’s not expressly focused on support, it can be a great resource for customer service professionals working in small business environments. After all, customer service is an essential part of every business — and most small business owners know the challenges involved in getting a support strategy up and running.
As a result, this can be a helpful resource for learning from other relatively small support teams, and figuring out how to work more efficiently.
6. Workfrom
Workfrom is a Slack community for employees who work outside of traditional offices.
This makes it the perfect option for any customer service professional who works remotely, either full-time or as part of a flexible schedule.
As a self-described “modern-day water cooler,” the community is designed to replicate the office experience for remote workers. Members greet each other in the mornings, connect with like-minded people, and share tips for staying productive outside of a traditional office.
Plus, members can find recommendations for workspaces in their area when they’re tired of working from home.
7. SaaS Community
As the name implies, SaaS Community is a Slack community designed for SaaS founders and professionals.
Its 800+ members span SaaS companies all over the world, including some from top names in the SaaS industry.
The community is designed to be a place where members can share knowledge, ideas, and best practices on virtually everything related to running a successful SaaS company — and customer service is no exception.
So if you’re a SaaS support professional, this could be an excellent place to learn from others working in similar roles. And even if your company operates in a different industry, it can still be a helpful resource for tips and advice related to customer service.
8. Hack Productivity
Hack Productivity is productivity-focused Slack community made up of people from all different industries and job roles.
But considering that productivity is an important element for success in any job function, this is a community that anyone can benefit from. So if you’re looking for ways to work more efficiently and better manage your time, Hack Productivity is certainly worth checking out.
9. CX Accelerator
The CX Accelerator Slack community, in their own words, is a place for those who are ready to put their CX career in high-gear. So, if you’re looking to advance your career in the customer service space, then this might be the perfect community for you.
The folks at the community discuss and lead education programs for beginners or aspiring veterans in customer support. They also aim to discover and create coursework at the secondary education level. Additionally, the community conducts weekly challenges, offers a peer mentorship program, provides curated CX resources, and more.
This community is also one of the first few to have an exclusive channel dedicated to #womeninCX.
Conclusion
Slack communities can be an excellent resource for any customer service professional. You can use them to learn from other people’s experiences, share your own insight, and get new ideas for assisting customers.
Plus, depending on the communities you join, you can also find insight on growing your business, working remotely, and even boosting your productivity. Freshdesk-Slack Integration helps with enabling frictionless cross-team communication.
And regardless of the topics, these communities are built around, they’re all designed to drive conversations and interaction — making them a great pick-me-up for breaks and downtime on the job.
