We have three part time employees and one more in training all to handle support. We did, however, start where you are. Here's my advice:
- Just use email. We tried Zendesk, Groove, and Helpscout. Helpscout is far and away the best.
- Your reps need to be smart, talented, and close to the business. That means you need to handle all support inquiries until you can afford to hire someone. When you do hire someone, make sure they're 5x more technical than you think they need to be. We hire developers as support reps.
- It takes us on average 2 replies to close a ticket. A reply takes us on average 6.5 minutes to write (some take 30 min, some take 30 seconds). Our tickets involve lots of debugging and weird stuff, so YMMV.
- Answer every support request as fast as possible. Our customer happiness ratings have a lot to do with how quickly the reply was sent.
- Treat support like a focus group. In a perfect world no one would ever need to ask you for help. If you get people asking the same question over and over, change your product to answer their question for them.
- Docs are a last resort. It depends on the product, but often documentation is a band aid for bad UI. That said, it's good for SEO.
- As you grow, keep support close to your ear and heart.