Nice Feature For The Verizon Community?

[prisaz]

It is called search. It is found at the top right, just below the weather.

[prisaz]

---

@prisaz wrote:

It is called search. It is found at the top right, just below the weather.

---

Perhaps this should be sticky at the top of each forum. Or would that be cross posting? Feedback welcome.

[Justin46]

You already know I am very, very, very much in favor of people searching the forums before they create a thread or add a post to a thread. I bet at least 75% of the actual questions currently being posted in the forums have already been answered and are in the forums database.

Of course some people only want to complain and don't ask a question, nobody can really answer that kind of stuff, but even for complaints, if people would just search first, they could add their complaint to an existing thread instead of blindly creating a new one.

Just my opinion of course......search, search, search first  

__________________________________
Justin
FiOS TV, 25/25 Internet, and Digital Voice user
QIP7232, QIP7100-P2, IMG 1.9
Keller, TX 76248

[retiredme]

All of which makes me think that it may be time for a reorganization of the forum topics. I, too, believe that many come here just to vent; but there are also many that seek viable solutions for perceived problems. While "Search" is a great tool, that is too tedious for the technicians to utilize when looking to see what problems exist that might need fixing. I am thinking along the lines of how the forum inputs are presented: customer service complaints; service outages; DVR technical issues; non-DVR technical issues; subscriber inducements; and so on. For example, there are many software related issues with DVRs right now, and if all those inputs were placed in the folder "DVR", it would be real easy for the technicians to focus on that equipment rather than search through all the threads. I think it would be advantageous if such equipment-related issues could be inputed nearly direct to the technicians. Or at least limit where they have to look to find the problems. And that would apply to other areas as well, such as "Customer Service", "Program Guide", "Customer Retention", and so forth. The VZ people responsible for such things can find the issues and deal with them more quickly. The current forum topic breakdown is too general and encompasses too many disparate items under each.

[Justin46]

---

@retiredme wrote:

All of which makes me think that it may be time for a reorganization of the forum topics. I, too, believe that many come here just to vent; but there are also many that seek viable solutions for perceived problems. While "Search" is a great tool, that is too tedious for the technicians to utilize when looking to see what problems exist that might need fixing. I am thinking along the lines of how the forum inputs are presented: customer service complaints; service outages; DVR technical issues; non-DVR technical issues; subscriber inducements; and so on. For example, there are many software related issues with DVRs right now, and if all those inputs were placed in the folder "DVR", it would be real easy for the technicians to focus on that equipment rather than search through all the threads. I think it would be advantageous if such equipment-related issues could be inputed nearly direct to the technicians. Or at least limit where they have to look to find the problems. And that would apply to other areas as well, such as "Customer Service", "Program Guide", "Customer Retention", and so forth. The VZ people responsible for such things can find the issues and deal with them more quickly. The current forum topic breakdown is too general and encompasses too many disparate items under each.

---

I have a somewhat different view on at least some of it:

1) I think in general the various forums are reasonably good the way they are structured. I think most people, if they care to even try to post in the correct or most applicable forum, can figure it out 98% of the time. Those that don't care, and there are obviously a fair number of those, are not going to be affected by any structural changes.

2) These forums are for "users-helping-users", so whatever structure there is should be oriented to us other users finding and helping, not Verizon techs. Yes, Verizon has some folks here, and they do help at times, but the focus is for other users to help. To me whether the user helping focus is the right one is certainly a subject for debate, and lots of users post here not understanding that, but Verizon has chosen to set it up this way.

3) There is a private forum for Community Leaders; in there we have a mechanism for us to notify Verizon techs that their help is needed in a thread. It works pretty well, and by the same token they can provide requests to us to try to help a user in a specific thread.

4)The search Mark and I are referring to is a search by the user before posting, not any kind of search by Verizon techs.

5) My view on searches, as I have articulated privately many, many times in the CL Forum, is that when someone wants to create a new thread, require them to enter at least one keyword, separate from the topic, and then an automatic 'search" be done on the keyword(s), under the covers, in the specific forum they are trying to create the thread, and the search results be automatically presented to them. I believe this would result in a significant reduction in the number of new threads asking the same old questions.

6) There is really nothing that can be done about threads or posts that are just complaints, other than just deleting them or locking them. I would be in favor of either option, and have said so many times, but Verizon apparently feels that would be unfair or something. I do not understand that position, IMO the posts that just say something like maybe "I hate Verizon,......", etc., contribute absolutely nothing, they really only detract from the usefulness of the forums, they tend to obscure the useful posts that have real, valid questions.

Anyway, something needs to be done: encourage searches, implement some automated search, I don't know, but something.

__________________________________
Justin
FiOS TV, 25/25 Internet, and Digital Voice user
QIP7232, QIP7100-P2, IMG 1.9
Keller, TX 76248

[Justin46]

Here is just one simple example of why search should be automated:

http://forums.verizon.com/t5/FiOS-Internet/Deleting-my-personal-webspace-website/td-p/431903

This is somebody who registered today and obviously did not do any kind of search, there are lots of threads, with specific instructions on how to get it done, but here it is, another new thread that somebody presumably will eventually have to answer.

What a waste of resources and people's time, both for the poster and whoever responds.

Note: Not picking on the poster of that thread, picking on Verizon and Lithium for not taking action on how the forums function.

__________________________________
Justin
FiOS TV, 25/25 Internet, and Digital Voice user
QIP7232, QIP7100-P2, IMG 1.9
Keller, TX 76248 

[retiredme]

You make some good points, Justin, and I do wholeheartedly support the idea of searching a topic - I have begun to not answer some entries simply because it's been done before and I tire of giving the same answer repeatedly. I was also not aware of the private forum for Community leaders - that sounds reasonable, and seems to make my suggestion about technician access unnecessary. I do still believe that a bit of reorganization might prove helpful to all if a customer could go specifically to a dedicated sub-topic; for example, under "Technical Issues" there might be: DVR, HDMI Cables, Remotes, etc. Similarly for "Program Issues" there might be: VOD, Recommended Channels, Funimation, etc. I do like the idea of the automated search feature. Maybe I'm just being anal and trying to organize too much.

[Justin46]

---

@retiredme wrote:

You make some good points, Justin, and I do wholeheartedly support the idea of searching a topic - I have begun to not answer some entries simply because it's been done before and I tire of giving the same answer repeatedly. I was also not aware of the private forum for Community leaders - that sounds reasonable, and seems to make my suggestion about technician access unnecessary. I do still believe that a bit of reorganization might prove helpful to all if a customer could go specifically to a dedicated sub-topic; for example, under "Technical Issues" there might be: DVR, HDMI Cables, Remotes, etc. Similarly for "Program Issues" there might be: VOD, Recommended Channels, Funimation, etc. I do like the idea of the automated search feature. Maybe I'm just being anal and trying to organize too much.

---

Nope, you are trying to make the forums more effective, and I for one like that!

And you may very well be right, that some reorganization would be appropriate, I don't know, I guess maybe Verizon could do some kind of analysis of the topics posted, where they are posted, and evaluate whether there could be perhaps some kind of sub-category structure added. A problem with things now is that apparently some people, with an email question for example, can't figure out how to find the email forum - if they can't do that, can we expect them to find some sub-forum? Maybe there are just too many high-level topic areas now, cut that down and implement the sub-category idea? Might work well. Anybody else have any thoughts on this?

I too have quit answering some questions because I know for a fact that the question has been asked and answered before and can be found with a search. In fact I got so frustrated earlier this year I just took a self-imposed vacation for a few weeks, didn't answer any questions, didn't visit the forums for days at a time. I finally came back, not really sure why I did My wife questions my sanity about this, but I actually enjoy it when the question and tone of the post are reasonable.

One other area where I think a major improvement could be made is the FAQ area. Theoretically there are now FAQ areas, but I bet they are rarely used. I proposed a while back that the CLs embark on a FAQ collection and creation project where we would identify topics that need FAQs, gather the info from existing posts or our own experience, create a draft FAQ, have it reviewed by the appropriate Verizon group, and the Mods/Admins post it. My idea was one FAQ thread for each topic area (linked index at the topic, each FAQ in a separate post in that one thread), to be stickied at the top of the topic area, and all or nearly all of the other stickied threads be removed (most of them are way, way out of date IMO). And of course then encourage posters to look there first, and responders simply link to the appropriate FAQ if the answer is there. The Admin here (Heather) reacted very positively, a couple of other CLs were positive, and that was it. So I guess that idea died too.

I wish something would be done, shoot, just try pretty much anything.

__________________________________
Justin
FiOS TV, 25/25 Internet, and Digital Voice user
QIP7232, QIP7100-P2, IMG 1.9
Keller, TX 76248

[retiredme]

Agreed. Other than for historical reference, most of the sticky posts are now meaningless and I suspect largely ignored. I have thought that for the Technical Issues Forum there should be a sticky right at the top for the usual technical issues which outlines the remedy, call it "Common Problems and Solutions". It would be less comprehensive than your IMG Guide, and likely just a list of issues and fixes such as one sees in the back of some technical manual. I guess it would be a Technical Problem Reference Guide. The trick will be to get folks to notice it. On the other hand, sometimes people just want a little reassurance that they are not alone in suffering some issue - it's the old "misery loves company" syndrome, and reaching out is cathartic for them.