Product support analysts sit in the middle of two worlds: customer support and product. The role requires having a foot in each world, which can make coming up with a job description a little tricky.
Many product support analyst job postings seem to refer to an individual working in the support queue or on product support, but most don’t cover both aspects of the job, which may set the wrong expectation for potential applicants.
If you’re adding — or thinking of adding — a product support analyst to your team, read on for examples of how to craft a job description that indicates the work a candidate will do and is reflective of the role's complexity.
About the job
There are many different ways that companies choose to delineate this section within the job description. Some product support analyst job descriptions may refer to this as "A Day In the Life" or "Responsibilities," for instance.
This section should give a detailed picture of what the applicant can expect to do every day. Try not toinclude extraneous or one-off tasks that they may have to do occasionally. For example, if they work in chat every day, that should be included. If they are occasionally required to do ad-hoc unscheduled video calls, that may not need to be included (your team can share those during the interview process if you feel like they are important enough to merit a mention). You should also include the time zones expected for work or location of the job if it isn't remote.
After reading this section, the potential candidate should be able to place themselves within the role and understand how they would perform.
Here are some examples you might include in a job description for this role:
You work on our support team and spend about half of your time working in the support queue.
You work cross-functionally with our product, engineering, and design teams to decide which problems we solve for our customers and how we prioritize them.
You develop reports on common, impactful trends within the support organization to share with cross-functional teams and illustrate issues and priorities from the customer perspective.
You prioritize and rank the impact of incoming customer issues to help better our escalation processes.
You conduct customer research, testing, and product discovery to understand the needs behind your customers' asks.
You relay insights from the product team back to the customer support team so that everyone is on the same page, including advanced training on new product features or releases.
You coach our customer support team on new product features and their technical details and are on the front lines of ensuring our documentation is up to date.
You partner with our product organization to create and effectively prioritize release timelines that ensure customer-facing teams have the time they need to get trained.
Skills and qualifications
This section of a product support analyst job description provides more details about the individual who would be the best fit for the role. Occasionally referred to as "About you" or "What you will need," this section explicitly addresses the personal knowledge and experiences a candidate needs to be successful.
Include only what a candidate needs here, and reserve "nice to haves" or "bonuses" for a separate section. If you wouldn't automatically reject a candidate for not having that certain skill or qualification, don't include it in this section.
Here are a few items you might include in a product support analyst listing:
You have [desired amount] years of experience providing customer support for a SaaS product.
You understand that there will always be tension between customer requests and the long-term product vision, and you are excited to navigate that tension.
You pride yourself on your negotiation and communication skills.
You feel confident in balancing empathy for the customer with big-picture priorities for the business.
You love working cross-functionally and building alignment.
You take a data-first approach — you know little is as compelling as actual quantitative metrics.
You are a technically curious individual who strives to become a product expert wherever you go.
You have experience working directly with product and engineering team members.
You have excellent written and verbal communication and find it easy to synthesize complex information into simple messages.
You love prioritizing and executing tasks efficiently.
Your track record of solving complex problems, both externally for customers and internally within a business, is extensive.
You have deep familiarity with agile frameworks.
Other things to consider including
Many companies choose to include information that paints a better picture of the company or the benefits that taking the job could provide. Here are some other things that companies include in their product support analyst job descriptions:
Salary range
Benefits that the company offers and any stipulations around them. For instance, state if any of them take time to kick in rather than starting right away.
Information about the company culture and mission, such as core values or a mission statement.
Any "nice to haves" that you didn't include in Skills and Qualifications, such as specific product experience, technical knowledge, or languages spoken.
5 great examples of real product support analyst job descriptions
There are many different iterations of the product support analyst job description. Some of them, as we mentioned, are re-titled versions of a product support role. However, the job descriptions here reflect the integral balance of a focus on product alignment and customer support that we see as being necessary to this role.
Product Support Analyst at RE/MAX
The product support analyst job description for RE/MAX is one of the most detailed descriptions of the bunch. It starts by introducing the benefits that a potential candidate can expect if they take the job and details information like salary range, qualifications and skills, and essential duties.
While this is slightly more support-focused than the others, it is still product-aligned.
Product Support Analyst at Help Scout
Help Scout is an extremely mission-driven company, and that comes through in this job description. The listing begins with a description of the company, the things that Help Scout values, and the type of motivations that the right candidate will have. This gives the potential candidate the opportunity to determine that they are values-aligned with the company before they get into the details of the role itself.
What follows are the two typical aspects of a job description: more about the role and details about the types of skills and qualifications that the candidate will need. To finish up, there is information about time zones and what Help Scout expects from a person working in this role and why.
Principal System Support Analyst at Liberty Mutual Insurance
Liberty Mutual starts this job description off strong by listing both the remote aspects of the role and the salary expectations. It does a good job emphasizing the critical aspects of the role: product prioritization, pricing, and releases. Uniquely, the company only includes a single header of "Responsibilities" to encompass both the Skills and Qualifications and About the Job sections.
The candidate reading this job description has a great picture of what the role will look like before they ever choose to hit the "Apply" button.
Product Support Analyst at the Space Needle
This role at the Space Needle is one of the most product-heavy of these listings. Specifically, the candidate given the position will be responsible for suggesting shifts in the usage of products and product strategy.
This posting keeps it simple and only includes two headers: essential duties and responsibilities; and education, experience, and skills required. Even though it's short and straightforward, it's packed with tons of information for the potential candidate to peruse to decide if they are a good fit.
Product Support Analyst at Infor
From the start, Infor emphasizes that this is an entry-level job and that the person who fills it will work cross-functionally for both the support and product teams. Beyond that, Infor includes a lot of information to help candidates determine if this is the proper role for them, including the following headers:
A Day In The Life Typically Includes
What You Will Need
Preferred Qualifications
Infor Values
The preferred qualifications section is a great way to identify the skills that would set a candidate apart but that might not be necessary enough to include in the overall “What You Will Need” section.
The intersection between product and support never looked so good
The more detailed your job description, the better a picture your potential candidates will have of what you're looking for and the quicker you’ll find the best, most qualified candidates. Include things like daily responsibilities, salary range, and your mission and values to provide as much context for the role as possible.
Painting a clear picture helps you set expectations properly and can improve the quality of candidates in your pipeline. Take the time to nail the details, and you’ll set everyone involved up for success.