When Off-the-Shelf Works

A general support classifier with 315 pre-built intents handles most businesses. Billing questions are billing questions whether you sell shoes or software. Password resets work the same everywhere. Order tracking, refund requests, feature inquiries — these are universal.

For 80% of companies, an off-the-shelf classifier with custom routing rules is all you need. You don't need a custom model. You need good routing.

When Custom Models Make Sense

Some industries have support patterns that don't fit the standard taxonomy:

Insurance: "I need to file a claim" is different from "I need to update my policy" is different from "I need proof of insurance." These intents have specific workflows and regulatory requirements that a general classifier might conflate.

Healthcare: "I need to refill my prescription" vs "I need to schedule a follow-up" vs "I need my lab results" — each requires different routing, different data access, and different compliance handling.

Legal: "I need help with a contract review" vs "I need representation for a dispute" vs "I want to update my estate plan" — each goes to a different practice area with different intake processes.

Property management: "My water heater is broken" (emergency maintenance) vs "the hallway light is out" (routine maintenance) vs "when does my lease renew" (leasing) — the urgency and routing are completely different.

When your industry has specific intent categories that a general classifier can't distinguish well, a custom model fills the gap.

How to Get a Custom Model

Supp is open to building custom models for businesses with industry-specific needs. You bring the domain knowledge (what your customers ask and how you categorize it), and we handle the model training and deployment. The custom model replaces the general classifier for your account. Same API, same widget, same pricing per classification.

If you're interested, reach out at supp.support and we can discuss what a custom model would look like for your vertical.

When to Stick With Off-the-Shelf

Your questions are generic. Billing, passwords, order tracking, pricing, cancellations. The standard 315-intent model handles these perfectly.

Your volume is very low. Under 100 messages/month, the accuracy difference between custom and off-the-shelf barely matters. You're not getting enough volume to benefit.

Your routing is simple. If every ticket goes to the same 2-person team regardless of intent, a custom model adds classification accuracy but doesn't change the outcome.

When to Go Custom

Your industry has specific terminology. Insurance claims, legal intake, medical scheduling — these have domain-specific language that a general model might misclassify.

You need fine-grained intent separation. "Emergency maintenance" vs "routine maintenance" matters a lot for routing urgency. A general classifier might lump them together.

You've hit accuracy limits. If the standard model is at 85% accuracy for your messages and you need 95%, custom training with your data closes the gap.

You want a competitive advantage. Being the first in your industry to offer AI-powered support with industry-specific classification is a differentiator. Your competitors are still using generic chatbots.