Quenching the thirst for innovation

Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Sales and Services has improved customer experience (CX) while saving on costs and IT effort with a move to the Genesys Cloud™ platform. Over 80% of calls are now correctly identified and routed by voicebots. In addition, the shared services organisation benefits from highly effective workforce engagement management and video chat. Results include a 12% uplift in fix rates, a $1 million savings on technician site visits and a 50% total cost of ownership (TCO) savings.

Over 80% of calls

correctly identified and routed by AI

50% savings in TCO

and enhanced integration possibilities

$1 million savings

with 12% uplift in fix rates from video chat

$5,000 savings from voicebots

expected to reach $20,000 by year end

Increased

outbound efficiency

Improved employee experience

with workforce engagement features

Our voicebots have been a huge win, correctly matching from a list of 30 different intents in over 80% of cases. Now, our agents spend less time on the phone and resolve more queries first time. We’ve already saved nearly $5,000 and expect that figure to reach $20,000 by year end.

— Nicole Thomas, VP, Customer Care Centre, Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Sales and Services

Perception shapers

Coca-Cola wants to refresh the world, inspire moments of happiness and make a difference. Those at the forefront of this mission include Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Sales and Services (CCBSS). This shared services organisation had looked after Coca-Cola partners and their end customers from three contact centres in Tulsa, Atlanta and Tampa.

“We help shape the overall experience and perception of the Coca-Cola brand every day,” said Nicole Thomas, VP, Customer Care Centre at CCBSS. “That ranges from fulfilling sales orders and resolving billing inquiries to troubleshooting vending equipment problems and arranging repairs.”

Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Sales and Services was the 2019 Genesys Customer Innovation Awards winner in the CX Mover category.

But managing voice, chat and email interactions from three contact centres separately using Cisco, Verint and NICE inContact systems was tough. In 2017, a move to the Genesys PureConnect™ application provided much needed flexibility and interoperability, along with simpler reporting — and a 50% TCO savings.

Native cloud benefits

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted CCBSS to consider a more agile cloud-native architecture that was easy to scale up and roll back without additional costs. “New functionality and integrations through Genesys Cloud offered flexibility we never knew we could have,” added Thomas. “We had home-based agents up and running virtually with native workforce engagement management — and a better development cycle with regular releases and a strong innovation roadmap.”

Home-based agents were virtually trained on Genesys Cloud over Microsoft Teams as part of a phased migration. “Our agents have had a very positive experience and say the solution is faster and easier to use,” said Thomas. “We also created real estate savings by going 100% virtual in Tulsa and consolidating to a single on-site campus in Tampa for customer care.”

Greater insights and integrations

One of the biggest revelations has been tightly integrating Genesys and Salesforce. For self-service, this integration introduces data actions that improve IVR applications. It also drives better agent-led conversations by automating screen pops and surfacing customer account information. In addition, PCI Pal integration enables agents to take secure credit card payments over the phone for equipment service repairs.

Outbound communications are also more efficient. “Previously, a customer might phone in to place their order and receive a needless call later from our sales team,” added Thomas. “Now, that no longer happens because the system automatically removes their name from the call list, releasing our agents for other tasks.”

To replace its previous post-call survey solution, CCBSS talked with several Genesys AppFoundry^® Marketplace partners before opting for Mindful Feedback. “We took advantage of a free trial and quickly found we could do so much more, like simultaneously survey our SMS, email and chat channels,” said Thomas. “That provides our bottlers with greater insights into what their customers are saying.”

Efficiency gains, happier employees

Usually, a system migration would have required the company’s IT team to complete a series of stressful manual switchovers.

“Those problems disappeared with Genesys Cloud,” added Thomas. “Also, we don’t have to provision softphones and we have neat tools like Genesys Architect to speed up interaction flow design. So, we only need two people to administer the system compared to three before.”

CCBSS is leveraging Genesys Workforce Engagement Management and has noticed an improvement in speed and reliability from what it experienced with Genesys PureConnect. Agents can listen to their own calls, view their quality evaluations and even add comments to those evaluations. Resource planners and supervisors are spending less time generating reports, building out work schedules, and managing campaigns and time off.

“Our agents appreciate real-time stats, like number of calls handled and talk time,” said Thomas. “Also, they can log in anytime to the Genesys Tempo mobile app and make a vacation request or view available shifts. We’ve received lots of positive feedback. They especially appreciate the flexibility of the app since they can access it when it’s convenient for them, even outside of work.”

And with the introduction of speech and text analytics, CCBSS is finally able to see the big picture. “We quickly pinpoint where the real hotspots are without manually sifting through tons of data,” added Thomas.

Reducing customer touches and transfers

Previously, CCBSS was unable to identify customers phoning in and could have up to 10 or more different contact numbers listed in their profile. Those calls could be with local restaurant owners urgently awaiting equipment delivery or a repair.

The move to Genesys Cloud solved that problem by putting artificial intelligence (AI) firmly within reach. Coca-Cola created its own voicebot using Genesys Dialog Engine Bot Flows and relies on Intent Miner to automatically create intent models. As a result, its partners and their end customers benefit from faster service and no longer have to repeatedly provide their details. Instead, an account finder voicebot discovers the caller’s identify and intent before connecting them to the best-fit agent.

Results during the first six months have been extremely promising. “Our voicebots have been a huge win, correctly matching from a list of 30 different intents in over 80% of cases,” said Thomas. “Now, our agents spend less time on the phone and resolve more queries first time. We’ve already saved nearly $5,000 and expect that figure to reach $20,000 by year end.”

Seeing how to fix problems

The company also leveraged video-enabled chat from Help Lightning, a Genesys AppFoundry partner. Unlike before, CCBSS technicians can work virtually alongside customers in solving their most complex problems.

Video chat allows our technicians to physically see what the customer is seeing. That’s not only improved our fix rate by 12% but also saved over $1 million in site visits.

— Nicole Thomas, VP, Customer Care Centre, Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Sales and Services

“Video chat allows our technicians to physically see what the customer is seeing,” concluded Thomas. “For example, if a beverage machine has stopped pouring, they can use virtual reality to circle things or point to a particular gauge or part for the customer to check. That’s not only improved our fix rate by 12% but also saved over $1 million in site visits.”

Looking ahead, CCBSS plans to expand chat, SMS and video chat services, while continuing to raise experience and productivity through Genesys and Microsoft Teams integration.