Amid the changes the storage and warehousing industry has experienced as a result of COVID-19, the increasing demand for online shopping has resulted in a rise and shift in customer expectations. Customers expect the same personalized experience they receive in physical stores when they shop online.
As a leader in the self storage industry, Copper Storage Management has long prided itself on providing best-in-class service experiences for its tenants. In order to meet – and exceed – these growing expectations, their team decided to go all in on a conversational approach to help support and engage their customers, which is why they used swivl across their marketing, sales, and support channels to create a unified customer experience.
“Staffing a call center is difficult when we're growing so fast. It comes out to be around 90% of the cost."
The Results?
• 81% Automation Rate
• 48% increase in agent productivity
• 200+ agent hours saved
• 1 in 3 interactions automatically resolved by swivl
The Challenge: High Volume of Tenant Inquiries
One of the main pain points that Copper Storage Management faced was the high volume of inbound communication from their current and prospective tenants. With 40-45 frontline agents and an additional 10 for severe escalations, the company needed a solution that could handle the high volume of customer interactions while also reducing costs.
Brett Copper, Director of Operations, explained, "staffing a call center is difficult when we're growing so fast. It comes out to be around 90% of the cost." When it comes to IVR and needing to handle questions on a 1 to 1 basis, the process can lead to long wait times when a customer is expecting an immediate answer to their questions.
Brett explained that after the initial testing during their implementation, the team was sold. They were confident in leveraging the full power of swivl to balance efficient, automated support and engagement with a personal touch. By anticipating known issues and frequently asked questions, they could rest assured that their team would be on top of incoming requests.
The Solution: Going all in with conversational support
swivl's platform has helped the company solve this problem by automating over 80% of inbound conversations through the website chat. With swivl, chat users no longer have to deal with long wait times. Furthermore, an average of only ~3% of chats were escalated to the live agent team. Prior to swivl’s rollout, their team was answering less than half of the chats coming in through their old system. Since the launch, the team’s acceptance rate has increased to over 90% of conversations. This has resulted in a significant increase in customer satisfaction and has allowed the company to focus on more complex tenant issues.
swivl's conversational AI platform provided the perfect solution for Copper’s team. The platform uses artificial intelligence and natural language processing to automate sales, services, and tenant management interactions.
According to Hadrian Agee, Call Center Operations Manager, swivl’s Conversations Inbox allows his team to have personal, real-time conversations with their website visitors and customers. They are truly embodying swivl's mission of making their storage business personal.
Speaking further to the power of live chat and conversational support, Hadrian said, “Support requests handled through email can often lead to inefficiencies, with team members spending a lot of time gathering information and context switching between replies. On the other hand, chat offers a more streamlined experience with clear ownership from start to finish. This not only benefits our team but also enhances the customer experience.”
Copper Storage Management sees relationships with their customers as ongoing conversations, not just one-off interactions that begin and end with a reservation. The company is focused on the experience of its customers and wants to make the buying experience as stress-free as possible.
“It's a great product, and I'm so happy we have this partnership."
The Results: Creating a smarter support experience
Since implementing swivl's platform in the second half of November, Copper has seen an increase in over 20% of newly generated interactions coming through the bot, plus more detailed contact information being collected through the system. One of the most significant benefits of swivl's platform is its automation. According to Hadrian, "it reduced the amount of agents and helped prioritize where they are needed as it relates to our Tier 1 and Tier 2 teams."
By leveraging swivl to answer frequently asked questions and assist with the tenant experience, Copper’s support team has been able to focus on more complex queries, with the bot currently resolving one in every three inbound conversations.
Since implementation, Copper Storage Management has automated +80% website lead interactions and current tenant management tasks, resulting in significant cost savings and improved customer satisfaction scores. The platform's integrations, automation, and ease of communication with tenants has played a critical role in the company's growth thus far. As Brett Copper stated, "it's a great product, and I'm so happy we have this partnership."
Looking ahead, Copper is excited about deploying some of swivl’s new generative AI features and Google Business Profile chat automations in the coming weeks.
If you are looking to streamline your operations and improve customer experience, consider swivl's conversational AI platform.
Products Used:
• Website Chatbot
• SMS Bot
• Facility Management Software Power-ups
• Team Inbox
• Google Business Profile
The Data:
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Implementation of swivl in Dec-22 increased online reservations and decreased contact form submissions, even with the addition of 20 new locations in Jan-23.
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swivl’s lead collection and automation rates rise month over month, setting the pace for Copper in Q1 2023.
