Overview
Prestige Storage, founded in 2016 in Columbus, OH, is a fully integrated self-storage commercial real estate company that has expanded to over 60 properties nationwide, encompassing 2,900,000 rentable square feet. As a results of its rapid growth and success, Prestige Storage faced a significant challenge with their call center. The majority of the calls were service-related, which took away time and resources from focusing on sales. To address this issue, Prestige Storage partnered with swivl to implement their omnichannel AI platform designed to automate common service inquiries and streamline operations.
Goal: Reduce the number of existing customer inquiries being sent to the call center
The Challenge
The operations team at Prestige Storage uncovered inefficiencies within the call center, frequently getting inundated with service-related calls — with a large portion of these calls involving simple requests such as forgotten gate codes and account balance inquiries. This high volume of service calls hindered the call center’s ability to prioritize sales-focused efforts.
The Solution
Prestige Storage implemented their own AI-powered self-storage specific chatbot on their website to automate responses to frequent service-related inquiries. The AI chatbot was designed to handle all types of commonly asked questions, from identifying items to be stored and providing size recommendations to directly helping with more tenant focused account issues such as gate code requests and account balance inquiries.
All of these actions were automatically solved by the swivl platform without needing to escalate to a human with it’s out-of-the-box integration to Prestige’s Facility Management System (FMS). This integration allowed the chatbot to pull account balances and redirect customers to payment URLs, significantly reducing the need for human intervention.
Diving into the data
Understanding the demographics and behaviors of their customers was crucial for Prestige Storage to tailor their services effectively. Lucky for them, the swivl platform provided insights into customer interactions, helping to identify key personas and their specific needs.
Since implementing swivl, our data showed that the majority of people interacting with Prestige’s web bot are existing customers (66%). Our data also shows that a large number of Prestige’s service related requests happen to fall into a category that is easily automated using swivl’s platform.
Individually, the top two categories make up more requests than all the other categories combined.
I forgot my gate code!
Some of the most frequently fielded service-related calls were about forgotten gate codes and unit numbers.
The swivl platform was built with intelligent automation in mind, allowing for these types of common requests to be proactively solved within a conversation without the need to have a manager step in.
From January to August 2024, we observed over 900 chat users requesting their gate codes. To address these inquiries, hundreds of communications were dispatched via swivl’s SMS and email channels. This automation resulted in a significant reduction in manual labor, translating to yearly cost savings of at least $11,000.
swivl's platform also identified users with past due payments (17% of access inquiries) and offered assistance with payment. It also identified inactive users and inquired about their interest in reserving or renting another unit. This resulted in the recovery of over $4,000 in past due payments across Prestige Storage’s 60 locations within a 4-month period.
By automating these requests through swivl’s conversational AI platform, Prestige Storage was able to provide quick and efficient service to their customers, freeing up the call center team to focus on more complex tasks.
68% of all gate code questions, asked via chat, resulted in an automation that a human never had to touch
Simplifying Account Balance Inquiries
After digging into the types of calls the Prestige Storage team is fielding, we discovered something else we could automate for them. When customers ask about paying their bill, it’s usually one of two things. They either want to know how to pay their bill or they want to know how much they owe and when it is due.
Similar to the Access workflow already discussed, an additional benefit of swivl’s FMS integrations is the ability to provide real-time account information and direct customers to the payment portal.
Stores are up. Calls are down.
Since implementing swivl, call volume from existing customers is down across Prestige Storage’s facilities. The really exciting thing is that these calls continue to go down even as Prestige adds new locations to their portfolio.
Shifting Focus to Sales
Service-related calls, while essential for maintaining customer satisfaction, detracted from the call center’s primary goal of driving sales. Post-implementation of swivl and service-oriented workflows, there was a noticeable shift in the type of queries the Prestige team had to handle.
The reduction in service-related call volume allowed call center agents to dedicate more time to engaging potential customers, understanding their storage needs, and converting leads into sales. Additionally, the implementation of swivl’s dynamic info collect card led to an increase in phone and email collection rates to over 51%.
This has allowed more focus on following up on sales opportunities, which are critical for business growth. It’s important to highlight that this shift not only improved the efficiency of the call center but also enhanced the overall customer experience. The time saved was critical in helping shift the in-store team’s time to be focused on improving their facilities and providing exceptional on-site assistance to their customers.
“The call center is one of the most expensive parts of running your operations. With swivl’s AI chatbot, our sales team can now focus on what they do best, without being bogged down by service-related tasks.”
Takeaway
By leveraging swivl’s AI-powered customer engagement platform, Prestige Storage not only optimized their call center operations but also unlocked new opportunities for business growth. The shift from managing routine service calls to focusing on sales and customer relationships underscores the strategic value of integrating AI-driven automation into customer service workflows.
Products Used:
- Website chatbot
- Automated SMS Channel
- Facility Management Software Power-ups
- Conversation Inbox
