Over the past few years, B2C companies have moved towards automated customer service solutions, such as chatbots. Their goal? To improve customer experience, increase productivity and reduce costs. And today, they’re taking things one step further by automating part of their calls with conversational voice robots, aka callbots, accessible via a telephone number.
From a technical viewpoint, a callbot functions like a chatbot, but with two extra components – voice recognition and voice synthesis. This means that they can understand a customer or lead’s request in natural language, give an answer, and even perform certain tasks. Callbots are generally deployed by companies with a high volume of calls (insurance industry, telecom, transport, e-commerce, hospitality, etc.).
The next part of this article presents 3 callbot use cases that help effectively reduce pressure on customer service teams, illustrated by real-life examples.
Get Information and Book an Appointment
Just like chatbots, callbots can provide general information: opening times, address, information about services and products, etc. If the user is an existing customer and wants to identify themselves, they can benefit from personalised information based on their customer account. There are several ways to identify a user: via their telephone number, with their first and last name and/or customer account number, etc. The company puts in place the script and login variables.
If the conversational bot is connected to the company’s booking management software, it can also suggest that the user make an appointment and pre-qualify the request (context, nature of appointment, etc.).
Sign up to a Contract
Insurance or electricity contracts, Internet packages… Callbots are excellent ways of increasing the number of new contracts, especially during non-working hours.
How does it work?
After asking the user to identify themselves, the callbot asks a series of sub-questions that are needed to create the contract. In the insurance sector, for example, these questions will relate to the type of insurance (car, house, civil liability, etc.), vehicle, make, model, contract, etc. The callbot pre-qualifies and records the request. Unlike IVR, the user doesn’t select options with the keys on their telephone, but answers out loud in their own words or those suggested by the bot.
The callbot then informs the user of the next steps and which documents they need to provide in order to complete their request. At the end of the conversation, the user receives a confirmation message (SMS and/or email). Depending on the insurance company’s strategy, the new customer may be called back the next day by an agent to confirm that their new contract is in place. If, however, a customer wishes to terminate their contract, the callbot may hand over to a human operator.
Manage Complaints or Make a Claim
One of the most frequently contacted departments in a company is the after-sales service. The latter should be perceived as a real strategic lever for customer satisfaction and loyalty. Automating part of this after-sales service can be particularly effective in making the processing of requests smoother, and therefore increasing customer satisfaction.
Managing complaints is a frequent callbot use case. Specific scripts with advanced decision trees can be put in place, to personalise information provided to customers as much as possible, as well as information given to the company. For example, the callbot could ask unhappy customers if their call is about a current request or a new claim, and run a script based on the answer.
- request in progress: identifies the claim with a tracking number, gives an answer according to the request status (in progress, processed, resolved, failed…), as well as any potential actions to be carried out: upload a form, send supporting documents, etc.
- new claim: asks sub-questions to collect all the information required to handle the problem (type and frequency of breakdown, type of product…), retrieves technical information and collects ID data in order to finalise the claim.
Messages should be fully customisable and modifiable by the company at any time. As with breakdown or incident reports, insurers can also set up callbot scripts for claims. The principle is the same, only the callbot’s questions are different: date of claim, context, registration number or postcode… The bot can also offer telephone assistance if necessary.
To Take Things Further
Whatever the case, a callbot can record conversations and replay them later (the user must be informed beforehand). This enables the bot’s manager to continually improve it, enrich the CRM with additional information and better understand the customers’ needs and friction points. The bot can also transcribe the conversation in order to leave a note in the CRM, for example.
If connected to third-party technologies, such as RPA (Robotic Process Automation), the callbot can automate tasks such as creating a contract, filling out a claim report, updating customer account information, etc. directly in the company’s software (CRM, IS, ticketing tool, etc.). Once created or modified, the documents can automatically be sent to the customer for signature. This allows an end-to-end automation of simple processes, saving both the customer and supplier time and resources.
The callbot can be configured to optimise the brand’s sales strategy as much as possible, by increasing sign-ups, monitoring, and managing claims or termination requests… The tool’s profitability is therefore easy to calculate.
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