The Challenge

Retail and e-commerce companies experience extreme surges in volume, during member or customer sales events, for example. These surges require lengthy hiring and training periods that lead to operational inefficiencies and an increased cost to the program.

A leading beauty brand needed our help handling emails faster and improving productivity in the pre-interaction stage, before agents connect with the consumer. Approaching a surge period, our partner was expecting an increase in online shoppers and had to prepare for the higher volume of customer interactions. We set goals to improve associate productivity and reduce costs across email interactions by automating easy work, predicting email replies, and guiding associates to faster and more accurate resolutions.

Our Solution

We implemented Sidd Pro, Laivly’s AI-powered agent assist technology. This tool incorporates automation across any CRM used by agents, including a brand’s loyalty program and order management platform. The program began with just one highly trained and experienced associate who performed all preliminary tests of the system. The second stage of the rollout involved 15 tenured associates on the program and 15 new-hire associates being trained to use Sidd Pro, comparing results for new associates versus tenured associates.

The program implementation took place during a surge period when we were onboarding a new group of agents, which allowed us to perform A/B tests comparing the performance of new hires who used Sidd Pro versus new hires who did not. Following these performance tests, all 60 dedicated email associates were trained on Sidd Pro to maximize the overall benefit.

Our Results

With automation implemented, our partner saw a significant decrease in email handle time (EHT) and increased productivity within a shortened surge period. Previous new hires took eight weeks to work at production levels. With Sidd Pro, new-hire associates reach production levels by week three. Here are some of the key results our partner experienced since implementing the tool:

• 30%: EHT improvement in 6 weeks
• 100%: usage rates of Sidd Pro Email week over week
• 5 weeks: faster speed to production

Explore how IntouchCX supports retail and e-commerce teams with AI-assisted email and agent support.