2916: Flying High with AI: Virgin Atlantic's Customer Service Revolution

[00:00:00] What real world impact is AI having on businesses today? How do we measure its success? These

[00:00:09] are just a few of the questions at the forefront of our minds here at the Experience 2024 event

[00:00:16] by Genesis here in Denver, Colorado, where AI is yes, predictably the topic of every

[00:00:22] conversation. However, I want to dive deeper than the surface level buzz and uncover tangible

[00:00:29] examples of AI business value. In my quest to find answers, I had the pleasure of speaking

[00:00:36] with Louise Phillips, Vice President of Customer Centers at Virgin Atlantic and Michael from

[00:00:41] Virgin Atlantic too, and they shared with me how Virgin Atlantic is leveraging AI to

[00:00:48] revolutionize customer employee experiences. So I convinced them to come away from the

[00:00:52] show floor and share their insights, not only with myself, but with all you lovely

[00:00:57] people listening all over the world. So today we're going to discuss how AI is being used

[00:01:02] to create smarter, more cohesive experiences and the results that they've seen, such as

[00:01:08] a 25 point improvement in customer satisfaction and a phenomenal 12 point increase in employee

[00:01:15] happiness within just a year. But how do they do it? Well, buckle up and hold on tight

[00:01:21] as I beam your ears all the way to Denver, Colorado, where you can sit down with myself,

[00:01:26] Louise and Michael as we explore this and much more. So a massive warm welcome to the

[00:01:34] show. Louise, to begin with, can you tell everyone listening a little about who you

[00:01:38] are and what you do? Yeah. Hi. So my name's Louise Phillips. My job title is Vice President

[00:01:44] of Customer Centers at Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Atlantic Holidays, essentially made

[00:01:49] up of your typical contact center function along with some customer care functions as

[00:01:54] well. So yeah, we're based in the UK across a couple of sites and I've been at Virgin

[00:01:59] Atlantic for 14 years. Fantastic. And Michael, can you tell everyone listening a little about

[00:02:04] you too? Hi. Yes, I'm Michael and I'm one of the operational change managers for Virgin

[00:02:08] Atlantic and I look after projects and continuous improvement and change really, variety change

[00:02:15] landing in the customer center. Over the last two years, I've focused primarily on technology

[00:02:19] with a real focus on Genesis Climate itself. Fantastic. Well, welcome to both of you. And

[00:02:25] just if we start the conversation, talking about AI and the customer experience is a

[00:02:29] big theme here at the event. How has Virgin Atlantic harnessed AI technology to create

[00:02:35] smarter, more cohesive customer experiences? And what impacts has it had on overall customer

[00:02:40] satisfaction? And the reason I ask that is there's a lot of hype around AI at the moment.

[00:02:44] Here, we're seeing so many real world examples and I know it's something you're both passionate

[00:02:48] about. To give you a very high level backstory, Virgin Atlantic have been partnering with Genesis

[00:02:53] now since early 2022 and really 2022 was about our implementation phase really. It was transitioning

[00:03:01] all of our contact channel platforms over to Genesis, whether that be voice, email, web messaging,

[00:03:06] etc., WhatsApp over time. And I guess the AI strategy really started to kick in around probably

[00:03:15] the latter half of 2023. Actually following our visit to experience in 2023 actually, we came back

[00:03:22] on the plane ride home thinking about predictive routing and that's where it all began really. We

[00:03:27] took a very curious but bold approach to say, you know what, let's give this a go. Let's switch this

[00:03:33] on. We didn't waste too much time in worrying about the ifs and the buts. We just kind of went

[00:03:38] with it and it was really, really successful. And I guess that's where our AI journey began.

[00:03:44] We quickly moved into an AI bundle with Genesis in January of this year, which will allow us to

[00:03:50] unlock further AI features, I guess. And so what's on the table for us right now is we've got

[00:03:58] the predictive routing in place. I can give you some examples of how well that's working.

[00:04:04] We're next month moving on to knowledge portal with agent assist, really big game changer for

[00:04:10] our people. And then we're also discussing things, obviously conversational bots, predictive

[00:04:16] engagement to drive obviously revenue. So yeah, we've got a bit of a list of things we want to get

[00:04:21] done, but also being very selective about what are the AI features that will benefit us and our

[00:04:28] customer experience because ultimately that is what we're going after. We want to improve

[00:04:34] our customer experience, not to talk too long about the previous few years of COVID, but

[00:04:39] we did have to work extremely hard to recover our customer center because of the impact that

[00:04:44] it had on the aviation sector. And AI is really allowing us to do that. We know

[00:04:51] that we were receiving five times more calls than we were pre-COVID, handling time was doubled, etc.,

[00:04:58] all because of the impact of the pandemic. And it's the handling time, the excessive handling

[00:05:03] time that was really driving down that customer experience. So what predictive routing is doing,

[00:05:08] quite quickly, we could already see the benefit and we were seeing 15% reductions in handling time.

[00:05:15] Because obviously what we're then doing is placing the right, you know, the call in front of the

[00:05:20] right skilled advisor based on the complexity of the contact versus their proficiency and their

[00:05:26] AHT. And so, you know, that's just one example that we can provide where we're really already

[00:05:31] starting to see those improvements. That figure there, 15%, it's great to be able to have a

[00:05:35] measurable figure that you can see and the difference it's making. Then can you also

[00:05:39] elaborate on how the combination of voice segmentation bots, bot flows and predictive

[00:05:45] routing has transformed Virgin Atlantic's customer journey too, particularly for transatlantic routes

[00:05:51] and for any techies listening wanting to take a look under the hood? The ability to have voice

[00:05:55] segmentation bots and milestone reporting from on our inbound channels has been a real game changer

[00:06:00] for us. So we've got a lot of great people who've been in the business for a long time and anecdotally

[00:06:04] they could tell you why our customers are contacting us, but we've never been able to quantify it.

[00:06:08] This ability for customers to tell us why they're calling, what was the main reason?

[00:06:12] And then for us to quantify that in volumes and percentages of our contact completely changed the

[00:06:17] conversations we could have with a wider business. So instead of there being that separation where

[00:06:22] they were doing their thing, we would do an hour thing and not being able to articulate to them

[00:06:26] what, how the impact of any changes they make. We suddenly, we were able to go with solid numbers

[00:06:30] and that allows us to change that discussion. Then we can knock on doors and say, this change that

[00:06:35] you're implementing or thinking of implementing, this is the impact it has on our customers and on

[00:06:39] the customer centre. So we know a relationship happened kind of the eyes and ears of the company

[00:06:45] as a whole. And if we look at the employee experience and the customer service, are there

[00:06:52] any specific improvements that around employee experience that you've implemented that directly

[00:06:57] translate into better customer service outcomes? Is there any examples or anything you can share

[00:07:02] around that? A big thing for us is personalising the service we give our customers. So even before

[00:07:09] we started at the very early stage of our AI, in terms of conversational AI, we started using

[00:07:14] bots and our inbound flow so we can identify our customers. And that customer, the details about

[00:07:19] that customer was being presented to the agent. So instead of them going, having to find out about

[00:07:23] the customer, they could start off with understanding where I know this customer and this is, they're one

[00:07:27] of our gold members and this is when the next flight is and this, that and the other. So they could

[00:07:32] come through, we could greet that customer by name and then we could have that conversation and we're

[00:07:35] already a little bit down the track with it. Those kind of things making it appear inside the

[00:07:39] Genesys interface that just makes everything a little bit easier for our agents and the agent assist

[00:07:44] and auto summarisation that we're implementing at the moment is still going down that track,

[00:07:48] making everything effortless for the agent and as a result effortless for the customer.

[00:07:52] So how would you say the digitalisation of Virgin Atlantic's customer experience has reshaped the

[00:07:57] way you engage with your passengers, especially those seeking more seamless connection?

[00:08:03] So as a business actually we'd started this process several years ago. We looked at asynchronous

[00:08:08] channels and we had set ourselves targets to move from, I believe we had an 80-20 sort of split where

[00:08:13] voice and then digital channels to try and get us to 60-40 because we knew from our own experience

[00:08:17] that was the channel of choice for many of our customers. So we're already quite, way down that

[00:08:23] path and it's since we implemented Genesys, we made some decisions about which digital channels

[00:08:29] we offer our customers and we're able to refine that and through use of the milestone reporting

[00:08:35] and text and speech analytics, we could understand what contact we handle better on

[00:08:39] digital channels and what we could contain in bot flows and allow customers the ability to

[00:08:43] self-serve and then it gave us that insight to say well this type of query actually customers want

[00:08:47] to interact with us digitally and we can offer them solutions without them having to speak to

[00:08:51] an advisor digitally which we couldn't have on a voice call. So that's progressed and we've built

[00:08:57] on and it's now just standard for us really that about 40% of our business is handled digitally

[00:09:02] and some of our channels we use proactively to take that customer effort. We use WhatsApp to

[00:09:07] communicate, to send out updates to customers without them having to contact us once they've

[00:09:11] initially registered something like a delayed bag at the airport.

[00:09:14] And as an ex-IT guy the belts and braces approach is you can only improve what you measure

[00:09:19] and there's a lot of distraction around new technologies at the moment but when I was doing

[00:09:22] a little research on you guys, customer satisfaction up 25 points, employee happiness up 12 points.

[00:09:29] Are there any other metrics that you use to measure the success of AI implementations in both

[00:09:35] customer and employee experience because it's not just about getting the new technology in there,

[00:09:40] it's what difference are we making how do we measure that? Anything you can share around that?

[00:09:43] We measure first contact resolution that's increased by six points year on year and that

[00:09:49] is quite a big shift for us because actually the complexity of our customer contact can sometimes

[00:09:54] mean that a repeat contact is sometimes often needed if somebody's changing a ticket etc.

[00:10:00] So to see our first contact resolution and really on the back of predictive routing because

[00:10:05] when you're putting the right, the customer in front of the right skilled age and who can

[00:10:09] handle that contact with proficiency, you will naturally see your first contact resolution

[00:10:15] increase. I think another one that stands out for me, we've talked about HTC, CSAT etc.

[00:10:20] I can't help but pick up on our employee attrition which is a 40 point improvement

[00:10:27] in the last two years and which is incredible because now that might not directly be related

[00:10:32] to just AI features but what it is related to is it is a far calmer, more positive environment

[00:10:40] to work in when you know that you're using AI to actually give, you're improving your

[00:10:46] agent occupancy, you're avoiding employee burnout and so that can't be overlooked.

[00:10:54] To go back to that piece about when we first started partnering with Genesis, the implementation

[00:10:59] was a serious undertaking. We were moving our workforce management, we were working our digital

[00:11:02] channels, our voice channels for various different parts of the business onto one platform and it was

[00:11:07] still against the backdrop of COVID recovery. We were still in that recovery period.

[00:11:12] In 2023, we started to be able to leverage different features to target specific business

[00:11:16] issues that have always existed to bring some of our specialist teams in to do email on there to

[00:11:21] replace services that we had prior to COVID and had to shelve because we no longer had the resource

[00:11:26] to do it and we're at the point now where we can really start thinking well what's the future

[00:11:32] look like? We've fixed it problems and now we're trying to preempt problems and differentiate

[00:11:36] the service through the use of AI. Talking about the future and we are very early stages on some

[00:11:41] of the things that we're talking about here but if we do try to look into the future a little bit

[00:11:45] I'm sure you can't share too much on this but how do you foresee the latest virtual agent or

[00:11:50] co-pilot enhancements further improving Virgin Atlantic's digital service delivery and

[00:11:56] is there anything that excites you about that possible potential on the horizon?

[00:11:59] So we've been in discussions with the guys over in Galway about these features that are coming so

[00:12:04] we are excited about answer highlight which is what we found was great about agent assist is

[00:12:10] our old the way we structured knowledge we had everything you could ever need to know about

[00:12:14] something and then an advisor needed to go through that and find the bit that applied to their

[00:12:17] particular customer whereas our new structure for knowledge and agent assist takes them to

[00:12:21] the relevant piece of information so answer highlight does that even better take you to

[00:12:25] the specific answer which is great the line of text if you need to give a really quick answer

[00:12:29] to a customer so we're looking forward to that being implemented. We're working with the team

[00:12:32] to understand what use cases the co-pilot will add value in our industry and our business

[00:12:38] because we have some requirements where we have very complex processes that we would like to see

[00:12:43] standardized to make sure everyone's following them consistently but these are quite involved

[00:12:47] processes so we need to find the sweet spot where the co-pilot isn't having to go through

[00:12:53] such a lengthy process that it becomes quite complex and then it's the chance for errors to

[00:12:57] happen and things so that's very much at the early stages discovery period at the moment.

[00:13:02] I mean I think I'd add and this you know this isn't something that's necessarily

[00:13:06] clearly placed on our roadmap this year but certainly something when I think about the

[00:13:10] future you heard me talk earlier about how the customer center is made up of your kind

[00:13:14] of contact center function but also customer care what I'm really excited about leaving here is

[00:13:19] really trying to just delve into the possibilities within a customer care department that don't have

[00:13:26] the natural channels like voice but actually you know is there any opportunity to automate

[00:13:32] those low value cases to actually then make sure that your humans are freed up for those more

[00:13:37] complex emotive transactions you know if I think about customer complaints you know it's a natural

[00:13:42] part of any business what I'm really excited about when I look ahead to the future is is there a way

[00:13:47] that we can segment how we how we deal with those those emotive use cases those customer journeys

[00:13:54] because you know we actually want to make sure that we can provide the best experience even when

[00:14:00] it's not been a great experience for the customer if they have to make a complaint what I'd like to

[00:14:05] do is how we leverage the AI features to actually drive those customer journeys as well. Yeah and I

[00:14:11] hosted a panel yesterday and the big theme was the last best experience anywhere any of us have

[00:14:16] anywhere becomes the standard expectation for the future and I suspect we've all got examples of

[00:14:21] just that so how do changing market trends expectations from your customers how do they

[00:14:27] influence your AI strategies particularly in delivering those seamless journeys across

[00:14:31] multiple regions and that enhanced expectation that becomes the standard? I think in terms of

[00:14:36] market trends I would probably say in terms of customer expectations I mean where there's

[00:14:40] certainly a customer expectation now that you will have some sort of web chat feature on your

[00:14:45] website customers don't wish to call us we do know from our own data that you know and we know that

[00:14:52] you know customers generally need to call us because they might not be able to self-serve

[00:14:56] that particular transaction online and we we know from our from our customer surveys that the

[00:15:02] expectation would be that they want to do it online so they don't want to have to call and so that

[00:15:07] that helps us drive those I guess those AI conversations around conversational bots etc

[00:15:11] you know where can we expose the the bot on our website at those crucial points where we know our

[00:15:18] customers are maybe struggling or yeah and you know we can see in the data that actually they

[00:15:23] it's a transaction that they they aren't necessarily able to self-serve therefore you place a web

[00:15:29] bot in front of them and with the potential to then hand off to a human you know that's a far

[00:15:33] greater offering I think for our customers but I think you know the reality is we've got a lot

[00:15:40] of work that we're focusing on within the customer center to drive the self-serve capabilities because

[00:15:47] we you know we think around maybe 50 60 percent on average of our voice contact is as a result

[00:15:53] of not being able to do that transaction online and that will always underpin all of our decisions

[00:15:58] around what's next on the AI features what what is the prioritization of those things and what

[00:16:05] what is ultimately it needs to drive a better customer experience

[00:16:09] a more efficient operation and largely reduce cost. And we are sat here at the experience event

[00:16:17] in Denver for Genesis I don't know how much of this you'll be able to talk about but with Genesis

[00:16:22] continually expanding its AI capabilities are there any specific areas of conversational AI and

[00:16:28] intelligence that you see as most valuable to Virgin and your continued growth and securing

[00:16:34] that competitive advantage? So on a tactical level some things we're looking forward to putting in

[00:16:38] the near future is we've talked about how people are important and we love getting our people

[00:16:43] engaged with our customers and things so we're looking at implementing the use of scorecards

[00:16:48] and gamification so using the AI capabilities and feeding our own data in so we create that

[00:16:54] this virtual circle where our agents are driving their own performance so they can see their

[00:16:58] scorecards and relationship to their peers and once we can feed our own data in as well as the great telephony

[00:17:03] metrics and messaging metrics you can get out of Genesis we can put in all of our sales

[00:17:08] information and things and we can understand what customers want to purchase what drives

[00:17:12] customers to purchase and the agents can start driving their own performance that way so in

[00:17:16] the near future that's one of the things we're looking to put in but as Louise has already alluded

[00:17:20] to there's a lot of things within our business we think could be automated through business process

[00:17:25] automation using AI so we're really excited to really delve into those steeply in the next few months.

[00:17:31] Fantastic well we are reaching the end of the event here so on that long plane ride home you would

[00:17:37] have had a lot of conversations with people on the show floor anything you're going to be reflecting

[00:17:41] about on that journey home? The big thing for me is CRM inside Genesis we have parts of our

[00:17:49] business who work in a sort of case management environment and when we first implemented Genesis

[00:17:55] it didn't feel like the features were there for us to migrate that over and now we're really keen

[00:18:00] on exploring that and that will allow us to leverage some unused aspects of the Genesis cloud

[00:18:07] like their external contacts and things like that then I think that will give us that holistic

[00:18:11] picture of our customers and we can personalize further then. Yeah I would absolutely agree with

[00:18:16] Michael actually it's CRM within Genesis for me it's that I think we've got some very

[00:18:23] exciting user cases customer journeys that we've not tapped into yet and I you know that that's

[00:18:29] really kind of getting me quite interested and excited in what could be the next chapter for

[00:18:34] our partnership with Genesis. And for anyone listening just wants to find out a little bit

[00:18:38] more information maybe inspired by your journey is there any way they can find out more information

[00:18:43] online or anywhere you'd like to point anyone listening that want to carry on the conversation

[00:18:47] or start a conversation with you about anything? Well by all means everyone is welcome to visit our

[00:18:52] website virginatlantic.com just to understand kind of the customer journey there the sort of

[00:18:57] the flow of how we support on both the sales and service side you can also then get to you know test

[00:19:03] our lovely chatbot our web messaging product but also you know if beyond that if there's any

[00:19:09] questions that any of our colleagues you know any externally have they can reach out to us on LinkedIn

[00:19:15] Awesome well I'll have links to that so everyone can find you nicely and I think it's really

[00:19:19] interesting because there's a lot of hype around AI at the moment there's a certain amount of

[00:19:22] cynicism in some areas but to have these real world use cases and not only that the measurable

[00:19:28] impact that you're having thank you so much for sharing that today. Thanks Neil. See you.

[00:19:32] As we've learned today AI's potential to transform customer and employee experiences

[00:19:37] is immense and Virgin Atlantic's journey with Genesis AI showcases the real world benefits

[00:19:44] of adopting advanced AI technologies from voice segmentation bots to predictive routing some

[00:19:50] incredibly cool things around that mentioned by Louise and Michael today and for me these

[00:19:55] innovations not only improve service delivery but also enhance overall satisfaction for both

[00:20:01] the customers and employees and that is the big takeaway but what role do you see AI playing in

[00:20:09] shaping the future of business how do you see it impacting your industry please share your

[00:20:14] thoughts join the conversation by emailing me techblogwriteroutlook.com twitter linkedin

[00:20:20] instagram just at neil c hughes but it's time for me to hit that show floor again so I'll be

[00:20:26] back again tomorrow with another unsuspecting guest but thank you for listening today and until next time

[00:20:34] don't be a stranger