Scaling Success: Zywave's Global Support Transformation With AI and Change Management

Posted by Amanda Del Signore on Fri, Sep 08, 2023 @ 09:40 AM
Amanda Del Signore

22 spotlight Square-9-Sep-08-2023-01-37-54-9014-PMStevie-winner Zywave provides software and technology solutions for the insurance industry in the United States and internationally. It offers cloud-based sales management, client delivery, content, and analytics solutions.

More than 15,000 carriers, agencies, and brokerages worldwide—including all of the top 100 US insurance brokerages—use Zywave solutions to enhance client services, achieve business growth, and promote greater health, wellness, risk management, and safety.

Zywave’s all-in-one platform provides customizable, user-friendly options that enable insurance professionals to build a unique solution to fit their specific growth goals.

Prioritizing Customer Experience
The company’s support organization of 50 agents handles around 100,000 complex cases per year.

Led by VP of Support, Emre Tekoglu, the support team was looking to transform from a reactive model to a more proactive support experience. Additionally, Emre wanted to shift from a cost center to position support as a strategic element of the overall customer experience. 

They eventually deployed SupportLogic to predict potential escalations, as well as automate case evaluation and review. SupportLogic generated escalation predictions, provided customer sentiment trend analysis, and surfaced the best cases for managers to review.

SupportLogic helped Zywave quickly become more proactive and predictive by enabling managers and agents to better prioritize focus and customer outreach. Zywave also reduced escalations and kept CSAT metrics strong, achieving 96% satisfaction score for the month of July 2023. They plan to continue to work with SupportLogic to keep escalations low and draw from teachable moments for case reviews.

Not only has Zywave Support made significant technology investments to power improvement of the customer support experience, but also to improve the support reps' experience.

Expanding Global Support Operations
Zywave Support has transitioned from the central Milwaukee location with 28 support representatives into global support operations with over 70 people in various locations, including the Philippines, Boston, Dallas, and other remote locations, by embracing change management over the last two years. 

They have now shifted from reactive to proactive support in everyone's desired state in customer service organizations by prioritizing the right cases using AI/NLP technology. They can effectively predict 70% of escalations before they happen by leveraging their data and insights.

Support is now a destination career path for both internal and external candidates. The changes they made enabled the support team to become the most successful department in the company based on employee retention, even when the whole industry was facing widespread resignations.

Since Winning Their Stevie® Award
Through the convergence of process, technology, and most importantly, their people, Zywave is committed to delivering the optimal customer experience. They recognize this is an ongoing journey that demands a growth mindset and continuous learning.

Since the application period, Zywave has focused on the following:

New process - They launched a new function in support for incidents. By deploying a critical incident response function, they demonstrate their commitment to proactively address and mitigate issues that affect multiple customers, ensuring swift and effective resolutions to preserve their trust and satisfaction.

Focus on support team’s growth - They have introduced a volunteer day off option for employees to prioritize their support team members' personal growth and community engagement, while also cultivating a culture of empathy and social responsibility within the organization.

Further technology investment - By continually reviewing and adopting AI-powered solutions and emerging support trends, including case resolution using robotic process automation, they consistently optimize their ability to reduce time to resolution and elevate customer satisfaction levels, cementing their position as a customer-centric organization.

Zywave won a Silver Stevie Award for Best Use of Technology in Customer Service – Computer Industries, and Bronze in the category of Achievement in the Use of Data & Analytics in Customer Service in the 2023 Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service.

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Topics: Steve Awards for Sales and Customer Service