How online retailer Verkkokauppa saves € 330K per year with automation

Verkkokauppa's virtual agent takes on the workload of 10 agents.
BackgroundConnector_Red_2
VerkkokauppaCaseStudy_HeaderImage_628x628_2x
Icon
15% increase in one-touch resolutions
Icon
€ 330,000 saved yearly
400 agent hours saved weekly
Icon
Workload halved for special shipping requests

Verkkokauppa at a glance

prod3.3

The customer

One of Finland's biggest and most popular online retailers

why5.1

The market

Verkkokauppa supports its global users in 3 languages: Finnish, English, and Swedish

inte9.2

The support team

A team of 30 handles support requests alongside a virtual agent for chat and ticketing

tele2

The situation

Too many requests via phone, duplicate tickets, and high handle times due to manual ticket routing

inte9.3

The solution

With automation, Verkkokauppa made chat their main contact channel, while ticket routing helped drive up first contact resolution rates in the process

inte3

The CRM

Zendesk

The Ultimate collab, in numbers

Increase in one-touch resolution 15%
Workload decrease for special shipping requests 50%
Agent hours saved weekly 400

Verkkokauppa's Ultimate journey

Chat stats

With automation, Verkkokauppa wanted to move incoming requests from other channels, particularly phone, to chat. Sure enough, chat traffic increased from 8% of total support volumes to 40%. But now, with automation, one single bot is able to handle most of them (vs. 10+ human agents.)

Ticketing wins

Verkkokauppa's one-touch resolution rate went from 60 to 75% thanks to automated routing. Whereas a sudden Covid-induced spike in volumes had once created a backlog that took 3 months to work through, automation now ensures they'll never face that situation again: The team now gets backlogs down to zero within a couple of days, especially because ticket automation prevents ticket duplicates.

Ultimate vs. the competition

In 2020, Verkkokauppa saw website visits grow by 50%, as people shifted their shopping online. This growth also meant more tickets, especially during peak season. So the company decided it was time to look to technology to help their agents work more efficiently.

Before signing with Ultimate, AI and Operations Manager Elina Ruuska had been piloting automation with another provider. But Elina recalls how it soon became clear that Ultimate brought to the table the ROI and collaborative culture they were looking for.

Elina_CleanBackground_Color_800x800_1x
“Communication with Ultimate was a big part of why we chose them. They made us feel that whatever issues might happen, they would be resolved.”

Elina Ruuska
AI & Operations Manager, Verkkokauppa

The runner up

A hierarchical business relationship

No real-time comms

No flexibility: “You bought it, you deal with it” mindset

Ultimate

A collaborative culture throughout negotiations, product onboarding, and continued work on the product

A dedicated Customer Success Manager, bi-weekly check-ins & an open ear whenever needed

Evolving together with the product

VerkkokauppaCaseStudy_ContentBlock_1_2x_3

Automation use case spotlight: Rapid ROI with routing

  • Before, agents needed to manually label and route high priority tickets

  • Now, customers can automatically add special shipping requests (like express shipping) upon checkout

  • The virtual agent then gathers additional information before escalating more complex questions to a human agent, driving down handle times

  • Workload on this intent has decreased by 50%: Agents are no longer tied up by admin tasks and can use their time to serve customers where their human warmth and creativity is required

“Faster full resolution is really helping us with our CSAT, thanks to upfront data collection by the bot.”

Elina Ruuska
AI & Operations Manager, Verkkokauppa

VerkkokauppaCaseStudy_ContentBlock_2_2x

Automation use case spotlight: saving AHT with ticket pre-filling

  • Before, agents would need to tediously look up, then copy and paste generic information into email replies

  • Now, the bot automatically fills in relevant information and responds to emails in seconds  

 

“Adding one solution (ticket) to another (chat) made getting started so much easier. We had been using chat before, so we were able to harness a lot of data from our own customers - so beneficial!”

Elina Ruuska
AI & Operations Manager, Verkkokauppa

Ultimate automation highlights, according to Verkkokauppa

career17

Cost-efficient

Their virtual agent takes care of the same workload as 10 full-time employees — that’s approximately €330,000 saved each year

prod2.2

Scalable

Automation takes away the stress of unexpected support request spikes (and having to hire additional agents to manage these surges)

inte5

Multilingual

Powered by conversational AI — instead of simple translation tools — our solution helps Verkkokauppa provide support in English, Swedish, and flawless Finnish

why5.3

So quick to get started

It only takes 2 hours to onboard support agents to the new bot

VerkkokauppaCaseStudy_ContentBlock_3_2x

The support team: cherishing chat & embarking on automation careers

Fun fact: The team named their bot “Ilmari" after the team member that used to run their live chat before automation. 
 
In news we love to see: Elina Ruuska was promoted from Technical advisor to AI & Operations Manager after Verkkokauppa implemented automation
“Chat used to be our agents’ least favorite channel. Things were hectic, they were serving 8 customers at a time, and it was hard to focus. Now, it’s the most sought-after channel."

Elina Ruuska
AI & Operations Manager, Verkkokauppa

Ready to streamline your support with automation?

Get in touch