Case Study: Dominion National

Dominion National’s IVR serves tens of thousands of calls monthly. Until recently, management and analysis were done on an ad hoc basis, which slowed response time and clouded insights into self-service outcomes. To improve both the effectiveness and efficiency of its self-service voice portal, Dominion expanded its use of NiCE CXone journey mapping and analytics tools to make several improvements to its caller journeys.

01 Before

Unstructured journeys

Dominion National had a great deal of data about caller interactions in its IVR, but what it lacked were structured insights. The company knew that roughly 70% of self-service interactions were completed successfully but had no formal processes in place to routinely analyze the nodes and scripted actions which promoted better self-service outcomes. The company was also in need of a review process to streamline those self-service interactions and hunt down trouble spots.

02 Desire to change

When complexity confounds outcomes

Dominion serves a national audience in multiple languages, but many insurance products are unique on a state-by-state basis. This means the company implements and maintains several dozen different caller journeys. With a lean staff, maintaining this large web was at times overwhelming. Having limited tools to harness the problem, Dominion found it difficult to assign a team to address the issue full-time. “When enough people would complain, one of us would go in and fix a problem with the IVR scripting or journey,” said Elbert Parker, Dominion National workforce manager. “But we were just putting bandages on the issues.”

With just basic reporting data at hand, Dominion National understood that as many as 50% of calls ended with the caller hanging up, without either speaking to an agent or reaching an IVR endpoint. With only partial journey insight, the company could not identify how many of those calls ended simply because the caller had received the needed information and felt free to disconnect, and how many reflected frustrations or a dead-end. These limitations and frustrations reported by callers who found unimplemented nodes or other issues with the IVR made clear that a more structured approach to caller journeys was needed.

“CXone Self-Service Analytics allows us toidentify where customers are struggling in their call journey, and make necessary adjustments in the IVR to reduce customer frustration and increase self-service.”

Damian Serrato

Call Center Analyst
Dominion National

03 NiCE solution

Journey mapping for streamlined interactions

Dominion National expanded caller journey insights with Self- Service Analytics, gaining dashboards for call performance and outcomes as well as deep-dive tools to audit IVR performance and improve outcomes. Data generated by Interaction Analytics is also available in Self-Service Analytics, making it easier for Dominion staff to incorporate in-call insights in journey planning.

Self-Service Analytics and the journey mapping construct also helped Dominion structure and formalize its IVR maintenance processes. “After all of those bandages, and after calibrating for these issues, we established that we needed someone to be dedicated to the IVR, and we were able to submit a job requisition and establish a position,” Parker said.

Event Analysis provides insights into how often callers engage with each step in Dominion’s dozens of caller journeys, including how often action scripts are called. These tasks were previously manual and cumbersome. New action scripts can also be built directly in the same interface used for analysis, reducing the time needed to repair a bug or create a new action to address an issue.

The Containment Insights screen provides a quick glance at the last two actions or events preceding a hangup. That extra context helps analysts more easily understand the call journey and assess whether the hangup was due to frustration or was a satisfactory call resolution. “Being able to quickly identify where customers are struggling in their call journey helps me make the necessary adjustments in the IVR, which reduces customer frustration and increases self-service call completions,” said Damian Serrato, Dominion National call center analyst.

04 Results

Streamlined self-service and smoother maintenance

Dominion National now has insights into volume and completion rates for each journey. This includes data on the number of callers making it through each journey, and at-a-glance data which provides more granular tracking of the root cause of each hangup. The company now tracks journey completion rates on a daily basis, making it easier to take corrective action before caller complaints pile up.

Visual mapping makes it easier to quickly correct broken or looping nodes and to fix incorrect voice guidance. The combination of visual and data tools helps Dominion National introduce new self-service options at steps where a higher number of hangups are noted. These tools also helped analysts eliminate dozens of unused action scripts and IVR nodes. In all, the review process revealed that 25% of scripts were underutilized or completely unused. Deleting them makes it easier to focus on maintaining and improving those actions that are crucial to call resolution.

In addition to having greater accountability and better responsiveness for call journey issues and glitches, the time and effort to repair an IVR journey error has been halved. Improving self-service journeys and outcomes also helps Dominion National reduce excess spending on call ports. The company has been able to eliminate 20% of its call port licenses without impacting service levels or sending callers to a busy signal.

05 Future

Support for a growing company

As Dominion National grows into new lines of business and markets, Self-Service Analytics is expected to promote better and faster outcomes for a wider range of customers. The detailed journeys will also help the company divert more calls, including onetime payments, to self-service resolution.

Follow Dominion National’s progression as one of NiCE’s key contributors and innovators with these additional resources:

Case Study: Dominion National’s Original CXone Adoption Story
Case Study: Dominion National’s CXone Chat Adoption
Video Testimonial: Empowering Agents with Scheduling
Video Testimonial: Reducing Manual Work
Video Demo: How Dominion National Utilizes NiCE CXone Self-Service Analytics