JPI Media offers essential reading through hundreds of newspapers, magazines and websites to help people in the UK make informed lifestyle decisions using trusted media. Multimedia campaigns remain a vital source of income in an era of declining circulation amid the rise of digital platforms. The business used to have teams around the country selling advertising space on the phone.

Anticipating market shifts, JPI Media introduced contact centre functionality and, after a failed pilot with another provider, chose the Genesys PureConnect Cloud application to consolidate its operations into three media sales centres in Edinburgh, Sheffield and Leeds. Subsequently, when the company wanted to evolve its sales centres and take advantage of the public cloud, it moved to the Genesys Cloud platform.

“Our previous Genesys solution provided what we needed in terms of optimizing our outbound calls and campaigns,” said Rebekah Avill, Head of Commercial Systems for JPI Media. “However, our long-term strategy was to move to a true public cloud platform with a single interface and open APIs for tight CRM integration and PCI compliance, which we couldn’t accommodate with our old system.”

Smart campaigns reach the right people
Outbound communications are better controlled and more effective. The preview dialling feature means agents can see the next contact on the list and tell the system to make or skip the call, at which point it’s removed from the queue.

“Running successful campaigns isn’t only about increasing dials and connections, it’s vital to make sure you’re targeting the right people,” said David Brewster, System Specialist. “That’s how you convert new leads to build a happy, loyal customer base. Genesys Cloud is very user friendly and excellent for compiling call lists and scripts.”

The opportunity to leverage the Genesys Cloud platform and integrate outbound with SMS is particularly attractive. “Many customers are busy tradespeople, such as plumbers and builders who have their hands full and cannot always get to the phone,” added Avill. “So, instead of placing a call it would be better to send a text to remind them their advert is due to expire, along with a quick link so they can renew when they get home from work.”

Additional business and resilience advantages
Switching to the Genesys Cloud platform has provided other benefits. Disaster recovery is certain. And, the IT team is no longer swamped with requests and can quickly adapt to changing business requirements. For example, during a temporary closure, JPI Media simply diverted calls between its Edinburgh and Sheffield centres.

“Shortly after going live, we needed to add our customer service teams to Genesys Cloud and move them away from the PBX environment they’d used for many years,” said Brewster. “We created, tested and executed the changes for 60 users and five new IVRs within a couple of weeks.”

We’re really pleased we made the move. We’ve got much better reporting and transparency of agent performance, call management and coaching requirements”

Rebekah Avill, Head of Commercial Systems, JPI Media

Having greater autonomy and time back means the IT team can work more with other departments that need support. Onboarding lead times have been reduced. Training only lasts an hour or so now that user experience is more intuitive. Small changes, such as single sign-on, mean agents no longer need to remember multiple passwords. “We’re really pleased we made the move,” concluded Avill. “We used to struggle to measure productivity and customer behaviour. And, although email was one of our most popular channels, we could only guess volumes and spot-check for quality. Now we’ve got much better reporting and transparency of agent performance, channel management and coaching requirements.”

It was a very seamless transition moving from our previous platform to Genesys Cloud. There was no disruption to the business. That was down to the experience and the skills of the Kerv team. It was clear that they were very experienced in implementing a pure cloud solution that would be tailored to the needs of our business.”

Rebekah Avill, Head of Commercial Systems, JPI Media

Enable home working with minimal service disruption, while maximising cloud and omni-channel innovation.

“Thankfully, we were already onboard with Kerv Experience and Genesys Cloud,” says customer services manager, Anna Gawthorpe. “That meant moving our supervisors and 20-plus advisors to remote working was pretty painless. They took their laptops home Friday and were up-and-running on Monday morning.”

The Genesys Cloud solution ensured there was no productivity loss. Home-based agents continued to handle 9,000+ calls a month, supporting local communities with a reassuring voice at the end of the phone during times of great uncertainty.

The situation was worsened by the launch of the NHS Track and Trace app, which generated extra calls from customers seeking guidance. The system handled them with ease. “It was important we were there when our customers needed us most, assisting with issues ranging from COVID-19 advice and refuse collection to free school meals and housing benefit enquiries,” says corporate manager, Joy Lake.

Greater care and understanding
Although at the start customers tended to make allowances, their tolerance levels changed during lockdown. Aided by improved reporting and call handling, the Council was able to closely match agents to specific situations, making flexible use of 17 different skill sets.

“Showing empathy and understanding is a natural part of the job, although it was needed more than ever during the crisis,” continues Lake. “This was reflected in our KPIs with, for example, average handling time increasing by a couple of minutes.”

Working smarter, not harder
With the old set-up, agents used to work in the dark, not knowing whether the customer had called before or who they had spoken to. “Kerv Experience helped integrate Genesys with our CRM system,” says Gawthorpe. “Now, it automatically calls up customer histories and case notes. So, they don’t have to repeat everything. And we’re able to resolve issues faster, while saving time on post-call work like logging details and follow-up actions.”

The Council is already planning its next Genesys-assisted innovation. “We can see a number of use cases for introducing web chat,” concludes Lake. “For example, a customer might want a date for their next bin collection, a blue badge form, or to book something into a recycling centre. Simple changes that, once again, will make a big difference.”

Now, we’re always in control and can see at a glance how we’re performing on call handling, queue times, service levels, and much more.

Amy Pereira, Contact Centre Supervisor, Ceredigion County Council