From overwhelmed phone lines to SA Health's first virtual employee - How we built virtual agent Zoe in six days to respond to COVID-19 - Clevertar

From overwhelmed phone lines to
SA Health’s first virtual employee

   How we built virtual agent Zoe
 in six days to respond to COVID-19

If you’ve been on SA Health’s              “The primary objectives were to provide
website since early April, you’ve          the public with an additional, reliable
probably met Zoe. She’s a virtual agent    source of COVID-19 information, and
that we built and launched in six days     ultimately allow our operational services
to help SA Health respond to a surge in    to focus on delivering health and
COVID-19-related queries to the state’s    emergency services.”
hospital switchboards and contact lines.
                                           Establishing Zoe’s operational purpose
Here’s a look at how we built Zoe in six
days and some of the top level results     In the high-volume environment that
that SA Health has enjoyed since. But      ensued following the COVID-19
first, let’s start with the problem:       outbreak, triage became a priority.

Too many enquiries, not enough             Zoe had to be built to connect people
customer service agents                    with content and answers that don’t
                                           really require a human interaction—
As COVID-19-related queries lit up         really the lion’s share of the massive
contact centres around the world,          influx of enquiries. To get there, the
health departments like SA Health were     team had to answer these questions and
being bombarded with enquiries from        rapidly:
concerned citizens looking for health
information at a time of uncertainty.         Why are people calling?
                                              What are they most worried about
COVID-19 presented a unique business          right now?
need requiring rapid responses and            What is the most high-value piece of
deployment, fitting with Clevertar’s          information SA Health needs to
capabilities,” says SA Health chief           convey to the people of South
executive, Dr Chris McGowan, who soon         Australia?
became aware of the product and               What are Zoe’s objectives?
expressed interest in trialling it.           What is the ideal outcome for the
                                              customer and their customer?

“The primary objectives were
to provide the public with an
additional, reliable source
of COVID-19 information, and
ultimately allow our
operational services to focus
on delivering health and
emergency services.”
SA Health Chief Executive, Dr Chris McGowan

Organizing and structuring the                Determining a content design plan
information already available
                                              To create this kind of experience, we
To deploy Zoe fast, the next step was         took the information provided by SA
to determine what information we              Health (see graphic below) and put it
already had available that she could          into a format that can be used as a
use to handle customer enquiries.             decision tree by our virtual agents
                                              (Zoe).
We started with the graphic below.
While this document is useful in and of       This stage is about taking the expertise
itself, it’s one-way—it relies on the         from our client and putting it into a
person reading it, understanding it, and      content design that can be
then acting on the advice.                    communicated by our agents—so they
                                              can share that expertise 24/7 in a two-
The benefit of having a virtual agent to      way, conversational way.
communicate this information is that it’s
happening conversationally. People can
articulate their question or issue in their
own terms, ask follow up questions,
and drill down to what they need much
faster.

What does a COVID-19 expert look like?
                                         All of these questions needed to be
Good question! Graphically speaking,     addressed in order to create a digital
Zoe went through a few transformations   persona that customers would view as
as you can see below. What uniform       authoritative.
does she wear?
                                         As you see below, Zoe is wearing the
What look conveys trust and subject      South Australian government’s specific
matter authority? And does she need a    shade of blue so that she’s uniform and
uniform?                                 looks official.

What’s in a name?                          Our team at Clevertar put Zoe through
                                           her paces to make sure things were
Next, we needed to give her a name.        working seamlessly before handing
You can name your agent whatever you       over the keys to the customer so that
like and in this instance, she was named   they could test it from their point of
‘Zoe,’ the Greek word for ‘life’. We and   view.
SA Health liked it because it was easy
to say and easy to remember for the        Just like a new employee, you want to
customers engaging with her.               make sure your virtual agent is saying
                                           all the right things and representing
                                           your organisation in the best possible
What does Zoe sound like?                  light.

In a time of public panic, Zoe needed to   On day 5, Zoe passed her performance
be authoritative, calming and              review and was ready to be integrated
empathetic, so we had to find a            on the SA Health website in a way that
voiceover artist who could convey both     complements the existing look and feel.
and we did so in just a few hours.

                                           Deployment stage and training
Developing content and getting it
ready for testing                          In a global pandemic, with information
                                           changing rapidly, you don’t want to
Next, our technical implementation         have to rely on an external team to
team took that high-level information      change something in your script.
and, working with content experts at SA
Health, began to structure it and script   Information can become redundant in
it out for Zoe.                            two minutes, which is why we empower
                                           and train our clients like SA Health to
Essentially, we took the SA Health         update content themselves through our
flowchart and turned it into a             easy-to-use web portal.
conversation.
                                           You don’t need to be a software
                                           engineer to update it either, so as
Testing and iteration                      restrictions or health advice would
                                           change, SA Health’s team were able to
This was a critical part of the process.   quickly make changes to ensure Zoe
We wanted to ensure that the Zoe           was up to date at all times. This
experience was thoroughly tested by        remains true today.
both internal users and our customers.

Optimisation and constant iteration        In South Australia, the testing regime
                                           changed very rapidly so it was essential
You can test and optimise for as long as   that Zoe be constantly optimised to
you want, but the true test is getting     reflect that. Today, her playbook is
real customers to engage with Zoe.         expansive, and she’s even able to
These interactions create a tremendous     provide links to additional information.
amount of data, which can be used to
refine the experience.
                                           Key changes over the ten weeks
While Zoe was initially developed in six
days, we then spent ten weeks                 Zoe has now got five times the
constantly refining Zoe to answer a           amount of content that she did at
wider range of complex questions              inception.
beyond the set of pre-defined                 Zoe started with ten frequently
interactions we launched with.                asked questions, that’s now more
                                              like 60 FAQs.
We were able to be responsive to              Introduced natural language
trends we were seeing and updated the         understanding, which allows users
flowchart five times in three weeks to        to write free text into the system
reflect the latest health advice and          and have Zoe analyse what they are
information.                                  asking and then send them the
                                              correct information.

Results. Did people actually use Zoe?       The length of the conversation really
                                            depends on subject matter. Our mental
Yes, they did. Since her launch on the      health agents speak with a customer
8th April, Zoe has assisted more than       for an average of four minutes.
34,000 people, with half of those
enquiring late at night after the call
centre has closed.                          How did we do it in six days?

As the content has been built out,          By following these steps, leveraging SA
customers are now engaging with Zoe         Heath’s existing expertise and materials
for longer, on average around a minute      and scaling the conversations that were
and a half and end the conversation         already happening.
once their query has been answered.

Why does Zoe work?                          young people prefer to message an
                                            online bot to ask business questions.
Gone are the days of waiting on hold
for hours with customer service,            Plus, our own research has shown that
particularly during a pandemic. Today,      people enjoy engaging with our virtual
people are more and more tech-savvy,        agents. One trial demonstrated people
especially younger generations, and         enjoyed talking to our agents more so
they prefer easy, on-demand options as      than their doctor.
a result.
                                            Six days is a quick turnaround, but
The numbers don’t lie: according to         necessity is a great motivator.
Microsoft, 90% of consumers now             Ultimately, we were so proud to assist
expect an online portal for customer        SA Health in alleviating some of the
service enquiries. Research also tells us   pressures on the health system,
that younger generations have a             allowing their vital staff to triage more
preference for online information           complex enquiries and make sure
readily available at their fingertips. In   everyone has access to accurate and
fact, Mindshare found that 63% of           timely information about COVID-19.

Ready to deploy a virtual agent
              on your website?

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platform and its impressive results in real-world deployments, check out
                            www.clevertar.com.

Clevertar is an award-winning Australian company that provides
              virtual agents for consumer engagement.

Our virtual agents are developed beyond chatbots to personalise and
  interact with customers using your specific scripts and direction.

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