Because the team of the online printing and e-commerce platform Helloprint found the previous automation solutions for the customer experience in e-commerce too standardised, too inflexible and too cost-intensive, they took matters into their own hands without further ado – and developed their own AI-supported automation software with Engaige.
For the Rotterdam-based company of the same name, Helloprint founder Hans Scheffer, CIO and Co-Founder Michael Heerkens and Category Manager Tijmen van den Elzen brought on board Rory McElearney, who has been working for many years on the development of natural language models, among other things. But let’s start from the beginning.
Background
As Tijmen van den Elzen explains, the Engaige automation solution was born out of a real problem Helloprint had: They wanted to offer a high-quality service in several languages in a highly complex industry such as the online print world with its thousands of product variants, but they were not able to do so without massive costs. The automation solutions that the company tried were all too standardised and not advanced enough for the specific use case – and also required high upfront investments and minimum contract periods of twelve months and more. Moreover, the tools did not have the expected effect, says van den Elzen. So the team took the task into their own hands.
Automation made by Helloprint
Engaige, the automation solution that emerged, is based on generative AI and is thus supposed to be adaptable to the individual needs of businesses. It enables personalised, AI-supported conversations with customers and should also be able to handle and solve problems after the purchase, such as complaints or undelivered packages, independently. According to the developers, the algorithms are based on the respective business logic, the website content or that of the help centre, as well as on other data sources with which the AI can be specifically trained.
The new software solution for the customer experience comprises three major areas: Engaige Commerce for personalised “conversations” with the customers of online shops, Engaige Solve & Support for the automated processing and ideally resolution of existing customer tickets, and Engaige Insights to better understand the interactions of customers in the shop and to be able to discover trends or weak points.
Among other things, the automation solution relies on the existing CRM, e-commerce, payment or logistics platforms used by the customers and, according to Helloprint, also includes marketing solutions. The list of integrations is already extensive and is likely to grow over time.
High goals
But what can actually be achieved with Engaige? The development team is confident about the performance promises of the AI-supported automation solution: it should be possible to reduce the time needed to find solutions to any problems by up to 80 %, which should subsequently be reflected in a growth in the conversion rate of up to 20 %, among other things. At the same time, it is possible to reduce costs in the area of customer service and customer experience by up to 40 %.
How does Helloprint know that? Of course, the Dutch online printing and e-commerce specialist is a user of its own development. As co-founder Tijmen van den Elzen explains, the solution is in use at Helloprint in seven countries and is said to have already resulted in a 25% reduction in customer service costs, while customer engagement has increased by more than 80% as services are now available 24/7.
