LIXIL develops and provides plumbing and home products such as toilets, bathrooms, and kitchens, as well as building materials like windows, doors, interior surfaces, and exterior surfaces.
LIXIL's Customer Service Department handles contacts about repairs and product questions after purchase and carries out improvement activities using VOC (Voice of Customer) data to ensure the LIXIL brand is top-of-mind for customers.
The Customer Service Department faced the challenge that consumers and construction companies installing their products could not solve their problems through the help center, causing their contact center to be overwhelmed with phone calls.
To address this issue, Helpfeel was introduced in 2022. The number of phone calls has decreased, and the speed of creating help pages has improved. We spoke to Mr. Takano, Mr. Nagasaki, and Mr. Kosui from the customer service department about the background of introducing Helpfeel, how it's being used today, and the specific benefits they're seeing.
Seeking a Customer-First Help Center That Reduces Burden on End Users
──Can you tell us about the challenges in the Customer Service Department before introducing Helpfeel?
Takano: The team I manage is on a mission to improve the NPS (Net Promoter Score) for the LIXIL brand. We consider LIXIL's customers to be the retail stores that sell our products, the construction companies that install them, and the end users who actually use them. However, our connection with end users was not as strong as with the other types of customers.
With the advance of digitalization in recent years, the environment has allowed end users to choose products they like by searching for them, shifting the trend towards end users choosing products themselves rather than just buying the fittings included with a house.
In this environment, to have our products chosen, we needed to be more proactive in our approach to end users than ever before, while also being mindful of customer retention. We thought we needed to strengthen our service measures to achieve this.
Nagasaki: As Takano said, with this background, we first conducted VOC analysis based on the opinions of end users received at the Contact Center and created help pages tailored to customer needs to improve the self-service rate. However, the search feature of the help center we were using at the time was poor, and customers could not find the information they wanted. Even when customers entered words into the search box, no articles were displayed, and they had to change the words and search again and again.
Kosui: On the other hand, there were many cases where dozens of help pages were displayed, and customers often didn't know which article to look at, so I felt that we were placing a burden on our customers.
Takano: If customers can't solve their problems using the help center, they will contact us. As a system-related issue, there was a problem with the uneven distribution of workload among members. Because of the history of our company, which was formed through a merger to become LIXIL, the people in charge of receiving contacts were only familiar with specific products. As a result, when we received complex contacts, we had to rely on specific members to deal with them, leading to a situation where the work became personalized and the workload was unevenly distributed among specific members.
Nagasaki: I thought there were two main reasons for these problems. One was that the system we were using at the time lacked a good search engine. The other was that we didn't have much SEO know-how, and I think we weren't able to create articles that would allow customers to find the right information when they searched.
──Were there any other issues with the system you were using at the time?
Takano: The system had many features, but we weren't really making good use of them. In fact, there were so many features that we ended up giving up on using them halfway through the operation. Instead of having too many features that we couldn't make good use of, we decided to focus on searchability and convenience for customers and began looking into replacing the system with a different one.
──Please tell us about the background to introducing Helpfeel as your new help center.
Kosui: We mentioned Helpfeel as one of the candidates for implementation and approached them in the fall of 2021. We were looking for a system with good search functionality. We wanted to create a system that would enable customers to accurately narrow down the information they were looking for when searching.
Takano: The main reason we decided on Helpfeel was that, in addition to its excellent search functionality, it was a system that specialized in what we wanted to do, considering that our company has a wide range of products and that the contacts we receive come from a diverse range of sources, including construction companies and end users.
Also, we had previously used a help center that was packed with too many features and was too difficult to use, so we had high expectations that Helpfeel would be easy for our members to understand and use smoothly.
The speed of updating help pages has greatly improved. Data analysis by Customer Success enables the PDCA cycle to run smoothly.
──Were there any particular things you tried to do when you introduced Helpfeel?
Takano: At the same time as we introduced Helpfeel, the Service Innovation Department also introduced Scrum as a framework. Until then, we had divided up the roles within the organization and the members had stuck to the roles they had been given, but we moved to a system where each member could work independently.
Nagasaki: The launch of Helpfeel was one of the missions of Scrum. I think that the fact that the UI was easy to use and had a low barrier to entry meant that even though we changed the system, there was no major confusion, and the members were able to grow quickly. Looking back now, I feel that Helpfeel and Scrum were a good match.
Kosui: In our day-to-day work, we try to publish help pages as quickly as possible. In the past, it sometimes took two months to publish a single article, and we spent a lot of time checking each word.
Now, we are conscious of the need to get new content out quickly, and we publish articles within about a week of starting work on them. We have also been able to speed up the VOC analysis process for creating article drafts. One of the reasons for this speedup is Helpfeel's knowledge base, which allows multiple people to edit articles simultaneously. We can now add or update 50 articles, including revisions, as we can finish revisions on the spot while having meetings. I feel that we are constantly renewing our help center.
──Can you tell us your thoughts on Helpfeel's customer success team?
Kosui: Thanks to the support of the technical writers, the quality of the help pages has improved, and you also provide us with detailed data analysis on a monthly basis. We are grateful for the figures you have highlighted for us.
Takano: We were able to gather a lot of data using the previous system, but because the data was so varied, we didn't know where to start with analysis and as a result, we weren't able to take any action.
Now, we are very grateful that Helpfeel has helped us to identify which data we should be looking at in the first place, and have helped us to narrow down the important data and set KPIs that will lead to improvement. You have created a situation where the PDCA (Plan Do Check Act) cycle is working properly.
Received the LIXIL Award for Energy Conservation and Productivity Improvement
──It's been about a year since you implemented Helpfeel. What kind of effects have you seen?
Kosui: The effects are clearly visible. The biggest result is the bounce rate. The bounce rate immediately after introducing Helpfeel was 43%, but it has now improved to below 37%.
Takano: The search usage rate has also increased, and the number of phone calls has decreased by 5-7%. I think there are environmental factors at play, such as the fact that customers are now looking at websites more than before due to the coronavirus, but even so, many people are now able to look at websites and resolve their questions before making a phone call. As a result, the staff who receive contacts are not as busy as they used to be.
──What are your thoughts on Helpfeel overall?
Nagasaki: There are few cases where people get stuck with the operation, and even new members who have just arrived due to personnel changes are able to use it immediately. In fact, a member who transferred from another department last year is already making the most contributions to help page creation.
It has also been well received by other departments within the company. Our products sometimes use difficult terminology to explain their uses and features, and I think customers appreciate the fact that even if they search for a feature using different terminology, the appropriate information is displayed in the search results. There have even been calls to display a pop-up search window on other pages too.
And this year, the Customer Service Department received an internal award called the LIXIL Award. I think the award was given in recognition of the fact that we were able to reduce the number of calls and cut back on manpower, and that our productivity had improved.
Aiming to Provide New Value, By Guiding Customers to Sales Pages and Building Up Knowledge, Rather Than Just Solving Problems
──Please tell us about your future plans.
Nagasaki: I'd like to provide more value than just solving customers' problems. We're currently in the process of directing customers to our showroom and sales sites in our help pages, to encourage repeat use. I'd like to contribute to the business in this proactive way, for example by responding to demand for e-commerce sales and home renovations.
Takano: In the medium to long term, we would like to make our knowledge more open. We think it would be good if we could publish as much information as possible, including knowledge for professionals who install the products, so that customers, construction companies, and distributors can all see the same information and solve their problems.
If this is achieved, all parties involved, both inside and outside the company, will be able to see the same information, so we can expect a reduction in the number of man-hours spent by sales staff and the number of individual contacts, which will also lead to cost reductions.
──Finally, please share a message to companies considering introducing Helpfeel.
Nagasaki: Helpfeel is not only an easy-to-use system, but the included support via customer success is excellent. We are able to improve with the advice of Helpfeel's experts, and I think you can expect to see results that exceed the investment you make.
