Lumen and Qualtrics Build New Customer Insights Platform to Boost Customer Service and Satisfaction

New real-time customer insights platform powered by Qualtrics allowed Lumen to increase NPS scores 17 points year over year

Lumen found that when their frontline service technicians feel recognized for delivering excellent customer service, they are nine times more likely to resolve customer issues in a single visit

Qualtrics, the leader and creator of the experience management (XM) category, expanded on its partnership with Lumen, a global enterprise technology platform and telecommunications company, to redesign Lumen’s customer and employee experience programs and improve the service it provides to customers.

Powered by Qualtrics XM® for Customer Experience suite and Qualtrics AI, the new Lumen real-time customer insights platform combines feedback from more than two dozen sources, including customer interactions, service performance, and market-specific trends in unstructured feedback like social media or call center transcripts.

These real-time insights into customer and employee experience performance allow Lumen to tailor its communication with every customer based on their specific needs and recent experiences. For example, call-center agents assisting a customer can see a Customer Health Score that fluctuates daily based on real-time operational inputs. The added insights enable agents to communicate with greater relevance, as well as empathy.

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As a result of its partnership with Qualtrics, Lumen achieved a 17-point year-over-year increase in NPS, indicating substantial gains in customer satisfaction and loyalty.

“Real-time data signals mean that our people can meet the moment and engage customers with empathy,” said Kristina Nissen, Senior Vice President, Strategic Pursuits and Mid-Market at Lumen Technologies. “Our new customer health scores powered by Qualtrics provide our people with a more comprehensive understanding of how to help each customer as an individual and which actions they can take to make the biggest impact on their experience.”

Contextual insights fuel smarter communications

Over a decade of research by the Qualtrics XM Institute demonstrates that how customers feel about an experience has the most significant impact on their future loyalty behaviors compared to other factors. Thanks to its longstanding partnership with Qualtrics, Lumen already had a wealth of experiential data showing how customers felt about their interactions with the company. But that data was missing operational context; for example, Lumen couldn’t tell whether an unhappy customer was offering feedback right after a technician missed a service appointment.

Lumen tapped into Qualtrics AI and natural language processing capabilities to build a comprehensive real-time customer insights platform that combines data from dozens of sources, including unstructured, unsolicited feedback that already exists in places like online forums, review sites, social media platforms, and chat or phone conversations as well as operational metrics like on time service delivery. That fusion of experiential and operational data enables better understanding of the types of Lumen experiences that have the largest impact on customer satisfaction and loyalty.

“Unstructured data represents close to 90% of the data generated today and Qualtrics AI enables organizations to extract rich information that paints a comprehensive view of customers’ experiences and pain points,” said Manisha Powar, Chief Product Officer of Qualtrics XM for Customer Experience. “Armed with this information, organizations can identify and prioritize the improvements that will have the most significant effect on customers’ emotions – boosting loyalty and profits.”

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Employee recognition feeds business outcomes

Lumen also used Qualtrics to establish a powerful link between Employee Experience (EX) and customer outcomes. With insights from Qualtrics XM for Customer Experience, Lumen found that when their frontline service technicians feel recognized for delivering excellent customer service, they are nine times more likely to resolve customer issues in a single visit.

Based on that insight, Lumen leaders stepped up the company’s promotion and recognition of great customer service within the company’s field organization. That’s led to savings on operational costs and time, as well as a more loyal and engaged workforce.

“You cannot drive exceptional customer experience, without unlocking the employee experience,” said Nissen. “For us, focusing on both experiences and empowering our employees is unlocking growth, profitability and increased customer loyalty.”