AI21 Labs automates 82% of its customer support thanks to Intercom’s bots and automation

Challenge

AI21 Labs is a startup that specializes in developing artificial intelligence systems and aims to change the way that people create and consume information. The team needed a customer communications platform that would enable them to support and engage their growing customer base.

Prior to using Intercom, AI21 Labs's support was managed using Google Groups. The company's team of engineers would respond to support queries manually in these groups, which made scaling their support and collaborating across the team difficult. So, AI21 Labs wanted to implement a solution that would enable the team to leverage automation to drive efficiency, host a knowledge base to empower customers to self-serve, and facilitate more seamless collaboration so their team could create stellar customer experiences.

Solution

Intercom provided AI21 Labs with an out-of-the-box solution that it could use to hit the ground running and streamline its customer support. The platform's powerful automation capabilities have enabled the team to not only drive efficiencies internally, but also achieve their goal of empowering customers to self-serve.

In fact, using a combination of Custom Bots, Resolution Bot, and Articles, AI21 Labs has been able to boost its support automation efficiency rate (or "ROAR," rate of automated resolution) to an exceptional 82%. Resolution Bot is automatically resolving 41% of conversations it interacts with, Custom Bots are helping to resolve 45% of inbound queries, and the help center is empowering customers who are seeking support to resolve their own issues at an astounding rate of 79%. Additionally, proactive support – getting ahead of known issues and providing help before it’s needed – accounts for 5% of the team’s resolution rate.

"Thanks to Intercom, we’re seeing 82% support automation efficiency (or 'ROAR,' rate of automated resolution)," says Matt Lewis, Head of User Operations at AI21 Labs. "This increased efficiency allows us to maintain a healthy culture of highly professional individuals, instead of a churning system of junior support agents.”

AI21 Labs also leverages Intercom features like macros, which enables the team to build a bank of custom saved replies in the Intercom Inbox, to quickly reply to customers’ questions. This has led to a 39% decrease in the team's average response time, and has also shortened their time to close.