Powerful partnerships: Leveraging AI for customer experience
SmartMeasures co-founders Mike Crooks and Libby Dale
Within the rapidly changing customer communications environment, the ability to harness the power of data analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) offers a strategic advantage to any business with the desire to change the narrative around customer churn and improve the customer experience.
Born from a desire to merge AI with behavioural science, SmartMeasures was launched in 2017 by co-founders Libby Dale and Mike Crooks. Having previously worked together in a large company and experiencing firsthand the advantage of using internal data powered by AI, Libby and Mike struck out on their own to make their vision a reality.
The path to creating this customer experience driven AI platform was an exciting but daunting period for the co-founders. Libby recounts how they approached the initial set up.
“From our experience, large organisations hold an enormous amount of data relating to their customers. It can be used to discover whether a customer is at risk of leaving or will become a future debt problem. The challenge they face is that the data is usually stored in disparate systems, and it can prove costly to resolve internally.
“We approached the challenge by merging AI with behavioural science, launching the Churn Prediction and Treatment solution in 2018; with our Debt Prediction and Treatment solution launching in 2023.”
By accurately predicting churn or debt early – before the event has occurred – we work with our clients using the “nudge” theory to guide the customer towards the preferred behaviour.”
This is where the behavioural science aspect of the solutions comes into play. SmartMeasures use a behavioural customer experience specialist to design messages that ‘nudge’ the customer towards the desired behaviour. Libby explains that designing messages to appeal to customers in various situations is a science, with every message tested against control groups – accurately measuring whether it changes customer behaviour to either not churn or pay their debt.
The power of partnerships
The path to implementing these solutions required a partner who would be able to provide a flexible delivery environment to customers through either SMS, email or print.
“We really struggled with generic mail houses in Australia as they generally only offer ‘batch type campaigns’ with limited ability to provide variability, whereas we needed the capability for the treatment AI to send the best-suited message to individual customers.”, explains Libby.
“Essentially, we needed to “intervene” to change their behaviour through sending time critical individual messages. It’s critical to have the right partner for AI to have the flexible environment to succeed, for us that partner was Zipform Digital.”
Andrea Candy, Head of Customer Relationships and Growth at Zipform Digital, described the relationship between Zipform Digital and SmartMeasures as symbiotic.
“Zipform Digital is not a traditional mail house – we look at everything with a digital first lens, with the production software technology which supports an AI led solution. We work incredibly closely with SmartMeasures within our separate areas of expertise, whilst achieving the best outcome for our mutual client, in this case a major East Coast based energy retailer.
“As a partnership, we have trust and understanding of what success looks like for our mutual client. The way we approached this collaboration has since led the way for other partnerships that Zipform Digital has established.”
Libby Dale agreed, revealing that each side of the partnership is pragmatic and collaborative in resolving issues.
“Neither of us seek to maximise their own interests at the expense of the partner or the best outcome for the client.”
Libby ends by sharing her view on the ultimate key to a powerful and successful partnership.
“Much like personal relationships, business relationships also thrive when there is a strong foundation of trust, open communication, collaboration, and mutual respect, along with a shared commitment to delivering the best possible outcome for the client.”
SmartMeasures, an Australian AI business, merges AI with Behavioural Science to drive tangible outcomes for utilities and energy retailers. Since 2018, their flagship churn prediction solution has significantly reduced customer churn. In 2023, they expanded to the US, offering debt prediction solutions. Unlike typical AI firms, they provide a managed service model, actively collaborating with clients for exceptional ROI.
They work collaboratively with Zipform Digital to deliver AI solutions for businesses in Australia.