Before switching to 8x8, the Alliance was using an outdated Avaya PBX system that was becoming difficult to manage. “It was pretty much held together with duct tape,” says Brad Williams, Vice President of IT for the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance. “It didn’t have the capabilities that we needed to be able to run the contact center, especially during the pandemic.”
Debra and her team began the search for a new, all-in-one solution that would help bring their call center operations into the digital age while maintaining their customer-first ethos. As a support expert for her own customers, Debra was looking for a provider that would be a true partner. In the end, they chose 8x8 for both business communications and contact center. Ease-of-use and cost were factors in the final decision-making process, but the real deciding factor came down to something much simpler: “The team at 8x8 really took the opportunity to get to know us and our stories. 8x8’s presentation was uniquely tailored to us, and that was exactly the type of personal connection that we were looking for in a vendor,” says Debra.
The San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance opted to switch to 8x8 Work for business and internal communications and 8x8 Contact Center to handle customer calls and messages. The team started with a 90-day plan for the migration process, but they later reached out to 8x8 about seeing if it were possible to go ever faster. “8x8 stepped up, along with our internal team, and we actually had the system up and running in under 45 days,” says Brad.
Employees at the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance had hands-on support with switching to the new system. “Anytime you introduce a new technology, there’s always a learning curve. But we had some excellent training on 8x8. Within a couple of tries, they pretty much had it down,” recalls Debra. “And now whenever we onboard new employees, we introduce them to the communications system and they are amazed at how simple it is.”
One 8x8 feature that has made a big difference for the Alliance has been 8x8 Supervisor Workspace, the one-stop interface with everything supervisors need to ensure that their teams deliver excellent customer experiences. “8x8 Supervisor Workspace is very easy to use and it allows us to see everything we need to know, all in one place,” says Brad. “And high visibility is invaluable because it allows us to get a better sense of our operations. We have managed to help more people than ever because 8x8 allows us to see exactly what is going on.”
With 8x8, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance has experienced some massive improvements across the organization. Since making the switch to 8x8, the average speed of answer improved by a massive 69%. Additionally, the team made some adjustments to the callback option, shrinking the callback wait time from 15 minutes to just three minutes. “In the last three months, we were able to assist an additional 11,000 callers, reduced our SLA’s by half, and have received very positive feedback from our callers,” says Debra.
There has also been a big change when it comes to the visibility and insights in 8x8 Supervisor Workspace to the seamless communication between teammates in 8x8 Work. “Thanks to 8x8, we have data that we never had before, which allows us to answer more calls, resulting in more revenue and more funds raised for wildlife,” says Brad. These insights are also critically important for agent coaching and identifying opportunities for improvement within the call center. “The team really appreciates having access to real data that helps them understand if they are doing their job to their full potential,” he says.
“We are in a very competitive market here in Southern California,” Debra adds. “We really want to be the best in class for anybody who calls us and visits our facilities. 8x8 has allowed us to better understand what our customers are looking for and how we can best serve them.”
