McAfee Automates Online Service

Tell us about your organization. We're an Internet security company and one of the largest providers of best-of-breed computer security solutions that prevent intrusions on networks and protect computer systems attacks. What problems were you facing? Our main goal was to enhance customer experience on the Web. We're a company that takes a great deal of pride in providing first-rate support to our customers. We wanted to differentiate ourselves from the competition by offering our customers service they couldn't find elsewhere. So it wasn't a matter of fixing a problem that was broken, simply improving the services we offered. Specifically, we wanted to implement a technical-support solution that would improve customer satisfaction, shorten problem-resolution times, and reduce costs by minimizing the number of calls being escalated to the next support level. We needed a tool that would assist our agents with complex service issues for our customers by remote-controlling the customer's computer, thus allowing the customer to troubleshoot, watch, and learn how the technician fixes the problem. Secondly, we wanted to offer chat as a new medium to allow customers to communicate with our agents. Why did you select Citrix? We looked at a number of vendors and spent nearly a month evaluating various feature sets and technology solutions. While Citrix offered one of the most compelling solutions, it was their integration and professional services team that really sold us. We realized the implementation and rollout of the solution was critical for end-user buy-in, so their integration team made them the clear winner. How did the implementation go? The implementation of Citrix GoToAssist was completed in two phases. We started the first phase in November 2005 with the implementation of the remote-control capabilities. The second phase was initiated in May of 2006, and included the chat functionality. We encountered some problems during the second phase with integrating the chat functionality into our Siebel call center environment, but overall, the implementation went off without a hitch. To ensure agent buy-in, we worked closely with the integration team during the rollout phase to make sure that the remote capabilities and chat functionality operated seamlessly. By that I mean remote-controlled assistance and chat are both new technologies in the call center environment, so we wanted to ensure that there would be no surprises to either the agents or customers once we went live. What have been the main rewards? Today, when customers dial into support, they can either initiate a chat session with the agent by clicking on the link or ask the agent--either over the phone or via the Web site--to take control of their computer to fix the problem. In either case, we're using new technologies to help customers deal with complex service issues where a phone interaction would fall short, and educating them at the same time. We've greatly enhanced our customers' experience, and the stats from post-service surveys prove it. Seventy-six percent stated that using Citrix GoToAssist provided a better customer experience than they had previously. Even though cost savings wasn't a priority, the call centers have realized a 77 percent first-call resolution rate, which is an increase of more than 13 percent over the previous year, and a 32 percent reduction in escalation to higher support tiers. The remote capabilities are also allowing our Tier 3 support agents to solve more problems remotely, saving us the cost of having to send a technician onsite. Five Fast Facts

• AGE OF THE INITIATIVE? 2 1?2 years
• WHO WAS INVOLVED? Customer service director and VP of support
• BEST IDEA? Receiving agent buy-in and, during vendor selection, evaluating the vendor integration team that would help us implement the solution
• BIGGEST SURPRISE? The adoption rate among our corporate customers; despite corporate regulations and restrictions, many allow us to remotely control their computers
• BIGGEST CRM MISTAKE MADE? Poor planning that doesn't take into account all the stakeholders