“Lockout Scenario” Chatbot Journeys

Problem

One of the top contact drivers for Hulu are lockout scenarios, meaning customers who are unable to log in to our app or website. Customers can be locked out of Hulu for a number of reasons, one of them having to do with issues related to the email address on file.

There are a number of tools that customers can use to regain access to their accounts. However, these tools won’t work if one of the following is true:

Email address on file no longer exists
Email address on file contains a typo
Customer cannot remember email address on file
Customer is billed by a third party as opposed to being billed directly by Hulu

In the event of these cases, customers need to contact customer support. Unfortunately, in order to contact customer support, a customer must log in to their account. But how can they do that if they’re locked out? Catch-22!

Solution: Hulu’s chatbot (aka “HuluBot”) is the one contact channel that can be accessed by unauthenticated customers. We could use HuluBot to ingest these cases, assist within the bot’s scope of support, and escalate to a human agent as needed.

Objective

Create chatbot journeys within HuluBot that would assist customers with lockout scenarios. To successfully reduce contacts, HuluBot must learn how to distinguish between cases that can be resolved by the customer and those that need to be escalated to customer support.

Stakeholders

A.I. Analyst, Support Product Manager, Digital Content Editor, Content Manager

Timeline

Oct 2019 - Mar 2020

My Role: Conversation Designer

Determined that all possible paths within this chatbot journey would lead to one of two end points: self-service or agent escalation
Identified all probable causes for “lockout scenarios” so that HuluBot could learn to ask the right questions and provide appropriate assistance
Mapped out all paths within the “lockout” chatbot journey to accurately distinguish between paths that could be self-serviceable and those that would require escalation
Designed and wrote 4 separate chatbot conversations related to “lockout” journey:
- “I can’t log in to Hulu”
- “I forgot my email address”
- “I forgot my password”
- “I need to manage my registered devices”
Crafted questions for each of the “lockout” journeys so that HuluBot could accurately determine the root of the issue and set customer off on the right path
Partnered with Hulu Viewer Experience stakeholders to create a specific phone number that HuluBot could provide users in cases where escalation to a human agent was necessary
Made “Lockout scenario” journey easily accessible to customers by pinning it as an option within HuluBot’s main menu
Collaborated with Content Editor to review all copy for tone, style, and accuracy
Partnered with the Content Editor and A.I. Analyst to identify help center articles that could bring further value to customers by including HuluBot entry points
Crafted contextual greetings for HuluBot to use whenever customers initiate a chat from one of the “lockout” entry points. This way, HuluBot can immediately display content that’s relevant and specific to the user
Participated in user acceptance testing

Results

Since the “Lockout scenario” journey launched in March 2020, the three Hulu Help Center articles where the journey was embedded experienced a 4-16% increase in the percentage of “yes” votes to Was this article helpful?
The average handle-time for contacts originating from this chatbot journey was just under 3.5 minutes, significantly lower than for similar contacts that came directly via phone
Hulu’s Social Support team now directs customers with login issues to HuluBot rather than posting our phone number on social media
Conclusion: All of this data shows the power of automation to help our customers and agents spend their time together as productively as possible