MTN Ghana boosts Net Promoter Score by 17% with Zendesk

Connected and consistent customer support

With a customer base of 29 million, mobile telecommunications company understands the importance of building strong relationships with people. The company provides a wide range of network services to suit the differing needs and lifestyles of its business and individual subscribers. Through MTN Mobile Money (MoMo), it also enables users to transfer money and make payments via mobile phone. Today, MTN Ghana has 120 Zendesk users, all providing connected and consistent customer support across a variety of channels.

Right place, right time

“Everything we do is centered around customer experience,” says Lionel Dodoo, digital CX specialist at MTN Ghana. “Although some customers still prefer to use traditional channels to access service, many are using data and digital tools such as apps and web services a lot more – a phenomenon that has seen a boost during and after the Covid-19 pandemic. That’s why we’re now providing a number of digital channels that offer ease and convenience.”

The result is that MTN Ghana can now be in the right place at the right time for each of its customers, providing joined-up support across all channels, seven days a week. This includes email, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google reviews. “Regardless of the touchpoint they contact us from, we’re looking to give customers the best experience possible,” adds Dodoo.

The company also pays close attention to its customers’ needs, whether they are within Ghana or outside the country using roaming services. “When customers are roaming, we’re able to provide a high level of support using Zendesk,” says Angela Solomon, customer social media & digital channels manager at MTN Ghana. “For example, let’s say a customer is in London and wants to use an MTN Mobile Money service, we’re able to use a video call integration on Zendesk to help verify the customer and authenticate their ID.”

Breaking down siloed communication

It wasn’t always this way. Prior to its phased roll-out of Zendesk, MTN Ghana’s customer communication was siloed across multiple channels. If a customer contacted the company’s customer support using WhatsApp and then moved over to Facebook to supply further information, communications across each channel would be separate.

Now, using Zendesk, its customer support agents can review all of a customer’s previous communications in one place. This enables them to gain insights from past interactions and solve problems faster. And as well as having a positive impact on MTN Ghana’s overall success, having a single customer view has led to increased productivity and higher job satisfaction among the agents themselves.

“By putting proper processes and workflows in place and automating a lot of the work that was being done manually, we’ve been able to optimize how our team works,” explains Dodoo. “We’ve deployed a number of features on Zendesk such as side conversations, priority routing, and video call assistance. This has added value and reduced the cost to serve per ticket. More recently, we’ve added integrations for Google Play reviews and Google reviews as a whole.”

Growing with the right tools in place

When it comes to measurement, key performance indicators (KPIs) that focus on customer satisfaction are critically important for MTN Ghana. These metrics include Net Promoter Score (NPS), first contact resolution (FCR) and customer satisfaction (CSAT). Since moving to Zendesk in 2020, the company has radically improved in all three areas.

Indeed, before implementing Zendesk, MTN Ghana recorded an NPS score of 80 percent, a figure that has now risen 17 percent to 97 percent. FCR has grown by six percent from 70 percent to 76 percent while CSAT has grown by three percent to 85 percent in the first half of 2022 compared to 2021. Tellingly, these impressive figures come at a time when the company is handling ever higher volumes across all channels. (Year-on-year growth of customer service volumes is 87 percent as of July 2022.)

“The results of our partnership with Zendesk have been fantastic,” insists Solomon. “Support is always available to help us and they really came through for us with an omnichannel platform during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Having a customer success manager assigned to us is also invaluable. She shares reports on how we’re faring, on agent productivity and on how much value our service is adding to the business. Zendesk even keeps us updated on new developments, industry insights, and webinars, so we can continue enhancing the service we provide to customers.”

What’s next?

So, what’s next for the MTN Ghana-Zendesk partnership? “First, we’re planning to enable additional channels such as Telegram as a digital support channel for MTN MoMo agents and merchants, and Apple Messages for Business,” says Dodoo. “Secondly, Zendesk will be integrated into our CRM tools, where it will give us more insights on customer behavior and enable us to make more informed decisions.”

As customer interest in the use of digital service channels builds, the company is also aiming to segment its support team to specialize in different channels and areas of focus – for merchants, agents, and consumers. It already has a chatbot, Zigi, functioning on both its website and WhatsApp, but is now planning to make the most of Zendesk’s Sunshine Conversations messaging platform to further develop its chat offering.

“Zendesk is a key player in providing great service across all our digital touchpoints,” says Dario Bianchi, chief digital officer at MTN Ghana. “It means we now have the foundation needed to accelerate our digital transformation through the implementation of self-service solutions like our chatbot, which is currently being implemented on our apps (Ayoba & MyMTN app).”