243: Fireside with Vaishali Dialani

Charlotte Ward: 0:13

Hello and welcome to episode two hundred and forty-three of the Customer Support Leaders Podcast. I'm Charlotte Ward. Today, welcome Vishali Delani for a fireside chat. I would like to welcome to the podcast today Vishali Delani. Hi Vishali. It's lovely to have you join me for the first time. We met uh two or three weeks ago, and I've since had COVID. So I hope everyone will forget, for forgive a croaky voice on my part, and I will I will try and muffle my coughs as well. But I do remember we had some super interesting conversations around the particular challenges that you're facing in the environment that you're working in and the support experience that you're building. But first of all, for the benefit of our listeners, would you please introduce yourself?

Vaishali Dialani: 1:07

Thank you, Charlotte. I'm super excited to be here. Um, so I work for a fintech company as the head of customer experience. Um, we are basically providing bank accounts for the low-income migrant workers in the UAE who cannot afford to otherwise um have access to financial services. Anyone earning less than 5,000 drams in the UAE cannot afford a bank account. Um so we provide them with digital bank accounts, along with that, also access to smart cards through which they can make online transactions, card transactions, and actually use them at um ATM and everything else. So full one-stop destination for their financial services is what we offer them through NAMANI.

Charlotte Ward: 1:50

Very cool. And what a noble cause as well. I love that. Um, very, very empowering for your user base, but quite a quite a unique user base, I would imagine, to try and build a support experience for. And that's what we're here to talk about today, isn't it?

Vaishali Dialani: 2:06

Yeah, so it's very true. Because especially with our user base, they're very different. They're mostly from the South Asian uh market, such as India, Pakistan, Philippines, Bangladesh, who are immigrant workers in the UAE working across you know different uh industries, such as construction, hospitality, um, and or even as cleaners. So they really are um extremely their literacy levels are extremely very low. And it when it comes to like being familiarized with the digital world, it's very different because back home they do not really uh haven't used smartphones much, but when they've moved to the buy in the UAE and Middle East, they really needed smartphone access to smartphones because that would that's their only lifeline to family back home. So um, so it's very new for them in to be part of this digital world itself.

Charlotte Ward: 2:56

Well, that's interesting. That's interesting. So it's a it's a tool that they've they've come to need for other purposes, but it also enables them to access finances in a way that also wouldn't be possible in the new um environment and economy that they're operating in, right? So so what are the what are the challenges then? What's the biggest challenge? I guess I was going to ask from your perspective what the biggest challenge was, but I'm actually going to flip it round and ask from your customers first. What are your customers' biggest challenges in terms of of uh accessing money, accessing funds? And uh, you know, we talked a little bit about this, we touched on the difficulties of of um being part of the economic landscape in the UAE. Um, but as the smartphone enables all of that, and your app enables all of that. What's the biggest challenge and how do you solve that for your customers then?

Vaishali Dialani: 3:51

So, in terms of customers, I think their biggest challenge would be um, I hope I'm able to do justice to their challenges, but I really I think the biggest challenge really is being able to build trust, um, especially because they earn such a low amount and they spend 80 to 85% of that um send money back home to their families. The only thing that they have left is 15% for themselves. Um, so I think a huge amount of trust when they have to send it through a digital app compared to being going to a brick and mortar exchange house and expecting someone else to make that right transfer for them, just handing over something and making sure that the money is sent. Um, so I think trust is the biggest challenge. Secondly, it is the um I use of so and the second one I would say is um internet. They all have data packages, but the limit the because they work for such long hours, they don't usually get the chance to use their phones a lot. So the only time they come back and use their phones are to speak to their family back home. So the limited uh availability of internet throughout their day or as a part of their lifestyle or routine, I think, is another challenge for them.

Charlotte Ward: 5:00

Which is as much about the cost of using that internet, I guess, as the time at the time available and and the sheer number of things they must want to accomplish in that limited time. So so you're solving some of those problems for them, I hope. I like to think. Let's let's start with trust. How are you building trust? Um, I mean, I guess the app has a big part to play in that, the product, the way it presents, the the uh the reputation and everything else. Um so maybe you can talk a little bit about that, but then from a support perspective, do you add to that trust? How do you add and build on that trust?

Vaishali Dialani: 5:40

Yeah, no, that's a really good question. Um, I really hope that we do uh uh you know help solve their challenges. Um so in terms of trust, we do quite a few things. And because the market might seem like a standard way of behavior, um, behavioral patterns, but it's actually very different because each um nationality behaves in a different way. And within like um the way they think is very different, their mindsets quite different, the way they send money is very different. So we then still have to look at it as targeted segments within our existing user base as well, despite them having similar um, you know, salary payments uh or the amount that they receive. So, in terms of building trust, we really focus on ensuring they know what's happening. Effective communication is an absolute key for our customers. They are very curious and they're highly engaged with us, but they need to know uh and they need that cushion of support that someone's taking care of me and being able to humanize our brand has really made a huge difference for us in terms of building that trust. So, you know, personalizing the way we message them, uh just saying, you know, hi Charlotte, instead of like, hi, this is your nominee account or this is your salary account. We sort of just more have personalized messages across. Second thing is continuously updating them through everything. Like Pete, if you're sending money, we tell them, right, now it's been processing. Now this is happening. Your receiver will receive it. We don't say, like, we even name the receiver. Say if you've said, you know, um, Amman has to receive, we'll say aman is waiting for the money to be collected. So we're just making the whole brand or the financial um experience of sending money more humanized in the way. Um, if you tell them a reference number, we support them. The third one is we support them by telling them what to do next because they don't know what to do next. So, like guiding them through the process, uh through effective communications and being super proactive with the way we speak with them has really helped improve their trust with the brand. In terms of other things that we do in terms of improving our service or just building our trust, is educating our customers. So, like doing different things that we know work for our customers based on historical data that we have or quantitative, qualitative um analysis and insights that we have done as a part of our research with these customers to understand, right, you know, say um, you know, one set of users think in a certain way. And we do a lot of experiments saying, does this work, does this not work in terms of communication with them as well? So I think a lot of trial and error to learn about our customers. Um, and then sort of once that pilot test works well and you know, our hypotheses are validated, we then run a test uh across the entire user base. And we've seen that really work very well for us in terms of building trust.

Charlotte Ward: 8:27

Yeah, yeah. I I mean there's so many good learnings there that we can all take. And and you know, the I can't imagine there isn't an organization out there that doesn't want to build trust with its customers. Um, and and just humanizing the experience. And it's some of the things you describe are quite simple. There's there is just being more personal, there is be being more communicative and proactive. But that education piece is is really interesting as well. You know, this is what you should do next. And also, like I guess operating, like building a library best practices and things like that. This is how this is how gen generally this thing works. This is what we think you should do next. That's all it's becoming that trusted advisor, isn't it?

Vaishali Dialani: 9:14

Yeah. And in terms of even like educating them, you know, it's all about um how we can we use different interaction models in terms of communicating with them. It's not only about them reading a text, it's about them watching a video or listening to an audio, or it's maybe like an interactive game, gamification. So it's we're using different models to try and see what our users engage most with and what helps them understand uh, you know, the brand really well and the service really well.

Charlotte Ward: 9:45

So what when they when they do have a problem then um and they do end up engaging with the support team directly. Uh how do you take that further? Do you is there, I mean, I guess some of the things you describe are very product driven, the the interactions with those emails, something is at such a stage. What do you as it what does the support team do to support all of that?

Vaishali Dialani: 10:10

So it's very interesting because we support our user base in nine different languages just to be able to cater them and make them feel really warm and welcome. Like our, you know, our IVR is not something that's really long and complicated. It's just very simple, like one or two. It's not, it's very simple in the way they have to choose. You don't give them too many options because that sort of doesn't work for them as well. And once they do the select a language, it's very easy because they know that they can actually explain their grief or their complaint or inquiry in their language. I mean, it's such a small thing, but the amount of difference it makes just to like be able to, you know, communicate with us in their language, we've seen that quite um useful in terms of getting qualitative insights about how they really, really feel emotionally connected to money or to our brand, uh, which is very interesting. So once, say for example, uh, you know, we have a problem and someone, a customer has called us and inquired about something or has some problem, we then actually, you know, collect at least one month data and review it as a support team to understand if we have 30% of calls for um, you know, our activation or onboarding process, we then try to break them down in qualitative of like out of that 20%, out of that 30%, 70% is maybe they don't understand the barcode, or you know, the remaining 30% is that they don't know the login or they don't know they have to set a password. You then we then pick on those users, do a set of research to understand exactly what they felt at that time. And from a customer experience perspective, I then sort of once I've called consolidated, you know, what the customer support team has given feedback, what the user research has said, I come up and design a few options, uh, and then we discuss it internally, the pros and cons. We do a few more rounds of user testing, what works for the user, do they understand it? Does that solve their problem? And after a few back and forth feedback loops, um, once everyone's aligned from a cross-functional perspective from product, you know, uh tech, um, customer service, as well as operations, we are then ready to like put it in the sprint and it's ready for production. So it's sort of uh as a cross-functional team in terms of support and experience, we just go hand in hand to make sure that we cover everything that the user needs.

Charlotte Ward: 12:34

Um exercises like that are great and and they are often used. Um the objective of those exercises is often to deflect tickets, right? I think that's that's so often the the I think it's becoming a bit of an archaic concept, just just as an objective in its own right, like just to deflect tickets. But I think um I think another perspective on that is is just that improved customer experience, making things simpler. It it doesn't mean you don't want to talk to your customers, you're improving the experience for them. Um when you've been through that exercise, then is is ticket deflection your I guess I mean I don't want to say is it your primary purpose, but but because I think I think that everything you describe probably feeds into that trust aspect as well, doesn't it? Ease of use is is gonna be a big one.

Vaishali Dialani: 13:31

Yeah. Absolutely. I think end of the day it is in terms of like support um perspective, it is ticket deflation, but like we try and look at it from um business objectives and from a strategic point of view of what is the biggest challenge for our customers because most of the times it's very interesting, but like there are customers who don't even call us or don't even know how to contact us for a matter of fact, because their literacy levels are so low and they just don't feel like the need for it because, say, their card already works, right? So if they they feel like it's easy access to go to an ATM, but they don't understand the concept of like digitalizing their financial experience. So, and don't even maybe bother to log in. So, how do you solve that problem? And like maybe they have faced 10 failures in the past because they can't remember their password. Um, so we try and always look at what the tickets are saying and then what the data has, and then see and just align on like, right, this makes more sense in terms of priority levels. Um, so yes, ticket deflation is important from a customer service perspective, but as a business objective, and while we you know prioritize uh our product or the experience, we look at it from a data perspective equally as well, because we are a data-driven company.

Charlotte Ward: 14:47

Yeah, yeah. That's a that's that's a really strong argument for for looking at things much more holistically than just tickets, because we can we can reduce our ticket volumes, but it's not always the right thing to do as a sole objective, uh exactly as you said. And I think it puts me again in mind a little bit quite quite often in support. I draw like I'm drawn to kind of medical analogies, you know, and it's kind of you want the the customers that aren't talking to you are as important and as informative about what you're doing for them as the ones that are are talking to you for sure.

Vaishali Dialani: 15:24

100% their interaction with our brand, with our service, with our product is a key for us, and I think that's why time and time again, like we have tickets, but I think we have to start looking holistically, as you mentioned, from all perspectives of the business, um, of actually even being able to listen the unheard, um, even if it's first hand.

Charlotte Ward: 15:46

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So we've touched quite a lot on the customer experience then and and improving things for them, in uh building trust with them. Let's go back to where uh the the perspective that I avoided so neatly at the start of this conversation, which is what does this look like operationally? What operational challenges does it present for you from a support perspective?

Vaishali Dialani: 16:11

I think when for us it is communication again because because we've noticed that, say, we're a B2B2C business, we've realized operationally or from a client success point of view, we might have a different challenge. But you know, the customer for the customer service team is great. So even if there's a roadblocker at the start, at operationally, we've noticed that the customer might be onboarded very well and has been engaged very well compared to like having an extremely smooth uh onboarding start, but then that client or that customer base doesn't really understand everything. And you know, they we they have increased our um customer service calls. So it really depends being able to identify a pattern in terms of right, this is the best approach to take for our customers because this is the ultimate way they will be engaged with the brand of the service. Um, I think that is a challenge for us operationally and as a business overall. But again, time and time, every corporate is different, every, you know, um, every industry is so different, and our customer users are so like our customer base is extremely very different. The dynamic, um, you know, the dynamicity of this entire thing, it makes it very complex to be able to find and identify insights or patterns. Um, so I think that's a that's a challenge there for us.

Charlotte Ward: 17:33

Yeah, yeah. It's actually at the surface level, as you know, as we started this conversation, I was thinking, well, this is this is a a user base that has challenges and must have operational challenges to support, but it's quite predictable. But as as it's quite predictable in in terms of a repeat and repeatable, that's the word I'm looking for. But actually, as you've unpacked this a bit more, you're talking about different languages, different technology challenges, different literacy levels, different access constraints. There are so many things that you have to be able to respond to much more individually, I guess, from an operational point of view.

Vaishali Dialani: 18:09

Yeah, 100%. And within India itself, there's so many dialects and so many like 121 languages in within India itself. So you can just imagine the fathom of like different languages and cultures and mindsets that we are within the South Asian market itself.

Charlotte Ward: 18:25

Yeah, yeah. Um it's it's mind-blowing how you manage to support it. Um how do you um how do you do most of that language support? Have you hired native speakers? Do you have uh have you needed to throw a lot of kind of multilingual people at this?

Vaishali Dialani: 18:43

So, in terms of we try and identify the most common spoken language, and most of them also, even there aren't many languages, some are written differently, some are spoken differently, and some are read differently. So, what we try and identify is patterns. So, for example, Hindi works very well in terms of the spoken language, and Urdu and Hindi are very similar, so that works very well. Nepali and, you know, Nepalese understand Hindi as well, so you can still have a conversation with them. So you identify most of our conversations are also voice-based, um, so voice interaction. So I think that makes it much easier compared to like typing and like reading, um, which makes it much, much easier for us to understand what the problem really is and unfold that from our business perspective.

Charlotte Ward: 19:29

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. And and let's not forget, in all of this complexity, you are also a fintech company. So there are there are other constraints, and and um I have zero experience in supporting fintech. So um I can only imagine the kind of bureaucratic and federal constraints on on anyone operating in that space and legal constraints operating in that space. Um, I would love to have you back to talk about fintech itself at some point. Point as well. Would you come back and do that for me?

Vaishali Dialani: 20:02

Of course. It's lovely chatting with you. And this has been such a fun conversation.

Charlotte Ward: 20:06

Thank you so much for exploring a very complex and uh environment and one that I had no knowledge of before. I hope uh I hope our listeners have learned a lot, and I really look forward to having another conversation with you soon on what sounds like uh a whole box of of challenges we can unpack and get uh get some value out of. So I look forward to that. Thank you so much for joining me today, Vishali. Um, and uh I will look forward to our next conversation.

Vaishali Dialani: 20:35

Thank you so much for having me, and I'm really excited for our next conversation.

Charlotte Ward: 20:40

Thank you. That's it for today. Go to customersupportleaders.com forward slash two four three for the show notes, and I'll see you next time.