Standard Life have been helping customers with their life savings for nearly 200 years. Today, they support over 4.5m customers, helping them to manage their pensions so that they and their families can enjoy a better future. Standard Life wanted to continue to improve the service they offer their customers over the phone, and in doing so increase value for their customers, employees, and the business.
Standard Life realised that, too often, companies fail to consider the ways in which the human brain works, and so they partnered with Cowry to optimise their call-centre scripts.
Transform customer experiences
Cowry conducted a behavioural audit to identify the psychological ‘friction points’ in customer conversations. They discovered that conversations about pensions can be confusing, fraught and lead to fractured communication. Customers are bombarded with information leading them to be cognitively overloaded and unsure on what to do next.
Cowry’s team of behavioural scientists took the findings from the audit, and used them to write and design an optimised playbook with over 65 separate behavioural nudges, for example:
Reduced Ambiguity – They introduced 3 simple steps: Collect, Check and Complete, which encouraged customers to bring their pension pots together.
Embedded Authority – They established prestige by renaming the team from ‘Priority Support’ to ‘Priority Plus’, and the call-centre agents were given the title of ‘Priority Plus Consultants’.
With the amazing results from this project, Standard Life have started to embed behavioural principles in other areas of the business.
We believe in believe in partnering with the experts and Cowry has a proven methodology using cognitive and behavioural psychology that really works. Through our pilots we have already seen significant benefits across a number of areas of the business in terms of how we’re supporting customers and making it easier for them to engage and make good decisions about their financial futures.”
Michael Reed-Smith, Retail Director, Standard Life
19 December
Read how Cowry applied behavioural science for Aegon helping customers engage with their pensions through cognitive interviews.
18 December
See how Aegon embedded behavioural science with the help of the Cowry Academy
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Cowry Consulting Ltd is a registered member of the Global Association of Applied Behavioural Scientists.