Lacoste case study

How LACOSTE increased customer conversion & retention

The Global Response team internalized the premium LACOSTE culture and delivered service that increased conversion and retention – while lowering the overall cost of doing business.

Goals

LACOSTE needed a customer engagement solution that could adapt to changing technologies without losing its signature luxury brand. They wanted to ensure a customer experience online that matched their elite in-store experience, and increased online customer conversions.

Challenges

LACOSTE’s contact center needed to be innovative and adaptive and to improve customer satisfaction in a changing online environment. Their solution had to be absolutely uncompromising in representing the superiority of the brand.

Results

Global Response delivered a brand-superior customer service experience across multiple channels. We helped LACOSTE expand their service, increase online conversion and customer retention, and lower the overall cost of business.

Turning online shopping into a luxury brand experience

LACOSTE—known worldwide for its green crocodile logo—was looking for a contact center that would take care of the LACOSTE brand as if it were their own. They found it in Global Response, whose agents have internalized the LACOSTE culture, become experts on the company’s distinctive products, and delivered service that continues to exceed customer expectations.

The Challenge

LACOSTE realized that their previous contact center could not deliver the range of services they needed for handling e-commerce customer service. They interviewed three contact centers and chose Global Response.

According to Jennifer Jackson, LACOSTE’s Director of Operations, “We felt reassured following our onsite visit that this company really cares about its employees and its clients. We were impressed by their retention rate—the managers and agents at Global have a long tenure, so they are experienced with the brand and typical customer service policies for each company. The fact that Global already has a number of other high-profile luxury apparel brands as clients also counted in their favor.”

LACOSTE + Global Response: Strategies

LACOSTE chose Global Response because they saw that we employed industry best practices and engaged our Brand Specialists to deliver the best service possible to every customer.

To support LACOSTE we employed these customer experience strategies:

1. Brand immersion

Initial—and ongoing—training for Global Response Brand Specialists on the LACOSTE brand includes visits to retail stores to see collections merchandised on-site, and quarterly visits from product managers to familiarize agents with key items and programs for each season.

“It’s really important to us that the agents speaking with our customers know our brand personality and our products well,” says Justyn Bellsey, eCommerce Project Manager, LACOSTE. “From the way Global handles other clients, we knew their agents would get the training and product knowledge they need to become an extension of our brand—and that’s what’s happened.”

2. Dedicated, experienced brand specialists

Another selling point for Global Response was their commitment to assigning dedicated agents to the LACOSTE account.

Even technological complications in the final weeks before launch did not phase the Global team.

“We were under a deadline to train the new agents on the existing ordering tool application, and Global was great about doing what was necessary,” says Bellsey.

“We did remote training for agents, the Global project managers came to New York, and we traveled to Florida for the launch. The entire Global team’s experience with implementation and best practices from launching other luxury brands, made for a very smooth transition.”

3. Technological innovation

LACOSTE saw the Global Response was powered by technology and able to adapt nimbly to whatever their needs were.

Bellsey says he could see the depth of experience that our Brand Specialists already had with state-of-the-art technology.

“We watched three agents working on another account that had [the service we needed],” she says. “They were incredibly good at their jobs and were very patient with our questions, talking with us for half an hour and showing us a set of best practices that we then implemented on our account for the LACOSTE agents who now handle over 100 chats a day.”

In this case, they implemented a new click-to-chat feature. The click-to-chat feature on LACOSTE’s site is powered by Oracle Live Help on Demand, which is an integrated set of live voice, chat, and email response services. These services allow online businesses to deliver just-in-time, personalized, interactive assistance that increases online sales, improves customer satisfaction and retention, and serves customers more profitably and efficiently.

“Global’s Brand Care Specialists use Oracle Live Help to give LACOSTE customers a shopping experience similar to the personalized buying experience they’d have at a LACOSTE store,” says Fred Soller, Application Sales Manager, Oracle. “It also helps to increase conversion and customer retention and brings down the overall cost of doing business.”

4. Transparency and reporting

Global Response provides LACOSTE managers with daily reports on key metrics including call volume, call times, chat volume, trends, and more.

If LACOSTE needs information that isn’t in a standard report, Jackson says Global finds it and quickly gets it to the requestor.

“Their reports are extremely valuable,” she says, “as is the insight they provide if we have questions about the data. For instance, if there’s a spike in calls or wait time increase, and there isn’t an obvious reason like a sale or promotion, we discuss it with Global and figure out if it’s an issue we need to address. Global is proactive and will contact us regarding any potential issues, which really lets us have a pulse on our online business and customer service issues.”

Outcomes

LACOSTE customers today expect to get correct, complete information every time they call, says Laura Uruchima, Retail Customer Service, LACOSTE.

“To be competitive, you have to deliver top-notch customer service,” she says. “We’re doing that by investing in and developing Global agents who know and care about the brand, and we’re leveraging the latest technologies for customer service like click-to-call and click-to-chat. When you visit Global headquarters, you see that the whole company embodies customer service—it’s all about your brand and your customers.”

Assessing the overall relationship, Jackson says, “On both the level of individual agents and the corporate level, Global has been an excellent fit for LACOSTE.”

“To be competitive, you have to deliver top-notch customer service. When you visit Global Response headquarters, you see that the whole company embodies customer service—it’s all about your brand and your customers.”

Laura Uruchima

LACOSTE Retail Customer Service