Case study of Thomas, voice assistant for Tchibo. The main goal of the project was to leverage online sales of coffee and automate customer support with the use of Google Assistant. Created for #TchiboHack (Hamburg, March 2019)

1. Powering online sales and simplifying
customer support
Increasing online sales of coffee Automation of responding to
customer support requests

2. Here comes
voice technology
Voice is inclusive! Designed not only for
digital-natives as speaking is more
natural than typing
People are using it! 1 in 6 Germans
already use voice assistants on daily
basis. This number is rapidly growing.
Experience is highly personalised and
humane - we use natural language to
communicate

3. Meet Tom
He is your personal Tchibo Barista,
always ready to help.
He can order your coffee or solve a
problem. Anytime, anywhere.
Oh, and he lives in your pocket.

5. Who is Tom?
A humane face behind Tchibo’s technology.
Tom is helpful - he is a bridge between Customer and
Tchibo.
Tom makes Tchibo more accessible, the interaction with
him is seamless and friendly and he’s not perceived as a
piece of technology but rather personal assistant.

6. A new way of ordering coffee!
Challenge:
Tchibo sells majority of coffee offline, although other
products have very high interest online.
Solution:
Propose a natural and frictionless way of ordering
coffee online. With one sentence, just like offline.

7. See the demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qo3fJlCmq8o

8. “Tom, order my usual coffee”
• Every order is linked to Tchibo Loyalty
Card so we are gathering all information
regarding the order and Customer keeps all
the benefits
• Frictionless process: all that our Customer
has to do is say one sentence and confirm
the details assigned to Google Account

9. Once they purchase, Customers may need support
Challenge:
Only in February 2019 Tchibo received 128.000 mails and over 805.000
calls to Support Center!
Each request cost about 3-4 euros to handle causing huge spending on
support that usually handles repetitive requests.
Solution:
As a face of the company, Tom can answer recurring questions (e.g.
where is my package, resend my invoice, what is delivery address). This
means reducing the number of requests passed to agents.

10. See the demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=018dxXutkg0

11. Cutting down the request volume by even 1% is a saving of
at least half a milion euro each year.
With Tom’s help, some of the requests can be handled automatically without
even reaching an agent. Moreover, with Natural Language Understanding
request pass Tom can be categorized and if they do reach the agent, we can
send to the right specialist.

12. Some other requests Tom can help with:
“Where is my order?”
“I want to make a return”
“I want to file a complaint”
“What’s the address of my last order?”
“I want to change payment method”
“Is it possible to pick up my order in the store?”

13. Development phases:
Tchibo Hack:
• Designing flow and interactions
• Implementing main customer scenarios (voice
commerce and order tracking)
• Integrating Google Pay for seamless transactions
Next steps:
• According to our research it is possible to fully
integrate voice assistant with Tchibo’s API for
purchasing
• Adjust the process for full legal compliance (e.g.
sending invoices via e-mail)
• Implement more Customer support scenarios (e.g.
filing complaints, service requests)
• Improve conversational design and UX

14. Is it easy to implement?
Yes, it is.
The technology is here and widely available.
The ecosystem of voice assistants already has a significant
user base
Platforms like Google Assistant offer tools that achieve legal
compliance. Also national laws are adapting to voice commerce
(as they did to e-commerce).

15. Challenges:
• By entering voice, Tchibo will be entering a
known for Customers ecosystem. It’s not a
new application to instal - it’s one
sentence that you can say to your
smartphone that you carry around
anyway.
• Tchibo led the way in home delivery and in
e-commerce. Now it has a chance to
become pioneers in voice ordering -
something that no one in Europe did well
before.
• Voice Commerce works extremely well in
FMCG - Dominos’ gathers around 25% of
their pizza orders via voice in the US.
Opportunities:
• As of today, voice purchasing in Europe is not
well developed. However, in the US (where
voice powered-devices launched two years
prior) voice commerce is quickly gaining on
popularity.
• If we take a look at the market, voice is where
mobile was 10 years ago. We are still in early
days of technology and at the same time it’s a
chance to lead the way.
• To make voice application discoverable it
requires some marketing efforts.
Voice Assistants:

16. Software development agency specialising in
helping businesses to discover the full potential
of innovating with voice technologies
www.upsidelab.io
@UpsideLab
Kasia Ryniak, Rafal Cymerys, Grzegorz Tluszcz
Meet the Team: