#Japan #Customer Experience #Sendai #Helpfeel #Tohoku Electric Power

Introduction

Tohoku Electric Power Co. has made significant strides in enhancing its customer experience by adopting the self-service AI, Helpfeel. This initiative led to a remarkable reduction of approximately 20% in the volume of incoming calls at their customer center, showcasing the transformative potential of AI in the realm of customer service.

The Background: Resolving the Connectivity Issues During Busy Move-in Seasons

Since the complete liberalization of electricity retailing in Japan a decade ago, competition within the energy market has intensified sharply. Tohoku Electric, which serves over six million customers in low-voltage power contracts, prioritized improving customer experience (CX), particularly during peak inquiry periods such as March, when many people move and inquiries about service initiation spikes.

A common issue for customers during these peak times was difficulty in connecting calls, leading the company to rethink its customer interaction strategies. Tohoku Electric had previously concentrated on boosting call response rates, often clinging to the idea that personalized phone communication leads to higher customer satisfaction. However, this mindset prevented the development of a robust web platform for customers to find answers independently, resulting in persistent telephone inquiries.

The Solution: Providing a 24/7 Self-Solution Web Environment

To tackle this, Tohoku Electric decided to revamp its FAQ system, aiming to create a self-service environment where customers could resolve their queries at any time. By implementing Helpfeel’s self-service AI, they sought to embody their group slogan, “More, Together.” This innovative solution allows users to engage in various search expressions while enabling quick and accurate responses through intent prediction search technology.

The Results: A 20% Reduction in Call Inquiries and Improved Response Rates

Within just ten months of the Helpfeel implementation, Tohoku Electric observed a surge to a monthly page view count of 160,000, indicating tenfold growth compared to the old FAQ system. This led to a significant number of customers solving their issues independently, achieving a 20% reduction in phone inquiries compared to the previous year. As a result, the response rate at the customer center improved substantially.

An essential enhancement was the integration of direct access from search engines to Helpfeel's page, resulting in a thirty-two-fold increase in organic traffic from browser searches. Furthermore, the initiative laid the groundwork for AI-driven search optimization, ensuring accuracy in information retrieval via AI functionalities in web browsers and generative AI tools.

For example, if a customer asks, “I’m moving to Sendai and want to clean before moving in. Can I use electricity beforehand?” the AI can effectively refer them to relevant articles, streamlining the inquiry process.

By enhancing the web self-solution environment, the role of the customer center evolved, allowing it to focus on handling more complex inquiries while providing comprehensive support through the online platform.

Future Prospects: Aiming for an Autonomous AI-Driven Customer Center

Helpfeel is committed to supporting Tohoku Electric in optimizing its knowledge utilization and AI advancement. The growing diversity of customer needs necessitates not just traditional operator responses but increasingly AI-driven engagements. Having established a self-service structure where customers can initially resolve their inquiries online, Tohoku Electric is now embarking on reforming its customer center operations.

This reform involves digitizing hundreds of pages of paper manuals, response logs, and field expertise to consolidate them within Helping's knowledge base. The aim is to create an AI-Ready knowledge infrastructure that the AI can reference instantly to improve customer experience and overall productivity.

According to Takahiro Kumagai from Tohoku Electric’s sales department, “The customer center is a critical touchpoint that communicates a corporate stance to customers. As the times change, maintaining our commitment to personalized digital engagement remains our foundational approach.”

While many companies strive to integrate AI into their customer service systems, this endeavor presents numerous challenges. Success hinges on meticulously organizing and structuring information in a format easily utilized by AI systems. This foundational work, albeit seeming like a detour, is essential for realizing effective AI application, ultimately enhancing customer service avenues to meet evolving societal issues and diverse customer needs.

For further details on this case study, visit Helpfeel.

Accelerating Corporate AI Utilization with the AI Knowledge Data Platform

The quality of the knowledge data used by an AI greatly impacts its response accuracy. Companies harbor vast unutilized data, including response logs and experienced insights, in addition to straightforward manuals and FAQs. Helpfeel restructures this internal knowledge into an AI-Ready knowledge base. This foundational platform supports a myriad of customer interactions, operator assistance, and voice of customer analysis, all within an overarching AI Knowledge Data Platform framework.

Currently, Helpfeel has been integrated into over 900 sites across diverse sectors such as finance, infrastructure, manufacturing, and retail as of April 2026.