As a trusted partner in the life sciences industry, Mercalis specializes in navigating the complexities of healthcare commercialization. With over 500 life sciences customers and 36 million patients supported, the company’s mission is to accelerate value while enhancing patient lives.
By offering end-to-end services—from patient affordability programs to healthcare provider engagement—Mercalis is a critical bridge between life sciences companies and the patients they serve. Yet, these operations are only set to grow, prompting it to rethink its approach to customer experience.
Scaling a complex system
With 1,000 agents handling over 400,000 monthly calls, Mercalis’s contact center operations are as vast as they are varied. Teams provide pharmacy help desk support, care coordination for patients and caregivers, reimbursement services—the list goes on.
Of course, managing such high call volumes is always an obstacle, especially around the New Year. According to Tommy Walker, VP of Technology Transformation and IT Operations, that’s peak re-enrollment season. Call volumes can double during this period, challenging the company to adapt and maintain efficiency.
As Walker explained, that’s when it pays to have a reliable contact center solution. “We rely heavily on technology to support and enhance the ways that we deliver service offerings to life sciences companies,” he said.
Self-service options, such as interactive voice response (IVR) systems and customer portals, helped ease the workload. However, Mercalis recognized the need to modernize further. How? Through artificial intelligence (AI)—more specifically, conversational AI via Cisco AI Assistant’s virtual agents.
“We see opportunities to take a more conversational approach to self-service using AI virtual agents and bots,” Walker added. So, the company chose to transition away from its on-premises platform in favor of the power and flexibility of Webex’s cloud-based alternative. “We were looking to leverage AI to enhance the customer experience for our patients and providers, provide tools that elevate and empower our agents and supervisors, and gain meaningful data insights for our life sciences partners.”
The overarching goal? Simplify processes, integrate channels, and uplift the agent experience—all with the power of AI-driven innovation.
Migrating to Webex Customer Experience solutions
In 2023, Mercalis was using an on premise contact center solution; however, after learning more about Webex Contact Center at Cisco Live in 2024, the company decided to transition from an on premise to cloud environment for a few reasons.
“We believe Webex Contact Center gives us better access and more innovation around AI tools and features,” Walker explained. “We believe it’s simpler to use, not only for our administrators but also for our agents and supervisors. It provides a better interface in a single pane of glass so that all the information they need is contained within one browser.”
Critically, the migration provides Mercalis access to Control Hub—a centralized management portal for all things Webex. From here, users can access configuration and design functions, intuitive dashboards, and real-time performance data.
“Control Hub is going to provide easier access and maintenance for our technical resources,” Walker said. “We believe the tools and functionality included in Webex Contact Center will make it easier for our agents and supervisors to offer excellent customer support.”
Expanding engagement with Webex Connect
Recognizing the value of omnichannel customer support, Mercalis has also integrated Webex Connect—a communications platform-as-a-service (CPaaS) solution.
According to Walker, the synergies between these two solutions have and will continue to yield substantial benefits:
- Visibility into the customer journey across different communication channels.
- Opportunities to leverage integrated AI for multi-channel support.
- Ability to apply logic from a single pane of glass and create a unified service experience.
“We are excited about the integrated capabilities that Webex Contact Center and Webex Connect provide to give us the flexibility to support across multiple channels,” Walker added. Although once a voice-centric contact center, bringing in the Webex Connect CPaaS solution will enable Mercalis to expand not only to additional digital channels for inbound customer interaction and escalation, but also to deliver proactive communications with outbound SMS messages and digital wallet integration.
Notably, both services are available through Webex Customer Experience. It combines CPaaS and contact-center-as-a-service (CCaaS) to deliver more connected customer journeys with a complete, integrated solution.
Embracing AI-driven innovation
As the company looks forward to leveraging Webex Contact Center to its full advantage, Mercalis anticipates the platform’s AI capabilities will become a key differentiator.
“We plan on using the Cisco AI Assistant for Webex to enhance the customer experience by using data-driven insights to understand who’s calling, if they’ve called before, and what types of interactions we’ve had,” Walker said. “With all of that data, we’ll make an informed decision about how to address or route that call, whether it be to self-service or an actual human being. Doing that will reduce the time they’re in the menu and ensure we connect them to the right person as quickly as possible.”
One feature he’s especially excited about is conversation summaries. Using generative AI, the AI Assistant can recap customer interactions, chats, and calls. That way, customers don’t have to repeat themselves and agents gain all the context they need.
“The ability to transfer the call with a summary of the conversation, where it left off, and what the agent needs next accelerates the opportunity to identify why someone’s calling and how we need to solve the problem to deliver an excellent customer experience,” Walker said.
He also expects Topic Analytics to play a big role in optimizing their workflows. With this feature, you can identify frequent topics of conversation between agents and customers and use this insight to monitor trends, improve training, and enhance self-service.
“From a customer experience perspective, we believe tools like Topic Analytics, which gives us insight into why people are calling and how we can resolve their issues, will allow us to improve how we design experiences and provide faster resolutions,” Walker added.
As for the agent experience? He sees the Cisco AI Assistant helping in that regard, too. The tool’s Agent Wellbeing capability can identify signs of burnout in real time. This allows supervisors to encourage breaks during stressful days and to help keep agents feeling effective, engaged, and fresh.
“That’s going to be extremely helpful to the health and wellbeing of our employees,” Walker said.
Looking ahead
As Mercalis continues its migration to Webex Contact Center and expands its use of Webex Connect, the company is poised to unlock even greater potential. With AI tools like sentiment analysis and call summarization on the horizon, Mercalis aims to set new benchmarks in customer success while delivering even greater value to life sciences partners.
“We really appreciate the partnership we have with Cisco,” Walker said. “Month by month, we’re seeing new features that build upon the tools already available. That growth and innovation allows us to stay ahead of the curve in terms of what technologies we can use to help serve our customers.”
Want to embrace AI and improve customer experience in your organization? Contact our team today to learn more about how Webex can help.
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