At A Glance

Luana Perez has watched people change their lives through fitness. You’ll want to read how Luana and Ergatta are using game-based rowing machines to inspire customers to achieve their fitness goals, establish a routine, and row with a community while never leaving the living room.

Who is Luana?

Meet Luana Perez, Senior Director of Member Experience at Ergatta!

About Ergatta

Ergatta is changing the motivation that moves people. We are a team of bright, driven, and innovative thinkers on a mission to build a new consumer category: game-based home fitness. Our flagship product, the Ergatta Rower, provides a competitive and personalized full-body rowing workout through an engaging game-based interface. Our products are sustainably-made in New England from American cherrywood and designed to be on display.

Luana’s CX Journey

Working in the fitness space for over a decade now, Luana journey began as CX agent at Flywheel Sports. She credits her time there for “instilling the value of making the customer the forefront” while laying the ground foundation for understanding everything about how CX interacts with other departments at the company. She explains, “Our team was seen as a valuable resource for giving customer feedback on just about everything,” which included the website and app, along with the class schedule, format, and even the music that played during workout sessions. Using customer input and analytics, they were able to improve in-studio experience, email communication, and marketing while fostering a strong community for customers.

Luana’s role grew into team lead followed by customer experience manager. “I was there when we started to offer an E-Commerce experience,” she recalls. In addition to apparel and accessories, Flywheel made an at-home bike available for purchase. Helping customers with a physical product for the first time required Luana to learn about delivery logistics, technical and software support, and troubleshooting. Managing customer experience at Flywheel now looked very different.  “I helped build the team up and created an LMS, making sure everyone was trained on brand ethos and what we were providing for our customers. Additionally, a part of my role shifted into community moderation – we had an incredibly active Facebook group that was used for customer experience feedback.”

Like many companies, Flywheel was impacted by the Pandemic and eventually closed. Through former colleagues, Luana was connected to Ergatta where she started as Director of Customer Service and now works as Senior Director of Member Experience. Describing how she now looks at CX as a driver to grow business, Luana says, “my role has started to involve the retention aspects of customer experience that includes strategies to keep our current members engaged through communications and programming while getting those who have fallen off to come back.”

CX in the Fitness Space

Working in the fitness space for so long means that Luana has heard countless inspiring stories about how physical activity improved their lives. She elaborates, “It’s exciting to see people who had fitness routines and had to stop because of an injury come back through the instruction of Ergatta.”  A self-described Customer obsessed and problem solver, Luana goes on to say that she thrives off the challenge of improving the customer experience. As her team’s ‘biggest cheerleader,’ she aims to make sure that her team are getting the career development they aspire for and feel successful.

CX Team Success Factors

Key Hiring Traits: What Luana Looks for in CX Agents

Luana understands that CX is often ‘a foot in the door’ position for those who are still figuring out what they want to do in a company. When hiring new agents, she looks for people with hospitality experience. She explains, “They’ve worked with customers face-to-face – I think that can be a different challenge, than interacting with customers primarily through phone or email.” Drawing from a hospitality background, new hires can refine customer service skills to reflect a brand’s values and voice.  Additionally, Luana looks for individuals who are eager to take on the different challenges involved in CX. “We are often problem solving. So, to get excited about that and have a creative approach to solving problems is very important.” With this in mind, Luana leans towards individuals who are able to quickly problem solve, but also has some analytical skills that can allow them to being able to flag ongoing trends

Using Metrics and Data to Assess CX Team Performance

To evaluate her team’s performance at both the departmental and individual levels, Luana reviews metrics and data on a weekly and monthly basis. She reveals, “we are looking at our CSAT scores, CSAT comments, first reply time, and full resolution time.” Additional attention is paid to trends around customer ticket inquiries, and if relevant, relaying to other departments. For individual agents, ticket solution reply time and CSAT scores are measured.

How Proactive CX Betters the Entire Company

At Ergatta, customer issues and problems are looked at case-by case. “We’re looking at the point of failure and are trying to address it at that moment,” Luana says. In-depth analysis is followed by a proactive approach – the company can identify trend lines and address them accordingly with the appropriate team, department or vendor if the source stems from an external partner.

Preparing for Peak Season

Ergatta’s peak season happens at the start of the holiday season (when promotions are offered) and continues well into the New Year when people commit to fitness goals during the cold months. “From a support side, we want to make sure that we are able to support our customers with a high-level of care,” Luana notes. To prepare and ready her team, she makes sure that LMS is updated, macros are in a good place, and all operational processes are efficient. “I think this has really helped set us up in the past and is going to set us up for success in the future,” Luana adds.

CX Goals: Fostering Member Engagement

Member engagement in CX is a priority for Ergatta. Looking forward, the company aims to continuously make programming that is exciting and motivates people to get on their rowers regularly and cultivate a healthy lifestyle. Focus is also being placed on education to keep customers informed of all product features that can motivate their fitness routine or help build one if they are just starting their journey. Luana is also concentrating on strengthening communication with the Ergatta customer community. “Making sure agents are informed about promotional offers so they can speak accordingly to current and prospective members is very important,” Luana says.

Topics of Interest

Leveraging AI in CX

Luana believes AI can be valuable in CX especially when it comes to self-service, immediate assistance, and directing customers to support resources. Elaborating on how AI is being used at Ergatta, she says, “In our cases, if there is something specific to the product that a customer doesn’t quite understand, AI can let them know that there’s a blog available featuring certain articles that may answer their question.” During high volume periods, AI can help triage tickets offering pertinent information until agents become available.

CXL Stability Vs. Perfection 

Working with a tech-based fitness product where both machine and human error come into play, Luana understands that CX is never going to reach a level of perfection. Consequently, if customers stopped reaching out, a red flag would be raised. “From an engagement standpoint, I would be concerned and wonder if our product is being used,” Luana points out. “And from a growth perspective, I would be concerned not hearing from new members since surveys are sent to get a sense about how they learned about our products.” More comfortable with stability than silence, Luana would use the time to proactively reach out to individuals to make sure their needs and expectations are being met.

Advice for CX Leaders: Celebrate Your Agents

Luana’s main advice to aspiring CX Leaders is to level up your agents while making sure their value is known to the rest of the organization. “Being a senior level in CX doesn’t necessarily mean you always have a finger on the pulse because you are not always in the queue,” she says. “For an agent, their day-to-day is in the queue, so they have a better understanding than anyone on exactly what your customers’ pain points and perspectives are.” 

Until recently, CX was a second-thought department made up of just ‘problem solvers.’ Luana stresses the importance of celebrating your team for being the frontlines as a brand ambassador. For this reason, Luana suggests, “having other teams spend time in the queue to make sure they get the perspective of your CX agents and understand that ‘yes, these people are the experts of our customers.”