LooseHeadz is a charity on a mission: to tackle mental health and breakdown mental stigmas in rugby.
The latest weapon its arsenal is next generation AI chatbot, IVA, which is helping to deal with the constantly increasing enquiries to its website in partnership with digital customer experience experts Lokulus.
The LooseHeadz ambition is to place a mental health lead into every rugby club around the world, and equip them with a toolkit of resources to help teams support members struggling with their mental health and get people talking about the stigma.
This is currently funded through the sale of its clothing range, with 100 per cent of the profits used to help #TackleTheStigma, with ambassadors such as Manu Tuilagi, Stacey Fluhler and Gareth Anscombe supporting the charity.
Born out of Wilmslow Rugby Club, and with 800 rugby clubs already signed up and numbers growing at pace, Looseheadz needed support to deal with the rapidly increasing volume of enquiries as it amplifies its mission to support 17,000 rugby clubs and their communities around the world The team plans to double its numbers each year.
Lokulus’s customer experience technology, a next generation chatbot that acts as a virtual agent, is integrated into the LooseHeadz ecommerce system, using its advanced functionality to have a clear knowledge of the customer and easily assist in personal updates in order enquiries.
IVA will signpost enquiries to the appropriate information or person, whether that’s those seeking mental health support, rugby clubs wanting to offer LooseHeadz support or customers who have ordered merchandise from the site and need help with their order. This will free up the team’s time to focus on accelerating the charity.
Dave Nicoll, co-founder of LooseHeadz, said: “We really feel like we’re making a difference and we don’t want that momentum to stop, so using Lokulus AI technology has been critical for us to ensure our digital communities are being signposted to the relevant information or person, and enable us to continue to engage with even more rugby communities across the world.”
Alister Harris, CEO of Lokulus, added: “Working with LooseHeadz on such a well-meaning and positive mission is a real proud point for us. They’re already making huge strides in the rugby community and hopefully, with the use of our technology and expertise in designing and automating customer journeys, their resource will not be taken up with mundane tasks and they can focus on growth and supporting more clubs and breaking down mental health stigmas in the sport.”
