Ink on the Interview
Q: You are with Cobalt Credit Union, and what brings you to EMERGE this year? Obviously, the subject matter, and you have been a client with Eltropy. You started out with POPi/o. Give us a quick little history lesson here before we dive into the topic.
A: I oversee digital banking. I’m the VP of digital at Cobalt Credit Union. So I really oversee the strategy of all of our digital innovation there. Eltropy is a big part of that, naturally, as we bring forward conversational intelligence, as we bring forward ways to engage with our members, no matter where they’re at in the world, 24/7, 365 days.
We originally started as a POPi/o client. Several moons ago, at this point, with video banking really took off, we’re rooted in military presence, so when I say around the world, I truly, we have people that have worked with us for years since we were SAC Federal Credit Union, and we wanted to make sure that no matter where they were stationed, no matter where their journey took them, we were able to serve them.
Video banking really brought that to life, and we got ahead of the curve before COVID and all of those pieces, which made it so much more vital in our day-to-day. And since then, Eltropy has acquired POPi/o as well as several others. And we’ve just continued that relationship. Now we do Chat, we do Text, obviously Video Banking. We have stood up our AI agents. So Coby speaks with our members. It gets rave reviews and is able to handle a lot. Right now, we have an 83% Session Containment Rate. We’ve really worked closely with Eltropy creating what that bot should do prior to that handoff, if the handoff’s ever needed to the agent. And then we’re currently testing and working on our AI Voice project, and we’re one of the first DNA clients that’s working with Eltropy as that happens.
Q: What was it about Eltropy Video Banking that really kind of attracted your attention, and then how has it benefited you guys since then?
A: Initially, it was something that caught our credit union’s eye, as that’s really cool, we should do that. It was as simple as that in a very infancy phase. As we’ve progressed, though, it’s become our market differentiator.
We’re able to compete with some of the bigger institutions. I came from a big top-five bank, and when I came over to Cobalt, I was like, oh my gosh, I wish I had this technology. I remember just the friction that some of our employees had felt. I was working at a big five bank, and so being able to have that technology and facilitate it in a way to spread our vision, it’s just been a game changer because we can say yes more than we say no. And that’s what our members need, right?
Q: You are able to move on a dime with this stuff, whereas a bigger bank might not be so fast. So that’s a really good lesson for a lot of credit unions out there watching that you can compete with this technology.
A: Yes, it really allows you to pivot much quicker, right? I think everybody’s probably similar to us, but we run a million projects at once, and we want to give our members everything and more. And so because of that, we have to have the back-end technology to be able to say, yeah we’re going to do that right now, or we’re going to take on that project, and it’ll be OK. And our employees know that, because we’ll be able to service our members, start to finish, and they’ll have the tools they need at their fingertips to get it done.
Q: When was Coby implemented? What are some of the benefits that you have experienced so far?
A: We were a little crazy, and we ended up implementing Coby, I think, 1.0, so like an intent-based AI, at the same time that we went live on a new digital banking platform. And that was August 2024. We did that intentionally to help with that overflow. It made everything seamless, if you will, because our members had different ways to engage with us and ask questions. So our digital banking conversion was beautiful. We didn’t need additional support. Our contact center obviously saw increased volumes, but they were very manageable.
So then, forward to about October, we put Generative AI in. And that way, we kind of took that baby walk, you know, crawl, run approach that they talk about. So our members had gotten used to the intent-based, okay, this is specific for digital banking. This is our new platform. Coby can help you with all things digital.
So then they got used to that. Then, we put generative AI in front of it and said, okay, now I can be your agent to help you with more simple tasks. Tell me more about how else I can help you. And just kind of start layering that on intentionally because we do have a membership that, we’re in Nebraska, we don’t love change, and so by layering it, we kind of built that trust up front, so now they use Coby so much more because they can trust it, because they know they’ve used it in the past, it helped me then, let’s try it again. It’s okay, I can always transfer to an agent, I know that now.
So, having that kind of layered approach has been really successful. So we’ve been live with Coby 2.0 since October 24th.
Q: What do you guys foresee in the future with this type of stuff? Because the sky’s the limit with this.
A: They’ve been hitting on it in the conference already, but personalization is so important. In my seat, I think about all of the ways our members like to engage with us, and I’m not going to tell them the right way to engage with us; that’s up to the consumer.
But I will say, I want to make sure that it’s consistent. I want to make sure that it is the best experience that they could ever hope for. And so because of that, we’re really focusing on that data cleansing that they’ve been talking about.
We want to make sure that the data coming in, because they are from all these different vendors, is cleansed and prioritized appropriately. So no matter how our member chooses to engage with us, whether that’s through Coby, whether that’s through an agent, a branch, or through our online banking provider, they’re receiving consistent information, consistent education, and they’re not conflicting with each other.
Because that’s the worst thing you could do, right? I log into online banking and get one recommendation, and then call my banker and get a different one. We want to make sure that we’re all speaking the same language and providing that same message. So that’s what we’re really focused on.
Lots of conversation around how our members like to learn as well. We’re very invested in our community. So, you know, with all the data that comes out around people choosing to learn off of a TikTok video rather than speak to a person now, how do we integrate that into our AI agents so instead of it touching someone, maybe it points it to a video or provides a dialogue along with that kinesthetic learning experience? How do you mash that together so that they truly receive the learning style and the experience that they want from a personalized approach.
Q: How much fun is your job?
A: I love it. It’s so fun! It allows you to bring forward a lot of really amazing ideas. Kudos to my team at Cobalt and all of the groups that I work with. I work with a very collaborative group because digital touches everything. So no matter what crazy idea we put out there, we have a whole team that’s like, figures out how to make that happen.
Q: What has Eltropy allowed you to do?
A: One of the biggest things with working with Eltropy, there are a lot of different platforms out there you can choose from. I am so glad that we choose, day over day, to work with Eltropy, and that’s because of the relationships they build. You know, you can hear from any of their team members that they put people first, and it comes through in their partnership.
So, working so closely with them on our products, we have product owners, we have engineers on our calls weekly, bi-weekly working sessions, so that we can create exactly what Cobalt is. And you don’t get that everywhere. A lot of times, people will sell you a boxed product, and they say, yeah you can do all these things. Can you go do that? Sure. That’s not the approach Eltropy takes. So it’s been really nice to work with them as trusted partners. That was one of the big, big pieces in our RFP was partnership. We wanted to make sure that we had someone that we could grow with who we also knew was innovating and growing themselves, so that we could work alongside each other. Thankyou to Eltropy and Ashish for always putting us first.
