How one company reminded customers that call-center workers are human beings

Korea's GS Caltex, working with agency AdQua Interactive, had family members of its call-center employees record messages that were then made into ringback tones—so callers would hear the family members introducing their loved ones just before customer-service reps took their calls.

As the above video shows, the messages reminded certain people not to be monstrous assholes, and helped improve the morale of the call-center reps. The agency reports that after the ringback tones went live, stress levels among employees decreased by 54 percent, kind words from customers increased by 8 percent and employees reporting that they felt respected increased by 25 percent.

The video got more than 2 million views and 200,000 engagements on the GS Caltex Facebook page within 24 hours of its release (it now has 2.8 million views there). The video embedded above is an English-subtitled version that has only 17,000 views; a Korean version on YouTube has 1.6 million views. The initiative also got coverage from 15 media channels within two weeks, according to the agency.

This is good marketing, good employer marketing and also just plain good. 

Ad Nut very much enjoys that while disguising the voices of the angry callers, the creators have chosen to make one of them sound like a tiny, enraged gnome. Ad Nut submits that the world would be a better place if anyone who failed to treat others with respect suddenly found their voice changing to befit their small-mindedness and immaturity.    

CREDITS

Executive Creative Director : Hunchul Chun
Creative Director : Hyunkyoon Kim
Copywriter : Ayoung Yoon, Olivia Sangjee Park
Producer : Dongkyeong Lee
Account Executive : Junyoung Lee, Minwoo Lee, Hyunwoo Nam
Media Planner : Sooyeon Im
Media Buying : Seungkwan Hong, Seunghyun Yoon, Sooyeon Park

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