Holland America Line sees signs of more informed purchasing with Copilot Studio agent

“With so many stateroom options and packages, booking a cruise can be a complicated process, and once you’re booked, it’s not always easy to understand how to prepare for a cruise and add additional services,” says Scot Pettit, Sr. Director, E-commerce at Holland America Line.

To help customers through the process, Holland America Line already has an excellent website with access to live chat and call support. But this recognized leader in the cruise industry wanted to go further for Holland America guests and the valued travel advisors who assist them. Finding ways to simplify this complex customer journey around the globe became a focus for the company. As Pettit says, “We wanted to provide even faster, personalized, and more targeted customer support—without driving up call volumes.”

Adding a chatbot with round-the-clock support seemed to be the next logical step. But Holland America Line was very clear that it didn’t want a traditional chatbot with limited if-then responses. This is what led the company to Microsoft Copilot Studio and the development of a virtual “agent”—an advanced, natural language conversational experience that uses AI to support the guest’s digital journey. This agent acts as a digital concierge called “Anna,” which customers access from the company’s website.

Deep telemetry, strong response rates

To ensure a quality customer experience, the first-generation Anna was refined through a multi-wave, three-month rollout. First, it was made available as a tool for contact center agents to answer customer questions, and then it was tested internally with all employees. From there, it was launched on the external website, starting with making it available to 5% of customers, then 50%, and then 100% of all customers visiting the website. Holland America Line expects to ramp up engagement levels as it continues expanding Anna’s capabilities.

The accuracy and performance of the agent was monitored using multiple tools and data sources. “The built-in analytics tools in Microsoft Copilot Studio and connectivity to other analytics platforms enabled us to set up an effective feedback loop,” says Pettit. Interoperability with Dataverse delivers conversational logs and feedback from customers. Adobe Analytics provides custom business metrics, and Application Insights in Azure Monitor provides near real-time technical monitoring of the platform. 

Copilot Studio also made it easy to take this feedback and refine the agent. As Pettit explains, “With Microsoft Copilot Studio, we are able to quickly assess what was answered and not answered by Anna, then organize responses into clear topics and categories, so we know exactly where to focus our time on content updates.”

Using generative answers, along with a highly effective monitoring and training process, the agent has achieved strong  resolution rates  with early users and is currently handling thousands of conversations per week. The excellent response rates by Anna are helping deliver more of the information customers need faster, leading to a better overall experience.

This is reflected in the latest business results. “What we’re finding is that when customers engage with Anna, they are more likely to find the right cruise that fits their needs than if they do not engage at all,” says Pettit. At the same time, there are early indications that Anna will reduce the number of basic informational queries to contact center agents. 

Optimizing AI for customers

The team continues to expand Anna’s capabilities. This first MVP release of Anna is currently running in the United States, and she is set to go live in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom, equipped with market-specific cruise and booking information. Anna will also soon be introduced in non-English markets.

Looking further ahead, Holland America Line is poised to advance the AI capabilities of its agent by integrating additional secondary flows, enabling customers to book excursions, spa services, drink packages, and other services, as well as find specific information about port and destination interests. 

These advancements will enhance the experience throughout a customer’s journey. As Pettit says, “With Microsoft Copilot Studio, we have an effective platform for delivering the benefits of generative AI to our customers, providing them with faster service and an even better overall cruise experience.”

Kacy Cole, CMO at Holland America Line, shares her perspective on how AI-powered agents are transforming marketing

An unexpected effect of implementing generative AI is that we’re gaining insights and understanding what’s changing in the cruise industry, what’s happening in our business, and better connecting with guests. These insights are going to transform how we continue to go to market. 

We’re able to localize our marketing using AI capabilities, and we’re able to get to market faster because AI helps us define audiences, product offerings, and media opportunities in a fraction of the time. The real opportunity is around the guest experience and deepening our relationship with them. With AI, we can have one-to-one conversations with guests, at scale. 

AI is also enriching my employees’ experience. 

What’s exciting about generative AI, as well as agents, is the ability to unleash imagination. I think marketing really starts to become a creative powerhouse limited only by our ability to dream.   

My team has started down this path, and we’re seeing a fundamental shift in our capabilities. Platforms like Microsoft Copilot Studio, which help us build AI-powered agents, are allowing us to think bigger, different, more expansively than before. What was once out of reach is now something we can pull a daily report about. 

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