Customer interactions are shifting dramatically, with text-based engagements steadily overtaking traditional voice-based interactions, with a growing preference for self-service options. For business decision-makers, technology leaders, and customer service heads, there is an undeniable and growing customer preference for self-service options, and your organisation must be ready to accommodate this shift.
Currently, many companies are at different stages of readiness; some are running WhatsApp in a personal capacity from mobile devices, while others are using the WhatsApp Business App on infrastructure that remains entirely separate from the rest of their communications. This siloed approach makes seamless conversations impossible and frustrates the end customer. To meet the demand for integrated, modern customer service, we are delighted to introduce our Telviva Digital Agent, called Viva – a powerful tool designed to transform customer interactions and drive meaningful business outcomes.
Historically, we have used chatbots, but most of these are essentially glorified decision trees. They are designed to follow a rigid script and present standard menu options to the user. If a customer asks something outside of that pre-defined script, the chatbot breaks, which can be immensely frustrating for the user. Viva takes this process a significant step further by making those customer interactions intelligent and autonomous. The most critical difference between legacy systems and modern AI-driven interactions comes down to the final outcome: a chatbot routes, but a digital agent resolves.
For businesses deploying our more advanced CRM and ERP-integrated agents, the return on investment comes through a measurable reduction in average handle time, a reduction in the volume of queries requiring a human agent, and an improvement in first-contact resolution. In our own implementations, we have seen that 40% or more of inbound contact centre volume can be successfully resolved by an AI agent without any human intervention.
The transformation journey from a “voice-only” contact centre to “digital first” CX has seen a 65% reduction in call volumes to Intercape’s contact centre, while the introduction of the digital assistant and self-service options has seen WhatsApp interactions decline by 44% since its launch. Read the full case study for more.
What makes Viva different?
Unlike basic chatbots, Viva is an AI-powered software embedded within Telviva’s cloud communications platform that autonomously handles customer interactions by understanding intent, drawing on knowledge sources, and responding intelligently without requiring a human agent to intervene. It uses large language model (LLM) technology to understand the intent behind what someone is asking in plain, natural language – the way a person would actually speak or type it.
Viva can integrate with your company’s website, FAQ documents, CRM knowledge base, and even your ERP system. For example, a customer can call in and ask about their account balance; the agent will look it up in your live system and provide an answer that is accurate, current, and personalised to that specific customer – in seconds.
While global players have built impressive AI infrastructure for global markets, Viva was built for the specific needs of South African businesses. This includes deep integration with the tools local businesses actually use, SA-hosted data, and support from a team that deeply understands the local landscape.
What are some of the considerations for organisations wanting to adopt automation? Learn more in this video with David Meintjes.
The 4 Digital Agent options
We know that digital transformation is a journey, which is why we designed our Digital Agent solution to be available in four different tiers to create a clear progression. Businesses can start with what they need today and confidently evolve as they are ready:
- Starter – Digital Receptionist & CX Influencer (Voice Only): The Digital Agent answers inbound calls 24/7 in natural language, checks user presence, and routes callers to specific people or departments. This instantly alleviates high inbound volumes, allowing human receptionists to transition into CX influencers who oversee system quality and complex escalations.
- Business – Text and Knowledge Agent: The Digital Agent handles text-based traffic across WhatsApp and web chat, drawing accurate responses to queries directly from the company’s website and/or an uploaded FAQ document.
- Professional – CRM Knowledge Management Module (KMS) Agent: The Digital Agent plugs directly into a business’s existing CRM knowledge base as its primary source of truth, ensuring both the digital agent and human teams deliver identical, consistent answers.
- Enterprise – Live Integration Agent: The most advanced tier, enabling the Digital Agent to perform real-time queries in CRM or ERP systems to deliver live, personalised details such as account balances, order statuses, or contract dates.
Telviva’s solutions are structured to provide clear, measurable Return on Investment (ROI). The Starter Digital Receptionist is charged at a fixed fee per month and handles unlimited simultaneous calls 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, depending on the time conditions set up for business versus after-hours.
Accuracy and easy escalation
Technology leaders often worry about AI providing false information. We mitigate this through strict knowledge control. First, Viva’s knowledge base is controlled entirely by the business; if the information in the knowledge base is accurate, the agent’s answers will be accurate. The digital agent does not hallucinate answers because it simply retrieves and presents what is stored in a curated knowledge source.
Secondly, graceful escalation is a core design principle at Telviva, not an afterthought. We have all had the experience of being trapped in a loop where the agent doesn’t understand and keeps asking you to rephrase, leaving you more frustrated than if there had been no technology at all. Viva is deliberately designed to recognise when a query is outside their capability. At that point, it hands off to a human, and critically, it passes the full conversation context with it. The human agent sees what was discussed, what was asked, and what was answered, meaning the customer doesn’t have to start from scratch.
We also recommend that businesses begin with lower-risk interaction types (like FAQs and routing) before deploying agents for higher-stakes interactions like complex service decisions. The goal is never 100% AI resolution, as that would require compromising on quality. Instead, our goal is maximum appropriate resolution, handling everything Viva can handle well and intelligently escalating everything else.
Telviva evaluates digital agent performance by focusing on task success, context, and user experience through four core metrics:
- Intent Accuracy Rate: Tracks if the agent correctly understood the user’s intent and responded appropriately.
- Task Success Rate: Confirms that the interaction achieved a successful resolution via backend execution.
- Semantic Error Rate: Uses an independent “LLM-as-a-Judge” evaluator to assess response quality against user intent.
- Turn-Taking Latency: Measures response speed down to the millisecond to ensure smooth voice interactions.
Together, these metrics provide a comprehensive, real-world view of agent effectiveness.
Privacy and Compliance
For modern businesses, deploying AI agents that access personal information requires absolute confidence in the platform’s security. Compliance with privacy regulation is built into our product architecture, not bolted on at the end. Our infrastructure is hosted exclusively in South Africa, in Teraco data centres across Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Durban, meaning customer data doesn’t leave the country.
All personal information is fully anonymised before being sent to LLMs for processing. We have Data Processing Agreements available for all enterprise deployments, and our teams are trained on privacy obligations. For businesses in the financial services, healthcare, or legal sectors where the stakes are highest, we also offer private cloud deployment options with enhanced data isolation.
Telviva’s journey over the past 20 years has had a consistent thread: enabling better quality conversations. We started with reliable, high-quality cloud telephony, expanded into unified communications, and deepened our CRM integrations so that communications and customer data work as one. The launch of Viva is the natural next chapter as we evolve as a communications company that uses automation to deliver better outcomes for our customers.
Are you ready to transform your customer experience, reduce handle times, and empower your human teams? Chat with us today to discover which Digital Agent tier is right for your business.
By David Meintjes, CEO at Telviva.