AI will help customers to self-serve, eventually eliminating the need for humans in customer service, and allowing Customer Service Reps to work more productively on more complex problems or emotional interactions.
agents will still be needed for more complex cases; AI will help them find the best way to navigate knowledge and more accurate information.
AI-powered chatbots
Customer service bots are the heroes that step in and save the day – or at least the customer and their time. Because they can eliminate manual work through automation, and handle quick-turn, high-volume requests to help customers preemptively, they cut out tedious processes for agents and can free them up to tackle more nuanced support issues.
They also boost customer support by feeding queries to the correct agent in real time, with the agent understanding upfront what he or she is expected to accomplish on behalf of the customer.
By talking with the customer, an AI system could provide the necessary support to figure out the problem, talking them through the troubleshooting steps and even flagging when it was best for the customer to be passed on to an agent, which would also improve resolution times and the customer experience.
AI-generated content
Natural language processing means that AI bots are increasingly capable of interpreting queries made by customers in their own words. They can also provide increasingly good responses that are personalised to the user and their needs. This helps to reduce the incidence of errors or misunderstandings, along with increasing customer loyalty and satisfaction.
Importantly, AI is often paraphrased text that creates another big benefit: it works around the clock for customers, reducing wait times and increasing efficiencies so that employees can concentrate on harder problems.
Artificial Intelligence can analyse company data to identify similarities among customer support queries to create knowledge articles that agents (or the customer themselves) can look at or that will appear themselves for access to self-service answers. It will improve efficiency and reduce customer support team costs.
AI-powered self-service
AI-powered self-service tools such as chatbots and knowledge portals can help customers get quick, relevant answers to their questions, increasing customer satisfaction, retention and loyalty for brands, just as they bring efficiency and scalability for contact centres.
For example, AI in customer service can automate many mundane and time-consuming or error-prone manual processes (eg, first drafts of knowledge base articles drafted automatically based on interactions and CRM data collected).
Zendesk automation similarly can ensure that the right agent gets placed for each ticket in terms of skillset and availability, averting escalation. The 3D development platform Unity used this approach to prevent more than 8,000 customer inquiries per year, while saving via automation more than $1.3 Million.
AI-powered virtual assistants
In conclusion, AI virtual assistants are useful for businesses not only in delivering fast and precise response to customer’s inquires and giving them a personalised supporting experience at the same time, but also in automating multiple business activities that can help facilitate the workflow of some staff and conduct specific customer feedbacks or advices so as to improve maidstream products and services.
Similarly, calls from customers reporting gas leaks can be routed to a human agent quickly by having an AI virtual assistant look up an emergency procedure. This speeds up both contact centre agents and increases customer experience.
Gen AI ensures multilingual service and employs natural language understanding to translate each customer’s language. In addition, voice-based technology identifies the speaker’s emotion and uses additional cues from context to offer more meaningful support – a step that consumers appreciate when companies offer service round the clock and respond instantly. This leads to higher customer satisfaction and brand love.
AI-powered augmented reality
Lastly, AR will become a significant customer support tool in the near future, as real-time augmented reality software can provide interactive and fun experience to customers directly on their phone. Nowadays, customers can see digital informations on their product or service by using AR, which guides them to discover while following troubleshooting procedures step by step to make sure they have fun and it helps to reduce the customer’s frustration and provide a better customer experience.
Second, AI can help agents by automatically deflecting low-priority issues and offering self-service options for high-priority inquiries, resulting in more time on important, high-value cases – the ones that impact customer satisfaction.
However, while AI provides opportunities for enhancing customer service, it’s not a magic wand. Companies face potential pitfalls, regarding both the technical feasibility of using AI, the difficulty of integrating AI products into their operations, and concerns about privacy. The best way forward is to focus on personalisation, take advantage of existing integrations and infrastructure, and ensure backward compatibility and interoperability with those systems, while upholding strict regulatory protection of data regarding customers, and being transparent with those customers about which AI an organisation uses.
