You have just started work and your calendar looks packed for the rest of the day. There are several tickets in the queue and you start resolving them one-by-one. A frustrated customer reports an issue. You help the customer out and update the status of the ticket to “resolved”. Job well done.
Machine learning in customer service is used to provide a higher level of convenience for customers and efficiency for support agents. Support-focused tools enabled with machine learning are growing in popularity thanks to their increasing ease-of-use and successful applications across a variety of industries. Gartner predicts that by 2021, 15 percent of customer service interactions will be handled completely by artificial intelligence.
Providing good customer service is an art. Typically, someone calling into a customer support department is already angry and frustrated with the services your company offers, and it is the job of a skilled customer support agent to diffuse that issue and help that customer leave satisfied and smiling. Blindly fumbling about or taking a one size fits all strategy toward the happiness of your customers is a perfect recipe for failure.
Gone are the days when artificial intelligence (AI) was a mere buzzword. Today, AI is transforming our lifestyle. AI enables machines to perform a myriad of tasks with minimal human interference. Whether in sales, marketing, or customer service, AI has revamped business processes. According to a recent Gartner report1, 55% of established companies have started making investments in AI or have prioritized it for their immediate plan of action.
All our activities, online and offline, leave an almost imperceptible electronic trail. Traffic cameras “see” you cross a junction around the same time each weekday, your phone lets your favorite coffee shop know when and how long you visit through their “free” Wi-Fi. The data collected by these devices or from our interactions with others tend to end up in a data archive somewhere, unused and unanalyzed.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has amazing potential to drive customer loyalty. Customer loyalty is a huge priority for most businesses. It’s one of the key facets of customer retention, as it reduces customer churn. Reducing churn is desirable since it typically costs four times more to gain a new customer than to keep hold of an existing customer. You also have a 70% probability of making a sale to an existing customer, versus 20% to a new customer.
Customers expect a personalized experience from your company. And when they don’t receive it, roughly 71% of customers1 will express frustration with your business. So how do you create personalized offers that wow your customers and lead to improved customer loyalty and greater sales? By tapping into powerful customer service analytics. Advanced analytics allow you to gather more valuable customer information.
Advancements in automation and artificial intelligence (AI) have revolutionized the business sector. Automation allows for concise, timely, and accurate service, which is in demand from a society accustomed to instant gratification. The predictive power of artificial intelligence allows businesses to improve upon their service. The end result is a fast, reliable, and effective customer service department, powered by AI and backed up by human agents.
An omnichannel approach to customer support requires a dedicated strategy—will you designate agents to focus on single channels or will they multitask? Are there channels that you want to guide customers towards? How do you properly staff agents on these channels throughout day, month, or year to keep up with customer requests?
The myths around AI have been nothing if not sticky. Fifty years after Hal 9000 made moviegoers very afraid, consumers continue to believe both that robots will replace humans — and also that AI is a thing of the future. The reality? Neither is true.
