Responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have accelerated the adoption of digital technologies by several years, according to a McKinsey & Company study. Yet, many of these changes are not temporary; they are here for the long haul.
Digital innovation, whether or not driven by the pandemic, has brought AI to the heart of many business operations. As the Harvard Business Review reports: "AI and analytics are boosting productivity, delivering new products and services, accentuating corporate values, addressing supply chain issues, and fuelling new start-ups."
The once-unfashionable contact centre has found itself at the forefront of AI adoption. As the home of an immense and growing store of customer data, the Customer Experience (CX) function holds the key to success in many business-wide strategic AI initiatives. However, there are also more tactical, low-hanging-fruit opportunities that contact centres can grasp to improve CX in practical ways.
To uncover how contact centres now harness AI to achieve better CX outcomes, consider the following five trends.
1. IVR Transitions into Voicebots
Traditional Interactive Voice Response (IVR) services form a significant pain point in the customer journey. Too many options, confusing choices, and frustrating dead-ends are familiar issues for consumers.
In recent years, many contact centres have made a concerted effort to improve IVR experiences, with AI paving the way. Thanks to advances in AI-powered Natural Language Processing (NLP) and natural language understanding (NLU), some contact centres have enabled customers to navigate the IVR menu using their voice alone. Such innovation makes for a much smoother experience and reduces customer effort, especially for those interacting through a smart speaker.
However, many operations are starting to push the boat out further. As Martin Taylor, Deputy CEO and Co-Founder of Content Guru, says:
“What makes IVR truly intelligent is an ability to identify the intent of a query and provide a resolution there and then”
From this concept, the voicebot was born. Evolving from complex, nested menu systems, contact centres can now resolve customer queries within the voicebot. If an issue is too tricky, the bot can still understand customer intent - from just a couple of words or a whole sentence - and seamlessly route the enquiry through to the most appropriate human agent.
2. Robotic Process Automation Reduces Routine Tasks
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is making its mark across the customer engagement sector by simplifying manual, routine tasks for agents and customers. As a result, both parties enjoy much more effortless experiences.
Consider the voicebot, but further along the chain of interaction. Once customer identification and intent have been verified, RPA triggers a workflow with the organisation’s IT systems that enables the customer to resolve their issues without assistance. As such, the contact centre caters for the modern, autonomous consumer.
However, RPA application goes further than facilitating the automation of simple, transactional processes. It also mechanises particular elements within the resolution process of more complex queries.
Take the voicebot once again. As soon as it captures the contact reason, it not only transfers the customer to the agent picking up their call, streamlining the start of the conversation, but it can also automate the ticket tagging process within one or more downstream systems.
Aside from this application, there are many more examples of RPA bringing value to the contact centre. For instance, the technology often features in the agent desktop, automating processes such as launching applications, updating systems, and following up action items.
3. AI Enhances Stalwart Contact Centre Systems
Through RPA, speech analytics, and other AI-enabled technologies, many traditional contact centre solutions are evolving at an unprecedented pace.
Consider how natural language processing (NLP) – an AI tool that transcribes and assesses customer conversations to draw contextual meaning – has advanced the agent screen-pop. In doing so, the technology scours through previous interactions before neatly presenting critical insights to the agent, at the same time as a customer contact is delivered. Such insights go beyond basic customer information and enable agents to offer faster, more personalised service experiences.